The Bride Thief (11 page)

She was the most loving woman he’d ever met. Honest. Sweet. Kind. Brave. She was the kind of woman who could make any man—even him—become decent and true, just by the effect of her presence. He loved her.

His body straightened, his eyes opened, wide with shock.

He was in love with her.

Xerxes, a man who had nothing in this world but money and power—nothing of value—had fallen in love with a woman who made everything glorious and new. The most precious, adorable, passionate woman in the world.

He wasn’t remotely worthy of her. And yet he ached to be. He ached to take her in his arms, to tell her he loved her, to make her his wife and treasure her forever. Eagerly, he grabbed the door handle.

Then he froze.

He loved her.
But he’d made a promise to trade her. A promise that would save a nineteen-year-old girl’s life.

He’d made a promise. He had no choice.

But Rose did.

Going back to the window, he swung the lead-paned glass open and took a deep breath of the cold night air.

For once in his life, he would give himself up to someone else’s control. To Rose’s. The truth was, he admitted quietly to himself, the power had always been hers.

He stared at the moonlight frosting the black ocean waves. From the moment they’d met, he’d thought he’d been the one in control. He’d been her captor; she’d been his prisoner. But she had always been the more powerful one, though neither of them had realized it. And tomorrow, she would decide his fate.

Reaching for his phone, he dialed. The first number was to his lawyer in San Francisco. The second was a hated number he knew by heart.

“Växborg,” he said, “I’m ready to trade.”

Chapter Fourteen

T
HE
next morning, gray rain streaked the windows on the drive north to San Francisco.

Rose wore a black dress and black raincoat, appropriate for either a death in the family or for any woman being traded away like a used car. She glanced for the tenth time at Xerxes sitting beside her in the backseat of the black SUV. He continued to ignore her.

Her family had offered to give them a ride to the airport, but he’d refused, and a half hour later, a black SUV and a full-sized van had roared in front of the old rambling house. Six bodyguards in dark suits had poured out as a uniformed chauffeur opened the door for Xerxes. Her parents’ jaws had dropped. So much for
regular folk
!

Today,
Rose thought, giving him another nervous side glance. Today, she would tell him she loved him. But not now. No, not yet. Biting her lip, she gripped her hands together, staring down at her lap. The plane ride to Las Vegas would last two hours. There was no need to blurt out her personal feelings in earshot of the chauffeur and bodyguard in the front seat!

Especially since she was already so scared…

She looked out at the passing scenery and gave a sudden start. Leaning forward, she touched the chauffeur’s shoulder timidly. “Excuse me, but you’ve made a mistake. We’re not even close to the city!”

“He hasn’t made a mistake,” Xerxes said.

She sat back in her seat. “He hasn’t?”

“We’re not going to the airport.”

“We’re not?”

He turned to look at her. His eyes were dark. “Do you remember I told you about the medical clinic an hour east of San Francisco? The best brain trauma clinic in the country?”

She stared at him. “We’re going to the clinic? Not Las Vegas?”

He nodded.

“You got Laetitia back!” she whispered.

He looked away. “Yes.”

Staring at him, a slow feeling of joy rose inside her as she realized what it had to mean.

Xerxes wasn’t going to trade her after all.
He’d realized he cared about Rose more than his iron-clad promises. He must have gone back on his vow never to pay off Lars, and offered the man a fortune in trade for Laetitia instead of Rose. It was the only solution that made sense!

Xerxes had chosen Rose.
He’d decided she was more important to him than his promise!

But as she looked at him, the smile slid from her face. Was that why Xerxes didn’t look particularly happy? Because for the first time in his life, he’d broken his word?

The SUV passed a thicket of juniper trees and drove past a gate into the parking lot of a small modern hospital. The building was blocky and sterile, but even in the cold rain of late February, Rose had never seen anything so beautiful.

Xerxes had chosen her. Over his promises. Over honor. It was all she could do not to wrap her arms around herself and sing a happy song. And suddenly, she was so filled with love for him that she no longer cared who heard her.

As the car stopped in front of the hospital, she turned to Xerxes in the backseat.

“I love you,” she blurted out.

His black eyes widened. She heard his intake of breath. “Rose—”

She covered his mouth with her hand. “If I don’t tell you now, I might never have the courage. I love you, Xerxes. I love you and I’ll never forget that today you chose me over…”

Her voice trailed off as she saw a red Ferrari roar past their SUV, followed by a van. The vehicles parked in front of them on the curb. A man got out of the Ferrari, and Rose’s eyes widened. Her hand fell numbly into her lap.

“Lars?” Shocked, she turned to Xerxes, her eyes begging for an explanation she could bear. “What is Lars doing here?”

The driver and chauffeur got out of the SUV, closing the doors solidly behind them, and they were alone. Xerxes’s face was almost expressionless as he faced her.

“He’s here for the trade.”

Rose stared at him. “The…trade?”

She turned back to see Lars open the back doors of the van parked in front of them. Inside, Rose saw a slender, dark-haired woman sleeping on a stretcher. Lars glared at Xerxes, jabbing his thumb toward the unconscious woman, then waited with a sour expression, his hands on his hips.

Then he saw Rose and gave her a sickeningly sweet smile.

Twisting her head away, Rose closed her eyes with a whimper. “You can’t trade me. You can’t.”

“I have no choice.”

His cold words went through her soul like a blow.

She’d been a fool to think he’d changed, or that he cared about her. His honor meant more to him than Rose ever could. Her heart fell to her shoes with a dull thud. Blinking fast, she said, “There must be some other way—”

“There is not,” he said. “I’ve tried. Tried and failed. Everywhere I looked for her, I arrived too late. I have no choice but to trade.” His dark eyes glittered as he looked up at her. “But what happens next is up to you.”

She stared at him in sudden shock.

“Those weren’t business trips at all, were they?” she breathed. “The honeymoon cottage in the Maldives. Our villa in Cabo. I thought they were romantic trips we took for your work, but the whole time you were searching for Laetitia behind my back!”

He gave a single jerky nod.

Tears flooded her eyes. “You’re no better than Lars,” she whispered. “Romancing one woman while committed to another.”

“That’s not how it was!”

She saw dark pain in Xerxes’s eyes, but she was too hurt to hold back any longer. “Who is Laetitia to you, Xerxes?” she said. “Why do you love her?
Who is she to you?
”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Because you made a promise.”

“Yes.”

“And my feelings mean nothing.”

“That’s not true.” He took a deep breath. “But I must fulfill my obligation.”

“So that’s all I am to you? An obligation?”

“Rose, no,” he said. “I…” He looked at her. “I…care for you. Very much.”

“You
care
for me,” she said bitterly. “Thank you. I’ve just told you I’m in
love
with you!”

He blinked slowly, then pushed an envelope into her numb hands. “I’m giving you the choice,” he said. “I’ve held you captive, seduced you. Now you have the power. I’m setting you free to decide.”

“By trading me?” Tears were brimming over her lashes as she crumpled the envelope in her fist. She could not let herself cry in front of him, could not! “By discarding me, pushing me into another man’s arms?”

“No!” he said fiercely. He put his larger hand over hers. “I know you’ll never love him again. But…
it must be your choice.
”

The icy reality slowly sank into Rose’s heart. Xerxes was really letting her go. He was trading her for the woman he truly loved. And he wouldn’t even offer Rose the small comfort of an explanation!

Agony and fury ripped her heart into shreds. She wrenched her hand from his grasp.

“You love promises so much? All right. Here’s one for you.” She lifted her chin, her eyes wet with unshed tears. “Never come looking for me, Xerxes. I never want to see you again!”

He sucked in his breath. “You don’t mean that.”

“Yes, I do. I’ll go through with this—this
trade.
” Her lip twisted. “But I want your word I’ll never see you again.”

“No!” He put his hands on her shoulders, searching her eyes with his own. “Don’t you understand?” he said in a low voice. “If I make you a promise, I cannot break it.”

“I understand that. Better than anyone.” She shook his hands off her shoulders and spoke in an icy voice that revealed nothing of her heartbreak. “That’s why I want to hear you speak the words.”

“I don’t want to do it!”

“As you said,” she gave him a hard, cold stare, “it’s not your choice.”

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes.

“Fine.” The words were low, as if ripped from his soul. “If that is truly what you wish. I will not come after you. I will not try to see you again.”

“Promise!”

“I give you my word.” He swallowed. When he opened his eyes, their dark, fathomless pain registered dimly through her numb heart. “But in return,” he choked out, “you must promise me you will read that letter.”

“Fine.” She wrenched away from him, pushing open the car door before he could see her cry.

He’d actually done it.
He’d made the promise. Some part of her had hoped, at the last moment, that he would refuse to make it, that he would tell her he loved her and only her.

Her mistake.

Stumbling out of the SUV, she tripped toward the curb, where Lars was waiting for her beside his gleaming sports car. He looked down at her, beaming.

“Darling,” the baron cried. “At last, you are back with me.”

“I will be a better man from now on. Everything is going to be different now, petal. I swear to you. I will do whatever you say, anything to make you happy, anything at all…”

Rose stared out wearily at the passing scenery as they approached the eastern edge of San Francisco. For the last hour, Lars had been prattling on about forgiveness and love. She didn’t think he knew what the hell he was talking about.

But then, neither did she, Rose thought bitterly. She thought of the stark, anguished look on Xerxes’s face when he’d said, “I will not try to see you again,” and it was all she could do to keep from crying.

So maybe she did finally know what love was after all.
Pain.

She blinked quickly, staring out at the rain as they zoomed west on the highway.

“I was so selfish to insist on having our wedding in Sweden. I should have realized how important it was to you to be married in your own hometown. I swear to you, petal, this time we’ll do it differently…”

“Just take me home,” she whispered.

“Absolutely,” Lars said, clearly thrilled to get any response from her. “Straight home to your mother. Then we’ll have the wedding you always wanted. As soon as possible. Is tomorrow too soon?”

That statement was so shocking that she turned to gape at him. “You can’t honestly think I’m going to marry you?”

He switched lanes in his Ferrari, weaving through traffic on the rainy, slippery highway. “I know this whole experience has been very upsetting for you, petal, forced to endure the captivity of that depraved beast…”

Depraved beast?
She had a sudden memory of Xerxes’s haunted expression as Lars had driven by him in the Ferrari, with Rose beside him. Her eyes had met Xerxes’s in the endless gray rain. Then Lars had stomped on the gas pedal, and they’d left him behind.

Xerxes was lost to her now. Forever.

“But we must put that all unpleasantness behind us now,” Lars finished firmly.

With an intake of breath, she whirled back to face him.

“What was
unpleasant,
” she said coldly, “was the way you lured me into a fake wedding to try to get me into bed, while you were waiting for your real wife to die so you could steal her money.”

Silence fell in the Ferrari.

“I did that because I loved you. I needed money for you. To make you happy,” Lars said in a determinedly cheerful voice. “But petal, we must move on now with our lives.” He gave her a toothy grin. “Marry me tonight. Let me start making it up to you.”

She had a sudden memory of raspberries in champagne, bubble bath, inscrutable dark eyes filled with tenderness and fire.

“What are you doing?”

“Making it up to you,”
Xerxes had said.

Catching herself, she looked at the blond baron beside her. Lars clearly believed that with almost no effort, he could make her swoon back into his arms. How was it possible she’d ever been so blind as to believe herself in love with such a man?

“We’re not getting married,” she told him evenly. “Not tonight. Not ever.”

“But I did it all out of love for you,” he pleaded. “I divorced Laetitia, gave up her fortune. All I have now is this car and a castle that requires a fortune just to maintain. I gave up everything—for you!”

Her eyes narrowed. “And you think that makes me obligated to marry you? Because you allowed Xerxes to get her some decent medical care, when you were waiting eagerly for her to die of your neglect?”

He reached one hand from the steering wheel and tried to take her hand. “You’re just angry,” he pleaded. “After our wedding…”

“What will it take for you to ever actually listen to me?” she shouted. “I am not going to marry you. Ever! Pull off the highway. I’ll take a taxi home!”

He withdrew his hand. His face was grim as he pulled off the highway. But instead of stopping, he turned the car around to drive the opposite direction on the highway, now heading to the east.

“Do you really think I’ll let you go?” he said in a low voice. “I gave up Laetitia’s fortune. You owe me yours.”

“My fortune!” Rose choked out a laugh. “You mean the fifty dollars in my bank account? You can have it!”

“I mean the money Novros gave you,” he said coldly. “Millions of dollars and that old factory in the bargain.” He switched gears to go faster on the highway. “Once the building is demolished, the land might fetch a good price,” he mused. “Perhaps for a gated community of vacation homes.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Funny, isn’t it? Novros called me last night. He’d always said he’d never give me a penny. But this time, he offered instead to give money to you.
What happens next is up to Rose,
he said.” He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “Oh, did Novros not tell you? He’s just made you a very rich woman.”

Rose suddenly thought of the envelope he’d given her, still clenched in her hand. Her hands trembled as she started to open the envelope.

Lars ripped it out of her hands and tossed it out his window.

“Why did you do that?” she gasped.

“You don’t need it.”

“What?”

“Forget him, Rose.”

“Stop this car!”

“Novros is a nameless bastard. A nobody. He’s brainwashed you, turned you against me,” he said resentfully. “Just as he did that sister of his.”

Her mouth fell open. “Laetitia is his
sister
?”