LITMIR.BIZ

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desk to the elevator. Civilized.

      But as soon as the door closed behind them, they were in each other’s arms. He pushed her against the wall, kissing her hungrily, desperately.

      She breathed against his skin, “I still can’t believe you’re doing this.”

      “Kissing you?”

      “Giving five billion dollars away. Why did you do it?”

      “Don’t you know?” he growled, his lips against hers. “Can’t you guess?”

      Panting, she shook her head. “You hate my father...”

      Darius’s lip curled as he drew back. “I didn’t do it for him.”

      “For your friends?”

      “Those aren’t my friends.”

      “For the other victims, then. All those hardworking people with pensions. Firemen. Nurses...”

      “I’m not that noble.”

      The elevator door opened. The floor-to-ceiling windows flooded the penthouse with moonlight. Taking her hand, he led her inside. He could hear the tap of her stiletto heels against the marble.

      She stopped, staring up at him.

      “Then why?” she whispered.

      “I couldn’t stand to see you treated badly,” Darius said huskily, “when all you’ve done is give your love and loyalty to someone who doesn’t deserve it.”

      She bit her lip. “I know my father isn’t perfect—”

      “Perfect?” His jaw tightened. “He’s a criminal—” He cut himself off, then said, “You’re under my protection now.”

      She looked troubled. “Your protection—or your rule?”

      “It is the same. I protect what is mine.”

      “Our baby.”

      His eyes met hers. “And you.”

      Letty stared at him, her eyes wide, as if she had no idea how to react. As if she had forgotten what it was like to have anyone properly look after her.

      He wondered how long it had been since anyone had tried to take care of her, rather than the other way around. He suspected Letty always sacrificed herself to take care of others—especially that father of hers—while her own heart bled.

      “But I’m not yours,” she said quietly. “Not truly. We got pregnant by accident. I didn’t think you were serious about marriage.”

      “I am.”

      “That commitment is serious, Darius. It means...forever.”

      “I know,” he said.

      She swallowed, searching his gaze. “I was sure after tonight you’d never want to see me again.”

      Taking her hand, he lifted it slowly to his lips. She seemed to hold her breath, watching as he kissed the back of her hand, breathing against her skin. Straightening, he held her hand tightly in his own. “I want to see you tomorrow, and every other tomorrow for the rest of our lives.”

      “Darius...”

      “You will marry me, Letty,” he said in a low voice. “You know it, and I know it. In your heart, you were always meant to be mine.”

      * * *

      Marry him? For real?

      How could she?

      Even if Darius no longer hated her, he certainly didn’t love her. And she was starting to fear she could love him again. Perhaps all too easily.

      What hope could they have of happiness?

      He’d never love her back. All he wished to do was possess her. He offered sex and money, and in return, he’d expect sex and total devotion. For her, those things went together. He wouldn’t have just her body, but her soul.

      So why was she still so tempted?

      She shivered, caught between fear and desire.

      “Are you cold?” he asked huskily, his eyes dark.

      “No, I... I...” Hugging her baby bump, she gasped, “I need some fresh air.”

      He smiled. “Come with me.”

      Still holding her hand, he led her through the moon-bathed penthouse, and she thought dimly how she was getting in the habit of following where he led. But with his hand enveloping hers so protectively, she didn’t want to do anything else.

      She still couldn’t believe what he’d done, announcing their engagement, defending her in front of all those people—and then telling the world he intended to pay billions of dollars of his own money to repay what her father had stolen.

      She’d been dazed. Then she’d danced with him, the same routine he’d helped her learn so long ago, and she’d been back in that spring meadow, practicing the waltz not for the pimply-faced Harvard boy, who was the nephew of her father’s lawyer, but for Darius, always for him, only for him. As they’d danced in the ballroom, she’d felt time melt away.

      Darius was right. She was his. From the very beginning, Darius Kyrillos had been the only man she’d ever wanted. The only man she’d ever loved.

      I don’t love him anymore, she told herself desperately. She wouldn’t let him buy her!

      Darius led her up an elaborate staircase, then pushed open a glass door that led out onto a private rooftop garden.

      Letty gasped at the beauty of the ivy-covered pergola decorated with fairy lights near a lit lap pool gleaming bright blue in the warm September night.

      Above them, distant stars sparkled like diamonds across a dark velvety sky. Past the glass walls of the terrace, the night skyline of Manhattan glittered.

      She kept her distance from the edge, afraid to go too close. But Darius went right to it. He leaned against the short glass wall, totally unfazed and unafraid of plummeting seventy floors to his death. He looked out at the city.

      Letty crept closer, her heart pounding. “This terrace is amazing.”

      “All the flowers remind me of home,” he said simply. She wondered if he meant Greece or Fairholme, but didn’t have the nerve to ask. She slowly turned her head, marveling at the lavish beauty of a rooftop garden that treated all of Manhattan as nothing but a backdrop.

      “You’re king of the mountain now,” she said softly. “Looking down on a valley of skyscrapers.”

      Turning to her, he came forward. Then he abruptly fell to one knee in front of her astonished eyes.

      Reaching into his tuxedo jacket pocket, he pulled out a small black velvet box.

      “Rule it with me, Letty,” he said quietly. “As my wife.”

      Shivering, she put her hand on her heart. “I already said...”

      “You said yes when you thought I’d back out. This is a real proposal. I expect a real answer.” He held up the black velvet box. “Letty Spencer, will you do me the honor of marrying me?”

      He opened the lid. Inside the black velvet box was an enormous pear-shaped diamond set in platinum. It was the hugest, most outrageous ring she’d ever seen.

      But that wasn’t what made her lose her breath.

      It was Darius’s face. His dark, yearning eyes. As he looked at her in the moonlight, she saw the man who’d just bruised her with the intensity of his kisses. Who’d just defied all of Manhattan and paid five billion dollars for her. The man whose child she carried.

      In his eyes, she saw the shadow of the younger man she’d once loved, strong and kind, with such a good heart. The one who’d loved her so fervently. They were the same.

      Letty’s

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