She looked at him for the first time. ‘I beg your pardon?’
Hooded dark eyes rested intently on her. ‘You’ve been crying. Your nose is still pink.’
‘Thank you so much for telling me,’ she mumbled in a wobbly voice, suddenly feeling tearful again and ready to scream at the hormonal upheaval of pregnancy. Of course, that was what was the matter with her.
‘We’re going back to Winterwood,’ he informed her.
‘I’m going back to Hector’s house.’
‘I have the keys. I’m not giving them to you until you calm down.’
‘I am perfectly calm,’ Bella bit out furiously. ‘Give me those keys! I don’t know what I’m going to do when Hector comes out of hospital but that has to be a few weeks away and I’ll deal with it then!’
‘You’re not getting those keys.’
‘And you call me childish?’
But he didn’t answer her. Her throat was thick with clogged tears. Defensively she turned her head away again. In a sense this was all her own fault. Back at the apartment she had not been prepared to face Rico. She had not had time to work out what she needed to say to sound convincing.
In short, she had made a mess of telling him that their relationship was over—so great a mess that he thought that she was simply being pathetically immature and vindictive over that argument in spite of his apologies. He did not believe that she really wanted to break off their affair.
And, since the truth was that she didn’t, it really wasn’t that surprising that Rico should think that way. Walking away from the man she loved demanded a degree of detachment and acting ability which Bella now acknowledged she did not possess. It was going to take lies to convince Rico that she had meant what she said. Maybe she ought to tell him that she had realised yesterday that she still had feelings for Griff… or maybe she should just tell him the truth.
No, not yet, she decided tautly. That would be a truth more easily dealt with when they were no longer together.
As she headed for the stairs in the echoing hall at Winterwood Rico murmured, ‘I expect you to come down to dinner.’
Bella almost exploded. He had tied her up in knots with Hector, forced her to return to Winterwood and he was withholding the keys to Hector’s house. He had been treating her like a fractious toddler on the brink of a temper tantrum from the minute she’d walked out of Hector’s room!
She spun round. ‘Tough!’
‘It’ll be Haversham’s turn to laugh if I have to carry you downstairs,’ Rico warned her.
‘You wouldn’t dare.’ But she knew he would, knew she could push him so far and no further. Biting her tongue, green eyes blazing, Bella looked back at him, thwarted.
‘Don’t wear that figure-hugging black velvet dress,’ he murmured softly. ‘I don’t like it.’
‘I’ll wear whatever the hell I want!’
And from the minute Bella got out of the shower she knew it would be that dress which she put on. Only, the zip proved oddly reluctant to go up. When she finally got it up and turned to look in the mirror she realised why. Her breasts now foamed over the straining neckline like overripe fruits. She looked down at them in horror and attempted to squash them down again. It was a pointless exercise. Until that moment she really hadn’t appreciated just how much her shape had already changed.
Coming down the staircase in a relentlessly shapeless floral dress which had been a fashion accident, Bella found herself wondering why Rico had told her not to wear that black dress. He had only ever seen her in it twice and the second time, weeks ago, he had told her she looked stunning in it.
He was waiting for her in the drawing room. Tall, dark and spectacularly handsome, he surveyed her entrance. Her heart skipped a beat; her mouth went dry. In mute misery she swerved her attention off him again.
‘That dress looks like a maternity outfit,’ he drawled.
Bella flinched and spilt some of the sherry which Haversham always served her before dinner and which she had yet to drink. But, since the same thought about the dress had occurred to her, she thought nothing of the remark. She contrived a shrug and said, ‘It’s comfortable.’
‘Allow me to get you another drink,’ Rico said.
‘No, I’m not really—Oh, dinner!’ she exclaimed with relief, rising to her feet as Haversham appeared.
Since she was really hungry, she was on the second course before it crossed her mind that it was time to bite the bullet and convince Rico that their affair was over. So far the meal had been unusually silent. And that, now that she actually thought about it, was strange. Rico was not, as a rule, someone who quietly smouldered. Rico did not suffer in silence. Yet, in spite of emitting hostile vibrations into the steadily thickening atmosphere between them, he had barely opened his mouth.
‘Why are you so quiet?’
He sent her a glimmering smile which made her feel uncomfortable. ‘I wanted to see you eat a decent meal.’