Chapter Ninety Nine

'Jasmine, we can have other children,' he pressed, as though that was the ultimate persuasion.

She instantly recoiled from it—mentally, emotionally and physically— her stomach cramping over the empty space that had been left by the miscarriage. This wasn't right. His mind was somehow stuck on their lost child. This proposal could be nothing more than an aberrational moment that would be regretted within hours or days.

'No...' She had to choke the word out. Her throat had tightened up. Her chest, too. She shook her head vehemently to get the message across.

'You wanted a baby,' he argued. 'You wanted me to be the father. So let's do it properly. Get married. Set up a home...'

'Stop! Please... stop!' she said. Her mind was spinning. He was offering the biggest temptation of all. Her heart was thumping a wild yes to it, not caring why it was being offered, responding instinctively to the things she'd yearned to hear—married to Collins Templeton , having a family...

He frowned at her resistance, 'I swear I'll look after you. I always live up to my commitments, Jasmine.' he sounded almost desperate.

Yes, he did, but commitments sounded so cold. Where was the passion for her, the love she craved?

'Once I give my word...' he went on.

Like a contract, not the love of a lifetime. He wasn't talking of love. Her need to hear more from him burst into speech.

‘Your word is not enough,' she cried, desperate to reach into the heart of the man.

'Why not?' he challenged fiercely. 'What more do you want'?'

'I want...' Was she mad to push for more? But how could she bear to be his wife if she was just one of many women he found desirable? It made her too vulnerable. If she plunged into this marriage and then found...no...no.... Words spilled out, begging for the right response from him.

'I want the man I marry to love me.' she blurted out.

'Love...' he repeated.

He shook his head as though it was some irrelevant concept, a vexatious sidetrack to be quickly bypassed. Only the end goal mattered and he had that in his sights.

'Of course you're very special to me,' he declared impatiently. 'Do you think I'd ask any woman to marry me?'

'How special, Collins?' she challenged, needing to nail it down. 'So special you don't want to spend your life without me? No other woman will do?'

'Yes. Thai's it. That's precisely it.' It sounded too glib, like he was quickly feeding back what she wanted to hear, no pause to express something more deeply personal to him in his own words. And she remembered the sting of neglect, the flame of jealousy. Accusing words tumbled out of the torment of loving a man who could not possibly love her.

'Then how come you had another woman on your arm at the Golden Globes night, very soon after you'd been with me three months ago? And a different woman again at the BAFTA Awards night, just beforeyou called me to join you for the Academy Awards. I saw shots of you on news programs...'

'Those women were simply...handy,' he said with a grimace, disliking being put on that highly ambivalent spot.

It didn't soothe the hurt of all the silence from him, the hurt that he found other women attractive enough to share important occasions in his life with them, not her.

And only two days ago had come the warning that this third occasion together was only another one-off—a longer time but to be ended in the same way, no promise of more. It didn't add up to love in Jasmine's mind. It didn't even add up to extra special.

The only difference was he knew she'd fallen pregnant to him and she'd lost the child that might have been. His child. Their child.

Obviously the whole thing had become very personal to him, linking this proposal to having other children, but it was the wrong time, thewrong place, the wrong sentiment.

It didn't fill her soul with joy.

She needed her love to be returned, not used.

Her baby would have loved her back.

But Collins...the hand of harsh reality squeezed her heart, forcing out the temptation it had nursed. She couldn't accept his proposal. Being married to him would be a hell of uncertainty and fear. That was the truth of it and as much as she might want to overlook it, how could she?

She looked at him with all the emptiness she felt and laid her position on the line. 'I don't want to be a handy wife, Collins. I need my husband to think of me as irreplaceable. The one woman he wants above all others. I don't believe you can honestly say that, so please...let me go now.'

‘Jasmine...' His hands gripped more tightly.

'No.' It took every scrap of her will to fight the blazing determination in his eyes. 'You'll think better of this tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the next.' She gave him a savagely ironic smile. 'This, too, will pass.'

A battle light gleamed. 'And if it doesn't?' he asked.

That was his problem. She was sure he'd find some handy solution to it.

'I'm going home,' she threw at him, unable to take any more argument with her heart and soul aching so badly. She wrenched her hand from his and held it up to ward off any further attempt to delay her.

'Goodbye, Collins. Thank you for seeing me off.' She left him without a backward glance, desperately certain in her own mind she was right to go. She was through with making rash decisions where Collins Templeton was concerned. If he'd truly cared for her. he would have shown it by considering her feelings, asking her what she wanted.

A quickie marriage in Las Vegas.

On his terms.

That was what he'd offered.

Where was there any love for her in that? No family wedding like Favour and Leonard's. A shoddy affair, telling her she wasn't worth much time to him. Just a convenience. And a baby machine.