Billionaire's Wife On Paper / Their Royal Wedding Bargain

Layla forgot to breathe. She was transfixed by the slow descent of his mouth towards hers, spellbound by the clean fresh scent of his warm breath, mesmerised by the magnetic force drawing her inexorably closer, closer, closer to his lips. It was as if she had been waiting her entire life for this to happen. She hadn’t been truly alive until now. She had been a formless ghost wandering through life until this moment when she had morphed into a live and vibrant female body with urgent needs and desires. Her heart sped up, her pulse leapt, her anticipation for the touchdown of his lips so acute it was almost unbearable.

Kiss me. Kiss me. Kiss me.

It was a silent chant keeping time with the pounding beat of her heart.

But suddenly Logan dropped his hold and stepped back, opening and closing his fingers as if to rid himself of the taint of touching her. ‘Forgive me. That wasn’t meant to happen.’ His tone was brusque, his expression masked.

Layla was so overcome with disappointment she couldn’t find her voice. She couldn’t bear to look at his face in case she saw his disgust for her written on his features. The cruel taunts of her teenage boyfriend echoed out of the past in her head.

‘You’re ugly. You’re a cripple. Who would ever want you?’

She looked down at her left hand where the ring was mockingly glinting, her stomach plummeting in despair. Such a beautiful ring for a girl who couldn’t even attract a man enough for him to kiss her. What a mockery that ring was. A glittering, glaring, gut-wrenching reminder of everything Layla was not and never could be.

‘It’s okay,’ she said at last, forcing herself to meet his gaze. ‘I understand completely.’

He sucked in a deep breath, sending his hand through his hair so roughly it left deep crooked finger trails. ‘I don’t think you do.’

Layla turned and got down to the business of serving their meal onto the plates where she had left them on the sideboard, next to the serving trolley. She placed the plates on the dining table and glanced his way. ‘I think I do understand, Logan. This engagement is nothing like your last. You loved Susannah.’ She released a painful breath. ‘You still love her. That’s why getting engaged to me makes you feel so uncomfortable, because you feel you’re betraying her memory.’

A muscle in his jaw flickered as if he was grinding down on his molars. ‘I don’t wish to discuss Susannah with you or anyone.’ His eyes were like closed windows. Curtains drawn. Shutters down.

Layla sat down at the table and spread her napkin over her lap. ‘I realise you’re still grieving. I’m sorry things have worked out the way they have—for her and for you. It was the saddest thing, especially since you’ve had so many other tragic losses in your life. But I think your grandfather was right in encouraging you to move on with your life.’

‘Oh, so you quite like the way he went about it, do you?’ His tone was as caustic as flesh-eating acid.

Layla pressed her lips together, fighting to control her see-sawing emotions. One second she was furious with him, the next she felt sad he couldn’t let go of the past. ‘Please sit down and have dinner. I’m getting a crick in my neck looking up at you.’

Logan strode over to the table and pulled out the chair and sat down, his knees bumping hers under the table. She shifted back a bit, trying to ignore the rush of heat that shot through her legs and straight to her core. Why couldn’t she be immune to him? Why was she so acutely aware of him?

They began eating in a stiff silence, only the clanging discordant music of cutlery scraping against crockery puncturing the air.

Layla drank her glass of champagne and Logan refilled her glass as if he were a robotic waiter, but she noticed he didn’t drink from his. His untouched champagne glass stood in front of his place setting, releasing bubble after bubble in a series of tiny vertical towers.

She picked up her glass with her left hand and the diamonds on the ring winked at her under the chandelier light coming from overhead. Something was niggling at the back of her brain… Why hadn’t Logan given Susannah his grandmother’s ring? Layla remembered Susannah’s engagement ring as being ultra-modern and flashy. It was a look-at-me ring that was not to Layla’s taste at all. ‘Logan?’

He looked up from the mechanical task of relaying food from his plate to his mouth. ‘What?’ His curt tone wasn’t exactly encouraging, neither was the heavy frown between his eyes.

Layla toyed with the ring on her left hand. ‘Why didn’t you give your grandmother’s ring to Susannah when you became engaged?’

Something passed through his gaze with camera shutter speed. ‘She didn’t like vintage jewellery.’ He put his cutlery down and shifted his water glass an infinitesimal distance. ‘I didn’t take it personally. I was happy to buy her what she wanted.’ He picked up his cutlery again and stabbed a piece of parsnip as if it had personally offended him.

Layla waited until he had finished his mouthful before asking, ‘How are her parents and siblings coping? Do you hear from them or contact them yourself?’

A shadow moved across his face like clouds scudding across a troubled autumn sky. ‘I used to call them or drop in on them in the early days but not lately. It only upset them to be reminded.’ He put his cutlery down in the finished position on his plate and rested his arms on the table, his frown a roadmap of lines.

Layla reached for his forearm and gave it a gentle squeeze. ‘I can only imagine how awful it must have been to have come home and found her…like that…’

He pulled his arm away and sat stiffly upright in his chair, his expression as blank as the white tablecloth. But after a long moment he relaxed his posture as if something tightly bound within him had loosened slightly. ‘When someone takes their own life it’s not like any other death.’ His gaze was haunted, his tone bleak. ‘The guilt, the what-ifs, the if-onlys, the what-could-I-have-done-to-prevent-this are unbearable.’ He expelled a heavy breath and continued, ‘I blame myself for not seeing the signs.’

‘You mustn’t blame yourself but I understand how you and most people do,’ Layla said. ‘But I read somewhere that sixteen percent of suicides are completely unheralded. It’s a snap in the moment decision borne out of some hidden anguish.’

Logan picked up his champagne and drained it in a couple of swallows, placing the glass back down with a savage little thump. ‘There were signs but I ignored them.’ He waited a beat or two before continuing in a ragged voice. ‘She had an eating disorder. Bulimia. I don’t know how I missed it.’ His mouth twisted in a grimace and his tone became tortured with self-loathing. ‘How can you live with someone for months and not know that about her?’

Layla reached for his hand but this time he didn’t pull away. ‘Shame makes people hide lots of stuff. Bulimia is mostly a secret disease and much harder to pick up on than anorexia, where the physical effect is so obvious.’

Logan looked down at their joined hands and turned his over to anchor hers to the table. He began to absently stroke the back of her hand with his thumb, the caress only light, lazy almost, but no less magical. Nerves she hadn’t known she possessed reacted as if touched by a live electrode, zinging, singing, tingling.

He lifted his gaze to hers and something toppled over in her stomach. His thumb stilled on the back of her hand but he didn’t release her. His gaze moved over her face as if he were memorising her features one by one. When he got to her mouth she couldn’t stop herself from sweeping the tip of her tongue across her lips—it was an impulse she had zero control over.

Logan gave her hand another quick squeeze in time with the on-off movement of his lips, in a blink-and-you’d-miss-it smile. A smile that didn’t reach high enough to take the shadows out of his eyes. But then he let go of her hand and sat back in his chair and picked up his water glass and drained it, placing it back down with a definitive thud.

‘Finish your dinner. We have a busy day tomorrow meeting with the lawyer to organise the legal paperwork. Rather than drive, I’ve taken the liberty of organising a flight from Inverness to Edinburgh.’ His business-like tone and abrupt change of subject was disquieting and left her with far too many questions unanswered.

‘Okay…’ Layla wanted to know more about his relationship with Susannah. She had idolised them as a couple, seeing them as a match made in heaven. Feeling jealous of the love they’d shared, hoping one day someone would love her in the same way. But finding out their relationship might not have been as open and wonderful as she had imagined made her understand why Logan was so reluctant to commit to anyone else.

But Layla had personal experience of the tricky question of how well could you know anyone, even someone you had lived with for years. Didn’t her childhood circumstances prove that? Her father had always been a difficult man; prone to angry outbursts, regular violence—especially when on drugs or drunk, but who would have thought he was capable of the crime he’d eventually committed—driving into a tree at full speed to kill the family he’d purported to love?

‘The legal stuff…’ She chewed her lip for a moment, desperate to get her mind off the accident that had killed her mother and changed her own life for ever. ‘You mean a pre-nup, right?’

‘Pre-nups are commonplace these days. Please don’t be offended by my desire for one. You have your own assets to consider—your cleaning business, for example.’

Layla gave a self-deprecating snort and picked up her champagne glass. ‘Yeah, right. My assets hardly compare to yours. You have offices all over the UK and Europe. My office is basically on my phone. I decided to give up my Edinburgh office after your grandfather died to come back and help Aunt Elsie. It seemed easier to work from here until everything is settled with the estate.’

‘I’m sorry you’ve been so inconvenienced,’ he said, looking at her with a concerned frown. ‘I had no idea you’d given up your office.’

She waved a dismissive hand. ‘I was glad to come home. Flossie was missing your grandfather and Aunt Elsie was finding it hard to do everything on her own.’

‘Your business is doing well, though, isn’t it? You’re running at a decent profit?’

Layla was not going to admit to him or to anyone how close to the wind she sailed at times with her business. Failure was not an option. A nightmare that haunted her, yes, but not an option. Failure would prove she was nothing but a product of her chaotic childhood—a child of addicts. Her parents had had no ambition beyond the goal of sourcing enough alcohol and drugs for their next binge.

Owning her own cleaning business gave Layla power and control, and God alone knew how little of that she’d had in her childhood. ‘I do okay.’ She put her glass back down again.

‘How okay?’ His gaze was as direct as a laser pointer.

Layla shifted in her seat and lowered her eyes to the remains of her meal on her plate. ‘It’s not always easy to get reliable workers. It takes time to build up trust, to know they’re always going to do the right thing by me and the people I get them to clean for.’ She met his gaze and continued. ‘They’re cleaning people’s homes where valuables and personal effects are not always under lock and key, and often the clients are not at home when my staff are there.’

A frown brought his ink-black eyebrows together. ‘Don’t you do background checks on them first?’

‘Some of the young people I employ wouldn’t pass a background check,’ Layla said. ‘They need someone to give them a break for once. To not always be expecting them to slip up or fail. I believe in showing trust first and teaching them some skills, hoping it triggers the desire in them to make better choices.’ The sort of choices she wished her parents had made.

‘Admirable of you, but you’re setting yourself up for guaranteed disappointment.’ His tone matched his cynical expression.

Layla hoisted her chin a fraction. ‘My vision for my business is not just about making a big profit. It’s about making a difference in people’s lives. Lives that others have judged and found wanting. But I know how powerful it can be when someone believes in you. Someone who sees something in you that no one else does. It’s…it’s transformative.’

His eyes moved over her face like a searchlight for a long moment and she had to fight not to shift her gaze.

‘Is that because of what happened in your childhood?’ His tone had lost its cynical edge. ‘My grandparents giving permission for you to come and live here with your great-aunt?’

‘It’s getting late.’ Layla pushed back her chair and rose from the table and began to gather the plates. Next he’d be asking her to spill all about her miserable childhood and that she was determined not to do. Thankfully, privacy laws had prevented the McLaughlins from hearing too many of the gory details about her early years—details Layla dearly wished she could forget. ‘I think I can hear Flossie asking to be let out.’

Logan placed a hand over her forearm as she reached for his plate. ‘I don’t want you to wait on me, Layla. I want you to talk to me. There’s a lot we don’t know about each other, and we need to know it if we’re going to make our relationship appear genuine.’

She glanced at his hand on her arm and gave him a pointed look. ‘Do you mind?’

He released her hand, his tone and expression softening. ‘I don’t know all the details but I know your background was difficult. It must have been, otherwise you wouldn’t have ended up living here. I think it’s great how you’ve taken charge and started your own business. But don’t be too proud to ask for help if you need it.’ He rose to his feet and pushed in his chair, adding, ‘There’s one other thing I think I should tell you. We’ll have to get married abroad and soon. According to Scottish law, there’s a twenty-eight-day waiting period before we can get a marriage licence, and I don’t want to lose any more valuable time.’

‘Married abroad?’ Layla opened and closed her mouth. ‘Please tell me you’re not thinking Vegas and an Elvis impersonator?’

He gave a crooked smile that made something in her chest ping like a latch springing open. ‘No. But if you’re not keen on an impersonal register office, how about a small and simple ceremony on a beach in Hawaii?’

Hawaii. The land of bikinis and beaches and beautiful bodies.

Oh, joy.

CHAPTER FOUR

A COUPLE OF days after the legal work was completed in Edinburgh, Layla flew business class with Logan to the island of Maui in Hawaii. The luxury villa he’d organised for their short stay was situated at Kapalua Bay beach, a gorgeous crescent of blindingly white sand and turquoise water and palm trees. Layla felt as if she was living in a dream sequence—swept away to an exotic location by a handsome billionaire who was intent on marrying her as quickly as he could.

But not for the romantic reasons her girlhood dreams had envisaged.

The speed and efficiency with which Logan set about achieving a goal was nothing less than breathtaking. Layla barely had time to get her head around the idea of a beach wedding, let alone buy the appropriate attire for it, when she found herself standing on the balcony of the beautiful villa overlooking the ocean with just minutes to spare before the ceremony.

Her wedding day.

It was strange to think that this time last week she had been a single woman with a simple goal of keeping her business on track. Now she was about to be married to a man she had known for most of her life who didn’t love her the way a husband should love his bride.

But Logan did love his family’s home and so did she, so it would have to be a good enough reason to marry. The only reason to marry, because the last thing she needed was to get silly ideas in her head about their relationship lasting beyond the year, as set down in the document his lawyer had drawn up.

One year and one year only.

The money Logan had transferred to her account on signing the document would guarantee Layla’s business success. It was exactly the windfall she needed to expand her business from a scribbled sticky-note vision into a profit-making reality.

Logan came out to the balcony where she was standing looking at the view. She turned to face him with an attempt at a smile. Their wedding ceremony was minutes away but if he was uncomfortable or uneasy about what they were about to do, he wasn’t showing it on his face. They might as well have been heading down the beach for an afternoon stroll.

He pushed back his shirt sleeve to glance at the silver watch on his strong tanned wrist. ‘The celebrant will be here in ten minutes.’

‘Okay…’ Layla took a deep breath and smoothed her hand down over her churning stomach. ‘Isn’t it meant to be bad luck for you to see me in my dress before the ceremony?’

His eyes ran over the Bohemian-style white dress she had bought in a boutique in Edinburgh. It was enough like a wedding dress for her to feel like a bride, even if she wasn’t a real one, and long enough to cover the scars on her leg. And—even more important—she could wear flat sandals or bare feet rather than struggle with heels.

‘I can safely say I’ve already had more than my fair share of bad luck. You too, I imagine.’ His tone was wry. ‘You look beautiful, by the way.’ His gaze held hers in a lock that did strange things to her insides. Tingling things, thrilling things. Forbidden things.

Layla was the first to look away, worried he would see things she didn’t want him to see. Things she didn’t even want to admit to herself. ‘I don’t have a bouquet or anything. I hope that’s not bad luck too.’

He walked over to a box that was sitting on the coffee table in the large open-plan room off the balcony. She hadn’t noticed it earlier as she’d been preoccupied with getting ready so soon after their arrival. Or it had been delivered while she was in the shower. He took the lid off and the sweet tropical scent of frangipanis filled the air. He took out a simple but beautiful bouquet and handed it to her.

‘I hope this will do?’

‘It’s perfect.’ Layla took the bouquet from him and bent her face to the creamy blooms with their egg-yolk-yellow hearts, the glorious fragrance drugging her senses. Not to mention Logan’s intoxicating closeness doing exactly the same thing. He was dressed in an open-necked white shirt and mid-blue jacket and trousers that brought out the intense blue in his eyes and the deep olive tan of his skin. She could smell his aftershave—could even pick up the clean fruity smell of his shampoo from his recent shower. His jaw was freshly shaven and her fingers itched to touch his face to trace where the razor had glided over his tanned skin. She was aware of every inch of his body standing within touching distance of hers. Aware of every breath he took, every flare of his nostrils, every rustle of his clothes when he moved.

Within a few minutes they would be husband and wife.

On paper.

She had to keep reminding herself of that pesky little detail.

Logan held out his hand, his expression inscrutable. ‘Ready to head down?’

Layla put her hand in his, holding the bouquet in the other, her heart thumping, her pulse racing. ‘I’m ready.’

I think…

When they got down to the beach, Layla took off her sandals and Logan his shoes so they could walk on the sand. They walked together towards the celebrant, who was waiting for them on the beach with two witnesses—a couple, Makani and Ken, whose award-winning landscape design Logan had done for them at their main home in the Hamptons in the US a few years ago. They spent part of the year on Maui, where Makani had family. Logan had informed Layla earlier that he had told Makani and Ken nothing about the reason behind his sudden marriage to Layla, allowing them to draw the conclusion it was a genuine love match.

If only it was…

Then Layla wouldn’t be feeling so conflicted about making promises that were essentially meaningless. Entering a marriage that after a year would be terminated.

The rhythm of the ocean lapping the shore was the only music to accompany them to their position in front of the male celebrant, who was holding two colourful leis. He gave the traditional Hawaiian welcome, placed the leis over their heads and began the simple service. ‘We are gathered here today to join this man and this woman in marriage…’

Layla repeated the vows as instructed, intensely aware of Logan’s warm blue gaze and the feel of his hand holding hers as he slid the wedding ring home on her finger. His voice as he said his vows was strong and steady and assured—no one would ever think he didn’t mean a word he’d said. Apart from her, that is. But it was an act and good actors, the best actors, made themselves feel the emotion so they could bring authenticity to the scene.

‘You may kiss the bride.’

Layla had fooled herself that Logan might skip this part of the service, especially since he had pulled away from kissing her the other day. But as soon as the celebrant spoke the words, Logan drew her closer and his head came down, down, down until his lips touched hers. She was expecting him to lift them straight off, to be satisfied with a perfunctory kiss for the sake of appearances, but the pressure of his lips changed, warmed, heated, hardened. Burned and branded.

Her lips moved with the sensual rhythm of his, opening to his, welcoming the slow sexy stroke of his tongue meeting hers for the first time. It wasn’t a deep kiss—no tangling or thrusting of tongues—but gentle nudges and playful touches of lips and tongue tips that sent a shiver coursing through her body from the top of her sun-warmed head to the soles of her sand-caressed bare feet. There was a swooping sensation deep in her belly, an ache spreading in a river of heat, simmering, smouldering, sizzling in her core.

His lips were gentle and yet firm, purposeful, passionate and utterly addictive. Layla nudged his lips with her own, sweeping the tip of her tongue over his lower lip, delighting in the way his breath hitched and his hold on her tightened.

His hand glided down to the base of her spine, drawing her closer to the hard ridge of his stirring arousal. It was both shocking and exhilarating to feel the intimate pulse of his blood. Shocking, because she hadn’t dared hope he would be attracted to her in such a way.

Layla slid her hands to the hard plane of his chest, feeling the thumpity-thump, thump-thump of his heart beneath her palm. She forgot about everything but the sensation of his lips moving with such exquisite expertise on hers, drawing from her a passionate response, a clawing and desperate need building in her body with such force it was overwhelming. Every nerve in her body seemed to be attuned to his mouth, to the warmth and potency of it, to the eroticism it boldly, blatantly promised.

She was so consumed by his kiss she no longer heard the swish and slap and sigh of the waves as they lapped and sucked at the shore. No longer aware of the ocean breeze stirring the fronds on the palm trees, no longer aware of the fine grains of sand beneath her feet or the sun shining down on her head.

The sound of the witnesses clapping seemed to snap Logan out of the moment. He lifted his mouth off hers and gave a crooked smile that said everything and yet nothing.

Layla licked her lips and tasted him, wanted him with a deep ache that vibrated in her core like a plucked cello string. Her heart was still racing, her pulse off the charts, her legs trembling. Now, that was a kiss. She felt dazed, stunned, spinning with lingering sensations. Her mouth still felt sensitive, her lips slightly swollen. She searched his gaze for any sign he was as affected by their kiss as she was but his gaze was like the ocean beside them with its mysterious depths and shifting shadows.