Chapter 4
Carter tensed, stunned and angry that she had said no. He thought she would want to get married and have a father for her child. She was too young to do this on her own.
“What do you mean no? Zahara, you are carrying my child.”
“Do you love me?”
His lips flattened in annoyance. They barely knew one another; she needed to come off that fantasy of hers that they were meant to fall in love and live happily ever after. She was going to be disappointed when that didn’t happen.
He felt cold inside at her asking him that and raked his fingers through his already mussed hair in frustration at having to spell out the facts of their situation to her. He sighed. “No. I will admit, I am attracted to you, and we are good in bed together, but I don’t love you, and under different circumstances, you would not be my wife or the mother of my children. But you are pregnant, and I...well, I will be a good husband to you and a father to our child. You will want for nothing, and I will be faithful for as long as our marriage lasts.” He felt that was sufficient reason for her to be his wife.
“Hell no.”
“What?”
“Let me spell it out for you and make my stance clear. No, I won’t marry you.” She squirmed to move out of his embrace, as she must have felt the anger and displeasure now radiating from him.
She struggled to get up from the bed and he helped her. Then he pulled himself up to lean against her headboard with a scowl. Zahara folded her arms and was now sporting a mutinous expression on her face.
“Zahara, I will not bring scandal to my family name and business by allowing the media to find out that I am having a child out of wedlock. And I will not have my child not have his father in his life.”
She scrunched her face in a grimace because she knew about his family scandal. His mother had had a child with another man, and Carter had a half-brother who had not been raised with them.
He didn’t want that for his unborn child.
“I understand Carter, and I am sorry that that happened to your family and Leaf, but I do not care about your image or what it means to your business. I will not marry a man who does not love me or only sees our life together as a short-term transaction,” she said coldly.
He opened his mouth, and the next thing he knew he was standing outside of her door with his shirt and pants in his hands. He had enough time to get his underwear on before she opened the door and pushed him through her doorway and out into the hallway.
He looked around at the closed doors in the corridor, making sure no one was witnessing his embarrassment and the fact that he was hard as steel seeing Zahara angry with him, shooting deadly sparks from her hazel eyes.
He knew he had said the wrong thing when he had lectured her and then told her how immature she was being. She had moved off the bed so fast, standing there like a goddess, her hair in messy disarray, her eyes spitting angry fire, her hands on her hips and her plump breasts with the dark areolas jutting forward over her round belly.
“Get out.”
He had tried reasoning with her, but she didn’t want to hear it, and when he didn’t move, she had threatened him with her experimental creams she had in her bathroom. That had gotten him moving to put on his underwear, but she had had enough of him and had gathered up his clothes, marching out of the room, and he had quickly followed.
Now he was standing outside, staring at her grey door. He stepped into his pants, zipping it up and buttoning it.
“Zahara, let’s talk about this reasonably. You are being emotional, and I understand, especially with your hormones being all over the place.”
Her door flew open, the wind from the force moving his hair.
She poked him with her finger. “I am not being emotional. No person would agree to that nonsense you just spouted. This is the twenty-first century, and women don’t have to get married because they are pregnant, especially into a cold, loveless marriage to an unfeeling brute.”
He opened his mouth but closed it when she snapped her arm out and cupped him through his pants. “You are denying what is happening between us. Does your body react like this for just anyone, hmmm? Do you talk dirty to them like you do to me?”
Carter stared stonily at her while his cock, already hard, pulsed in her hand. He wanted her and was fighting himself.
She searched his face while she continued to caress him, and he closed his eyes because it felt so good. But then he blinked them open when he felt nothing and heard the door closing in his face again.
He growled low in his throat in frustration at not getting what he wanted and not getting to taste her again.
He turned when he heard, “Men. Sometimes you are such idiots. Leave that nice girl alone before I fetch my broom to clear out the hallway.” He glared at the man in a kimono and a hair net on his head, smoking a cigarette as he watched Carter through brown eyes.
“Davis, who are you talking to? I swear, are you being nosy again and watching people in the hallway?” The door was opened wider to show a pretty, light-skinned black girl with freckles along her nose and cheeks. She had naturally fiery red hair and was short and plump. Carter caught the man looking at her with a longing expression before he masked it when she turned to look at him and then at Carter in the hallway. She grinned when she saw him.
“Not a dull moment here. Davis, come on; I need to test my new wig on your head before I have to go to work.” She turned and disappeared from Carter’s sight.
Davis gave him a warning look before he shut the door.
Carter clenched his fists and decided he needed to finish getting dressed and leave before he drew more attention to himself and his situation.
“Zahara, this discussion is not over. Call me when you have calmed down. I will postpone heading back to Vegas and will find somewhere to stay overnight.”
He paused, listening to see if she was still near the door. He was about to speak when he heard her voice.
“Just go away. I am tired.” He heard the sadness and fatigue in her voice, and he nodded, reaching out and touching the door, suddenly feeling the need to soothe her. He didn’t like hearing her this way, and he jerked his hand back. She was right. He only responded this way with her; not even with his Delilah did he lose control like this, and it scared him. He could not get emotionally attached to her or anyone. Losing Delilah sent him spiraling, and he’d lost himself for a bit. His family had been concerned about his mental health and had all been there for him, until he’d gotten help.
He had always thought of himself as being strong, ruthless even, but the guilt over her death had eaten away at him. He did not want that happening again.
***
Carter reached his rental car, opening the door and getting in. He reached for the start button but then pulled his hand back and reached behind the seat, where his suit jacket had been resting. Grabbing it, he searched the inside pocket for his phone. He’d been so preoccupied with Zahara that he had forgotten it in the car. He frowned. He had lost all control around her. If his family found out, especially his brother Leaf, they would never let him hear the end of it.
He hit the contacts button and dialed the number he was looking for.
He heard a husky growl. “What?!”
He grinned. It sounded like he had just interrupted something. Good. He wanted someone else in a sour mood along with him.
“She’s pregnant.” He dropped his bomb, and all he heard was dead air on the other side of the line.
He then heard a rustling sound and a female voice asking huskily, “Darling, where are you going?”
“I will be right back; Carter just dropped a bomb on me, and I am just going to step out of the room for a minute so I can gloat and drive his blood pressure up.”
Carter rolled his eyes. Then he heard, “Don’t you dare move, wife; this will not take long, and I like you in that position, wrapped in silk ropes for my pleasure.”
“Leaf, hurry up,” Carter barked. “Leave your wife alone. I don’t need to hear what you two like to do in bed.”
Leaf gave a humourless chuckle. “That’s what you get for interrupting me. Next time, text me first, and if I don’t answer, leave a message,” he warned.
“Noted.”
“So, Papa, I am assuming it is Zahara that is carrying your child?”
“How do you know it’s Zahara?”
“Your moody attitude, and I also saw your business itinerary for this week and knew that you were finally heading to New York to see her. So how bad did you screw everything up?”
Carter sighed. “Bad.”
He scowled when he heard his brother Leaf’s roar of laughter.
When the laughter wound down, Leaf said, “Well, I want to congratulate you on being a father and screwing this up as usual with your dictatorship. Not everyone is going to fall into line with what you want, Carter.”
He gripped the phone because just hearing that sent him on edge. He loved control and everything in its place; it threw him off when things did not go according as planned—which it rarely did. Just wanted to put that out there.
“What happened?”
Carter sighed and told Leaf everything.
He heard a low whistle. “No wonder she is furious. If I tried that shit with Deana, I would not be able to walk for a week. Carter, you need to stop—”
“I don’t want to hear anything more about what I feel from you. You are not me,” he growled.
Leaf sighed. “Well, I am sure you are already strategizing in that brain of yours to convince her to listen to you and get her to do whatever it is you want, and I hope she gives you hell first.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem. Now I’m going back to my wife.”
Carter looked at the phone, scowling as his brother hung up on him.