Billionaire's Scandalous Twins

Chapter 11

“I would say that it is a pleasure to meet you, but I generally reserve that comment till I have come to know that person better. You know what I mean?” asked Barbara and Isobel thought that woman was here with her claws already pretty out. She just smiled and said,” Of course I understand. It is great to make your acquaintance. Hope we can talk better and at length sometime soon enough.”

“Why would you want that now?” asked Barbara as she snapped her fingers in the direction of her assistant. It was a gesture which meant that she wanted a seat. Even Nicholas frowned at her. He could understand very well that she was trying to intimidate Isobel. And strangely even though Barbara was his fiancé he did not like it, not even for a bit.

He did not know exactly what she had come to know about her but he did not want Barbara interrupting their conversation. Not at all. So he knew that he needed to speak up at this point of time.

“Barbara, I think that it is a good thing that you are trying to take interest in my work and who I see and what I see but I would appreciate it if you inform me of your plans the next time before you do this,” said Nicholas and Barbara looked at him with her painted lips slightly parted open and even Isobel was shocked at his words.

“I don’t understand. What is it that you have to say to this woman that you cannot say before me?” asked Barbara as she narrowed her eyes towards Nicholas and he met her gaze with a hard unforgiving stare.

“I don’t think that I have ever asked you that question or even talk to you about your works, interests and desires and that even doesn’t mean that we cannot talk but not when I am discussing something serious and private. My entire life is not an open book to anyone and not even to you. So don’t dare to intrude in what you do not know about,” said Nicholas. There was something in his eyes which meant that he was not going to balk down under her eyes.

“I cannot believe that you are talking to me, To ME, of all people in this manner on our engagement cruise and that for a woman whom you don’t even know,” said Barbara and then Nicholas smiled in her direction coldly.

“It was you who you insisted on the engagement Barbara. I was content with my playboy lifestyle. And don’t think that you can guilty me into thinking that you are one who is doing this as a favour. It is the other way round,” said Nicholas and Isobel said,” I think that we can take this discussion sometime else. I should leave.”

“Why would you leave? You are not the one he is publicly berating on their engagement cruise, is he?” asked Barbara with a vicious glance at Isobel and then said,” I shall be talking to my father about how you insulted me infront of another woman tonight. This is not the end of it.”

She did not wait after that and then she walked off in her high heels and Isobel did not even know that she was holding back a huge breath until she left.

“That was really bad. I did not come here to cause any kind of problems in your life, Nick,” said Isobel and she sounded genuine and Nicholas looked at her and said,” She is a spoilt woman who thinks that she can snap her finger at everyone and they will dance to her tunes. But that is not going to happen in my case. But she is not what we need to talk about. Let’s go back to talking about the twins.”

“I already told you their names. Now I will tell you how they really are,” said Isobel with a soft smile on her face. Even though she did not feel entirely comfortable with the situation she knew that beggars could not be choosers.

He frowned a little and took a sip of his own cham­pagne. “ I heard the names. They are a bit odd for boys, don’t you think? Family names?”

“My grandfathers,” she said, just a touch defensively as if she was prepared to go toe to toe with him to guard her right to name her sons whatever she wanted.

“That was nice of you,” he said after a second or two and took the wind out of her sails. “Go on.”

While around them people laughed and talked and relaxed together, a tight knot of tension coiled about their table. Isobel’s voice was soft, Nick leaned in closer to hear her and his nearness made her breath hitch in her chest.

“Jade’s sunny and happy all the time. He smiles from the minute he wakes up until the moment I put him down for the night.” She smiled, too, just thinking of her babies. “Carrick’s different. He’s more…thought-ful, I guess. His smiles are rarer and all the more precious because of it. He’s always watching. Studying. I’d love to know what he’s thinking most of the time because even at four months, he seems almost a philoso­pher.”

His gaze was locked on her and Isobel could see both of her sons in Nick’s face. They looked so much like him, she couldn’t understand how he could doubt even for a moment that they were his. 

“Where are they now?”

“My sister Maxie’s watching them.” And was prob­ably harried and exhausted. “The boys are crazy about her and she loves them both to death. They’re fine.”

“Then why did you get tense all of a sudden?”

She blew out a breath, slumped back against the booth and admitted, “It’s the first time I’ve been away from them. It feels…wrong, somehow. And I miss them. A lot.”

His eyes narrowed on her and he picked up his glass for a sip of wine. Watching her over the rim of the glass, he swallowed, then set the flute back onto the table. “Can’t be easy, being a single mother.”

“No, it’s not,” she admitted, thinking now about just how tired she was every night by the time she had the boys in bed. It had been so long since she’d been awake past eight o’clock at night that it was odd to her now, sitting here in a restaurant at nine. This was what it had been like before, though. When she’d only had herself to worry about. When she hadn’t had two little boys depending on her.

God, how had she ever been able to stand the quiet? The emptiness in her little house? She couldn’t even imagine being without her sons now.

“But,” she added when he didn’t say anything else, “along with all the work, a single mom gets all the perks to herself, too. I don’t have to share the little moments. I’m the one to see them smile for the first time. To see them waking up to the world around them.”

“So since you’re not looking to share the good moments, that means you’re not interested in having me involved in the twins’ lives,” he said thoughtfully. “All you really want is child support?”

She stiffened a little. Isobel hadn’t even considered that Nick might want to be drawn into their sons’ lives. He wasn’t the hearth-and-home kind of guy. He was the party man. The guy you dated, but didn’t bring home to mom.

“You and I both know you don’t have any interest in being a father, Nick.”

“Is that right? And how would you know that?”

“Well—”

He inclined his head at her speechlessness. “Exactly. You don’t know me any more than I know you.”

“You’re wrong. I know that you’re not the kind of man to tie himself down in one place. That week we were together you told me yourself you had no plans to ever get married and settle down.”

“Who said anything about getting married?”

Isobel sucked in a breath and told herself to slow down. She was walking through a minefield here. “I didn’t mean—”

“Forget it,” he said.

Another waiter appeared, this time delivering a dinner that Nick had clearly ordered earlier. Surprised, Isobel looked down at the serving of breast of chicken and fettucine in mushroom sauce before lifting her gaze to his in question.

“I remembered you liked it,” he said with a shrug.

What was she supposed to do with that? She won­dered. He pretended to not care anything about her, yet he remembered more than a year later what her favorite

foods were? Why? Why would he recall something so small?

Once the waiter was gone, Nick started talking again. “So answer me this. When you found out you were pregnant, why’d you go through with it?”

“Excuse me?”

He shrugged. “You were alone. A lot of women in that position wouldn’t have done what you did. Giving birth, deciding to raise the babies on her own.”

“They were mine,” she said, as if that explained everything, and in her mind it did. Never for a moment had she considered ending her pregnancy. She’d tried to reach Nick of course, but when she couldn’t, she’d hunkered down and started building a life for her and her children.

“No regrets?”

“Only the one about coming on this ship,” she mut­tered.

He smiled faintly, laid his napkin across his lap and, picking up his knife and fork, sliced into his filet mignon. “I heard that.”

“I meant you to.” As Isobel used her fork to slide the fettucine noodles around her plate, she said, “Nick, my sons are the most important things in the world to me. I’ll do whatever I have to make sure they’re safe.”

“Good for you.”

She took a bite of her dinner and, though she could tell it was cooked to perfection, the delicate sauce and chicken tasted like sawdust in her mouth. She knew that she should be enjoying this as long as she was here and she had this trip but she could not. It felt like someone was holding a knife to her throat.

“I’ll want a DNA test.”

“Of course,” she said. “I’ve already had the boys’ blood tests done at a local lab. You can send your sample in to them and they’ll do the comparison testing.”

“I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

“What?” She shook her head, looked at him and said, “Don’t you have to wait until we’re back in San Pedro?”

“No, I’m not going to wait. I want this question settled as quickly as possible.” He continued to eat, as though what they were discussing wasn’t affecting him in the slightest. “We dock at Cabo in the morning. You and I will go ashore, find a lab and have them fax the findings to the lab in San Pedro.”

“We will?” She hadn’t planned on spending a lot of time with Nick, after all. She’d only come on board to tell him about the boys and frankly, she’d thought he wouldn’t want anything more to do with her after that. Instead, he’d moved her into his suite and now was pro­posing that they spend even more time together.

“Until this is taken care of to my satisfaction,” Nick told her softly, “I’m not letting you out of my sight. The two of us are going to be joined at the hip. So you might as well start getting used to it.”