Substitute Bride For The Comatose Billionaire

locked

t suite. She moved to the windows next, pulling the heavy velvet curtains u

d over the room

pearing into her hands. Her shoulders shook with silent

d by the do

the mind had forced it to carry. In the Sanctuary, Master Kaelen had taught her to

as she poured water into a tumbler. The motion was automatic, trained-whe

e glass into her mothe

d to steady her. She set the glass down with a c

n. "New York. Twenty-on

e cadence. This was the voice of a woman speaking from a p

bitter laugh. "Your father was closing a deal in Tokyo. He flew back whe

ond chair closer and sat, her body an

lways finding reasons to stay late at the office." Her hands twisted in her lap. "I didn't think anything

darkness, Emilie could see th

oming from somewhere down the hall. They evacuated us. Moved us to the emergency stairwell

covered her mother's, feeling

t was wrong. The smell was wrong. And when I unwrapped the blanket-" Her voi

Emilie said. "Dur

ate strength. "I went to the nursery the next morning. I demanded to see the other babies. And there she was-Corie-lying in

came out flat, without judgment. "Why didn

-" She spat the word. "-Archibald Dunlap cares about one thing only. The appearance of propriety. If I'd announced that hi

r face emerging from s

called me 'Mommy,' my heart wasn't screaming for my real child. And all the while, I used Dunlap money and Dunlap connections to

t have words for, something that might have been recognition o

Not a question. "Corie. You thought s

. The woman-she was screaming that Burnett had to take responsibility, that t

ut

's not a liar. Not about this. When I finally accused him, three years ago, he looked at me like I'd lost my mind. He sw

ther's inexplicable favoritism toward Corie. The way her own father, Burnett, shif

uietly. "To this story. Mo

widened. "What

parted the curtain just enough to let

eight of absolute certainty. "What matters is that I'm here. What matters is that t

alm eyes and the capable hands and the aura of command

ered. "What happened to

. It didn't r

ose," she said. "That'

ver response Hettie might have made.

med herself back into Mrs. Burnett Dunlap in the space

nt bags-enormous things with logos that screamed expense: Prada, Valentino, G

ployers they considered temporarily diminished. "Miss Corie asked me to deliver these. She selected them from her own wardrobe as a welcome gif

tightened on

tartled the security guards. She reached the first garment b

gested previous wear, not storage. And there, barely detectable beneath the floral notes of

iscoloration at the hem-champagne, perhaps, from a party three weeks ago. She'd seen the ph

htful," Em

opened. Th

tension, worth more than most people's monthly rent

ith a gaze that made him step backward, "that I don't wear other peopl

ightly, sending it sli

e first time, there was genuine warmth in it. The warmth of a pr