Page 33 of Untamed Billionaire's Innocent Bride

CHAPTER NINE

WHENHELOOKED back on this episode and cataloged his mistakes—something Dominik knew he would get to as surely as night followed day—he would trace it all back to the fatal decision to step outside his cabin and wait for the Englishwoman the innkeeper had called from town to tell him was headed his way.

It had seemed so innocuous at the time. No one ever visited his cabin, with or without an invitation, and he hadn’t known what would come of entertaining the whims of the one woman who had dared come find him. He’d been curious. Especially when he’d seen her, gold hair gleaming and that red cloak flowing around her like a premonition.

How could he have known?

And now Dominik found himself in exactly the sort of stuffy, sprawling, stately home he most despised, with no one to blame but himself. Combe Manor sat high on a ridge overlooking the Yorkshire village that had once housed the mills that had provided the men who’d lived in this house a one-way ticket out of their humble beginnings.

They had built Combe Manor and started Combe Industries. Dominik had also fought his way out of a rocky, unpleasant start...but he’d chosen to hoard his wealth and live off by himself in the middle of the woods.

Dominik felt like an imposter. Because he was an imposter.

He might have shared blood with the distant aristocrat he’d seen on the screen in a London office, but he didn’t share...this. Ancient houses filled with the kind of art and antiques that spoke of wealth that went far beyond the bank. It was nearly two centuries of having more. Of having everything, for that matter. It was generations of men who had stood where he did now, staring out the windows in a library filled with books only exquisitely educated men read, staring down at the village where, once upon a time, other men scurried about adding to the Combe coffers.

And he knew that the Combe family was brand-spanking-new in terms of wealth when stood next to the might and historic reach of the San Giacomos.

Dominik might share that blood, but he was an orphan. A street kid who’d lived rough for years and had done what was necessary to feed himself, keep himself clothed and find shelter. A soldier who had done his duty and followed his orders, and had found himself in situations he never mentioned when civilians were near.

Blood was nothing next to the life he’d lived. And he was surprised this fancy, up-itself house didn’t fall down around his ears.

But when he heard the soft click of much too high heels against the floor behind him, he turned.

Almost as if he couldn’t help himself.

Because the house still stood despite the fact he was here, polluting it. And more astonishing still, the woman who walked toward him, her blond hair shining and a wary look on her pretty face, was his wife.

His wife.

The ceremony, such as it was, had gone smoothly. The vicar had arrived right on time, and they had recited their vows in a pretty sort of boardroom high on top of the London building that housed his half brother’s multinational business. Lauren had produced rings, proving that she did indeed think of everything, they had exchanged them and that was that.

Dominik was not an impulsive man. Yet, he had gone ahead and married a woman for the hell of it.

And he was having trouble remembering what the hell of it was, because all he could seem to think about was Lauren. And more specific, helping Lauren out of those impossible heels she wore. Peeling that sweet little dress off her curves, and then finally—finally—doing something about this intense, unreasonable hunger for her that had been dogging him since the moment he’d laid eyes on her.

The moment he’d stepped out of the shadows of his own porch and had put all of this into motion.

There had been no reception. Lauren had taken a detour to her office that had turned into several hours of work. Afterward she had herded him into another sleek, black car, then back to the same plane, which they’d flown for a brief little hop to the north of England. Another car ride from the airfield and here they were in an echoing old mausoleum that had been erected to celebrate and flatter the kinds of men Dominik had always hated.

It had never crossed his mind that he was one of them. He’d never wanted to be one of them.

And the fact he’d found out he was the very thing he loathed didn’t change a thing. He couldn’t erase the life he’d led up to this point. He couldn’t pretend he’d had a different life now that he was being offered his rich mother’s guilt in the form of an identity that meant nothing to him.

But it was difficult to remember the hard line he planned to take when this woman—his wife, to add another impossibility to the pile—stood before him.

“I have just spoken to Mr. Combe,” she began, because, of course, she’d been off the moment they’d set foot in this house. Dominik had welcomed the opportunity to ask himself what on earth he was doing here while she’d busied herself with more calls and emails and tasks that apparently needed doing at once.

And Dominik had made any number of mistakes already. There was the speaking to her in the first place that he would have to unpack at some later date, when all of this was behind him. Besides, he’d compounded that error, time and again. He should never have touched her. He should certainly never have kissed her. He should have let her fly off back to London on her own, and he certainly, without any doubt, should never have married her.

The situation would almost be funny if it wasn’t so...preposterous.

But one thing Dominik knew beyond a shadow of any doubt. He did not want to hear about his damned brother again. Not tonight.

“Do me this one favor, please,” he said in a voice that came out as more of a growl than he’d intended. Or maybe it was exactly the growl that was called for, he thought, when her eyes widened. “This is our wedding night. We have a great many things to accomplish, you and I. Why don’t we leave your Mr. Combe where he belongs—across the planet, doing whatever it is he does that requires you to do five times as much in support.”

He expected her to argue. He was sure he could see the start of it kicking up all over her lovely face and in the way she held her shoulders so tight and high.

But she surprised him.

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