Kelly Hunter – Red-Hot Renegade (страница 8)

Jianne had been doing all right during those first few minutes of her arrival at Madeline’s lunch gathering. Right up until the moment someone had seen fit to deposit baby Layla into her uncle Jacob’s arms. Everything started hurting after that.

Watching the husband she’d once loved so fiercely cradle his niece with such gentle authority and fend off all attempts to get him to hand her over scraped at Ji’s heart. She’d wanted children once. Not immediately following her whirlwind marriage, but at some stage in her and Jacob’s future she’d imagined them. Imagined Jake with them.

She accepted the champagne Madeline handed her and smiled and hid the assault on her heart as best she could. If she wanted to continue this charade she’d have to get used to being in Jake’s company again and the company of his siblings. And that meant conversing with them.

Bracing herself, Jianne turned her attention once more to the small knot of people that now included Luke and Tristan as well as Serena and Erin. She summoned a smile and admired the design of the glittering rings on Erin’s fingers, and discovered that Erin was a jeweller and had made the rings herself. Small talk between strangers, the kind that made people relax, and it was working, sort of, until Jake and a sleepy baby joined them, and all conversation ceased.

When the silence grew beyond awkward, Tristan pinned her with his golden gaze and asked her if she’d ever managed to finish her visual design degree.

‘Yes,’ she stammered, startled that he’d even remembered such a thing. ‘Yes, I finished it. I make my living nowadays doing design work for various organisations. International companies in need of multilingual branding, mostly.’

‘Do you need to make a living?’ asked Jake quietly, his blue gaze unreadable. ‘What happened to your trust fund?’

‘It matured, I reinvested it, and now there’s more of it,’ she said calmly. ‘If you’re asking me if I need the money my work brings in the answer’s no. If you’re asking me if I like to work and imagine that what I do is of value to people, the answer’s yes.’

Jacob stared at her through those unreadable eyes, until finally Tristan spoke up again. ‘Will you be able to work from Singapore?’

‘Easily. I’ve clients here as well as in Hong Kong and Shanghai. My travelling schedule should stay about the same.’

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