Mistress to the Magnate: Money Man's Fiancée Negotiation. Michelle Celmer

as he dialed the P.I.’s number. He answered on the first ring.

      “You told me it could take months to find her,” Ash said. “Are you sure you have the right Melody Trent?”

      “I’m positive it’s her. Your girlfriend was in an auto accident. It’s how I found her so quickly.”

      Melody Trent wasn’t his girlfriend. By definition, she was his mistress—a warm body to come home to after a long day at work. He paid her law school tuition and living expenses and she offered companionship with no strings attached. Just the way he liked it. But it was no time to split hairs.

      “Was she injured?” he asked, expecting, at worst, a few bumps and bruises. He truly was not prepared for what the P.I. said next.

      “According to the police report, the driver, your girlfriend, was pretty banged up and there was one fatality.”

      Ash’s stomach bottomed out and his mouth went dry. “How banged up?”

      “She’s been in the hospital for a couple of weeks.”

      “You said there was a fatality. What happened exactly?” He rose from his chair, began pacing as the P.I. gave him what few details he had about the crash. And it was bad. Worse than Ash could have ever imagined. “Is Melody being held responsible?”

      “Fortunately, no. The police filed it as an accident. That doesn’t mean there won’t be a civil suit, though.”

      They would deal with that when and if the time came. “How is Melody? Do you have any details on her condition?”

      “All the hospital would say is that she’s stable. They’ll only give details to family. When I asked to talk to her, they said she wasn’t taking phone calls. That usually means that for whatever reason, the patient is unable to speak. My best guess would be she’s unconscious.”

      Since Melody left him, Ash had been counting the hours until she came crawling back to ask forgiveness, to say that she’d made a mistake. At least now he knew why she hadn’t. Although that wasn’t much of a consolation. And he would be damned if anyone was going to stop him from learning the truth. “I guess I’ll just have to be family.”

      “You going to say she’s your long-lost sister or something?” the P.I. asked.

      “Of course not.” He needed something a bit more believable. Something he could easily prove.

      Melody was his fiancée.

      The next morning Ash caught the earliest flight to the Dallas/Fort Worth airport, then rented a car and made the two-and-a-half-hour drive to Abilene. He had called ahead the afternoon before, setting up a meeting with the doctor in charge of her care. They told him that Melody was conscious and out of the woods, but that was the most they would say over the phone.

      Once he got to the hospital he strode right past the registration desk. He’d learned a long time ago that if he looked as though he belonged somewhere, showed he was in charge, people naturally followed along, and no one tried to stop him as he stepped onto the elevator. He got off on the third floor, surprised to realize that he was actually nervous. What if Melody didn’t want to come back to him?

      Of course she would, he assured himself. Her leaving had obviously been a great error in judgment, and it would have only been a matter of time before she realized how much she missed him. Besides, where else would she go while she healed from her injuries? She needed him.

      He stopped at the nurses’ station and they paged a Dr. Nelson. He appeared less than five minutes later.

      “Mr. Williams?” he said, shaking Ash’s hand. The department on his name badge was neurology, which likely meant that Melody had suffered some sort of brain injury. Which explained why she would have been unconscious. But did it mean her injuries were even more serious than he could have imagined? What if she never made a full recovery?

      “Where is my fiancée?” Ash asked, surprised by the note of panic in his voice. He needed to hold it together. Barging in and making demands would only make this more difficult. Especially if Melody told them he actually wasn’t her fiancé. He took a second to collect himself and asked, in a much calmer tone, “Can I see her?”

      “Of course, but why don’t we have a talk first.”

      He wanted to see Melody now, but he followed the doctor to a small family waiting room by the elevator. The room was empty, but for a television in the corner playing some daytime game show. He sat and gestured for Ash to join him.

      “How much do you know about the accident?” the doctor asked.

      “I was told that the car rolled, and there was one fatality.”

      “Your fiancée is a very lucky woman, Mr. Williams. She was driving on a back road when the crash occurred and it was several hours before someone drove past and discovered her there. She was airlifted here for treatment, but if the local EMS team hadn’t worked so quickly, you would be having this conversation with the coroner.”

      A knot twisted his insides. It was surreal to imagine that he had come so close to losing Melody for good, and the thought of her lying trapped and alone, not knowing if she would live or die, made him sick to his stomach. He may have been angry that she left him, but he still cared deeply for her. “What was the extent of her injuries?”

      “She suffered a subdural hematoma.”

      “A brain injury?”

      He nodded. “Until two days ago she’s been in a drug-induced coma.”

      “But she’ll recover?”

      “We expect her to make a full recovery.”

      Ash’s relief was so intense, his body went limp. If he hadn’t already been sitting, he was sure his legs would have given out from under him.

      “Although,” the doctor added, his expression darkening, “there were a few … complications.”

      Ash frowned. “What complications?”

      “I’m sorry to have to tell you that she lost the baby.”

      “Baby?” he asked, the doctor’s words not making any sense. Melody wasn’t having a baby.

      The doctor blinked. “I’m sorry, I just assumed you knew that she was pregnant.”

      Why would Ash even suspect such a thing when the radiation from childhood cancer had rendered him sterile? It had to be a mistake. “You’re sure?”

      “Absolutely.”

      The only explanation, Ash realized, was that Melody had been cheating on him. The knot in his gut twisted tighter, making it difficult to take a full breath. Is that where Melody had been going when she left him? To be with her lover? The father of her child?

      And like a love-sick fool Ash had been chasing after her, prepared to convince her to come home. She had betrayed him, after all that he had done for her, and he hadn’t suspected a damned thing.

      His first reaction was to get up, walk out of the hospital and never look back, but his body refused to cooperate. He needed to see her, just one last time. He needed to know why the hell she would do this to him, when he had given her everything she had ever asked for, everything she could have ever needed. She could have at least had the decency, and the courage, to be honest with him.

      He could see that the doctor was curious to know why, as her fiancé, Ash hadn’t known about the pregnancy, but Ash didn’t feel he owed him or anyone else an explanation. “How far along was she?” he asked.

      “Around fourteen weeks, we think.”

      “You think? Didn’t she say?”

      “We haven’t mentioned the miscarriage. We think it would be too upsetting at this point in her recovery.”

      “So she believes she’s still pregnant?”

      “She