“You’re too independent,” he complained with a growl. “You refuse to ask for help.”
“I’m working on that.” She took a step back and he followed.
“Why don’t you audition for one of my movies?” Dev asked. Her insistence on avoiding Arjun Entertainment was like a thorn in his skin.
“No! You still don’t get it, Dev.” She thrust her hands in her short hair and gave a harsh sigh. “Everyone wants something from you. If they don’t ask for it, you’ll offer something. Anything. It’s how you work a relationship.”
Dev narrowed his eyes. He didn’t like where this conversation was going. “What are you talking about?”
“You think you have to do something to earn your way into people’s hearts,” she said as she gestured wildly with her hands. “You have to be number one in the box office to win approval from your parents. You have to pay everything to gain acceptance with my mother.”
Was this how Tina saw him? That he had to buy his way to a person’s heart? “I have money and I want to help out.”
“At first I thought it was your way of maintaining control in a relationship. Now I realize that you can’t just give yourself. You don’t think you’re enough.”
He didn’t like this. He jutted out his chin as the dark emotions started to swirl in his chest. “That’s not true.”
“And you are just as reluctant to ask for help as I am.” She placed her hands on her hips. “Do you realize that asking me to stay for two months was the only time you asked for my assistance in anything?”
“You were pregnant and then you were grieving.” He had gone out of his way to keep the world at bay. He didn’t want her to worry about anything.
“I still wanted to look after you. You were my husband.”
“I am your husband.”
“I ask for your advice all the time,” she continued as if he hadn’t made that declaration. “But I didn’t want you to think I married you because you could help my career. I wanted you, not what you could do for me.”
“You didn’t need to prove anything,” he said. “I know why you married me.”
Tina’s cheeks went red. “You do?”
“You didn’t want to be a single mother.”
Tina blinked and gave a slight shake of her head. “Dev, I didn’t marry you just because I was having your baby.”
Dev clenched his teeth as the curiosity swelled inside him. Why had she married him? He wanted to know but he was afraid the reason no longer applied. What would it take for her to stay married?
“This is the problem with attending weddings,” Tina said as she cast a look at the entrance. “It makes you think about your own. Your marriage. What you would have done differently.”
“You know what I would have done differently?” he asked gruffly.
She gave him a wary look. “No, Dev. What?”
“I wouldn’t have gotten you pregnant.”
* * *
His words were like a punch to the chest. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant, he would still be the most eligible bachelor, living a carefree life and driving his career to new heights. “I know,” she said softly. “It changed everything, didn’t it?”
“No, jaan. You misunderstand me.” He reached out and gathered her in his arms. She pressed her hands against his muscular chest and felt the solid beat of his heart. “I would have protected you better. I would have looked after you.”
“That was my responsibility, not yours.” She should have been more careful but apparently she did not learn from her mistakes.
“I disagree.” His expression was fierce and she watched the fire in his eyes. “I should never have allowed you to get pregnant. It was an oversight on my part. But I was glad you were carrying my child.”
Her heart did a funny, slow flip. She knew he had been excited about the baby but she needed to hear that he didn’t regret it. “You always wanted a family.”
“And I wanted you,” Dev said quietly. “I would have eventually asked you to marry me, but the baby moved up my timetable.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “You would have married me even if I wasn’t carrying your baby?” That she did not believe. He was idealizing their affair. If she hadn’t been pregnant, he would have ended their affair to enter an arranged marriage with Shreya.
“You gave me the one thing I never had,” Dev said as she brushed his finger along her cheek. “A home life. A world outside the film industry.”
“You could have gotten that on your own,” she whispered as her throat tightened with emotion.