“What exactly are you trying to say to me?”

Tiago sighed, as if Lillie was being dense. And he hated himself for that, too, when she stiffened. “This cannot be an affair, Lillie. No matter what happened between us in Spain. Do you not understand? I will have to marry you.”

Her eyes went wide. Her face paled, and not, his ego couldn’t help but note, in the transformative joy a man in his position might have expected to see after a proposal. “Marry me? Marry you? Are you mad? On the strength of one night?”

“On the strength of your pregnancy. Because the Villela heir must be legitimate.” He looked at her as if he had never seen her before and would never see her again, or maybe it was simply that he did not wish to say the thing he knew he must. But that was life, was it not? Forever forcing himself to do what was necessary, what was right. Never what he wanted. So he took a deep breath. “We will marry. Quickly. And once that happens, I will never touch you again.”