Chapter 42
TRENT
Iwasn’t expecting her to be home when I pushed the front door open.
The apartment was quiet and I kicked off my shoes, mentally sorting through the conversation I’d had with Alex.
Just before I’d left, he’d told me he was leaving it up to me what parts I’d tell Charlotte now and what could maybe wait until tomorrow.
When I rounded the corner into the living room, my thoughts stalled and my feet came to an abrupt halt. Charlotte was curled up on the couch like someone had unplugged her. Her shoes were off, her legs tucked under her, and her hair mussed.
Her phone was in her lap, but the screen was dark. She wasn’t scrolling, just staring into the middle distance with her jaw tight. My chest constricted.
“Hey,” I said, because it was the only thing I could think of. “You’re home. I thought you’d still be out with Stella.”
She looked up so fast, it was like she’d been startled out of a deep sleep. “Yeah. Um. Headache. It came out of nowhere.”
Headache. Sure. Except her eyes didn’t look headache tired. They looked upset tired.
I dropped my keys on the side table and walked over slowly. “Did you have fun with Stella? It must’ve been good to see her after so long.”
“Yeah,” she said, but it sounded hollow. Empty. “It was nice. Good weather. We walked a lot. I think that’s what triggered the headache, walking so much while talking so much at the same time.”
“Mm.” I lowered myself onto the couch beside her. “Have you taken something for it?”
She nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be fine.”
She didn’t lean into me or tuck herself against my side like she usually did. She kept her arms folded, her shoulders tight, and every instinct I had went on high alert.
“We’re meeting some of your brothers for dinner later,” I reminded her gently. “Are you still up for that?”
“Hm? Oh. Yeah.” She blinked like she’d forgotten. “Definitely. I just needed to lie down for a bit.”
Lie down.
But she wasn’t in bed. She wasn’t resting. She was here, back early, and curled into herself like she would shatter if she stretched out.
“Did something happen?” I asked.
Her answering smile was small and brittle. “Yeah, something happened. I got a headache.”
Right. And I have the secret to eternal life.
I didn’t push, though. I knew her well enough to recognize that tone, so I shifted the subject, giving her a little space to climb out of whatever dark corner her head had wandered into.
“I talked to Alex,” I said quietly.
She straightened up a little, turning toward me and searching my face for a long moment before she finally nodded. “Yeah, I remember. How did that go?”
“It’s messy,” I admitted. “Gregory is playing dirty and it doesn’t look like he’s going to just give up.”
“And?” she asked, her voice soft and afraid. “What does that mean?”
“Not a damn thing.” I let out a breath. “I asked Alex to get me a meeting with him and if he won’t go for it, then we’ll work through your father, but the fact is that you and I are married, whether Gregory and your dad like it or not. We just need to deal with their bruised egos, is all.”
She nodded slowly but she didn’t look relieved. If anything, she looked even more drawn. I reached out and took her hand, surprised to find that it was really cold. “Charlotte?”
She didn’t pull away, but she didn’t squeeze back either and I sighed, ignoring the ache in my chest about being shut out like this. “I’m not going to pretend it’s not complicated, but I’m not letting anyone wedge themselves between us, okay?”
Her eyes flicked to mine. “I know.”
“But?” I pressed when she averted her gaze again only fractions of a second later. “I’m going to handle this, baby. Trust me.”
“I do. Of course, I trust you. There is no but.” She took a shaky breath. “It’s just that you shouldn’t have to keep fixing everything. You don’t have to handle everyone for me.”
“I know I don’t have to,” I said. “I want to.”
She looked down at our hands like she was trying to memorize the way our fingers looked laced together. A long silence stretched between us, thick and weighted. Something was wrong, bad wrong, and she wasn’t telling me. I felt it like static under my skin.
“I can see when you’re hurting,” I said quietly. “Even when you’re trying not to show it.”
Her throat bobbed as she swallowed, but she didn’t answer, so I squeezed her hand before bringing it to my lips and kissing the back of it. “We’re going to get through this together, Charlotte. Gregory is just one guy. We’re not going to let him beat us.
For a moment, she closed her eyes, making it seem like she was absorbing what I’d said. When she opened them again, she finally leaned into me, resting her head on my shoulder like she’d taken to doing when she needed comfort. I wrapped an arm protectively around her.
Something had happened today, and eventually, when she was ready, I’d find out what it was. As soon as I did, I’d handle it. Just like I’d promised, but for now, I’d just keep her tucked against me, warm, soft, and quiet, but not relaxed.
Not really. Her breathing was too shallow, her fingers too still on my arm. I could also practically feel her thinking.
When she looked up into my eyes again after a few long minutes, relief trickled through me, but it only lasted until she opened her mouth and said the last thing I’d been expecting to hear.
“Wouldn’t it just be easier if we considered this a loss and backed out?
I mean, we still have time to get the marriage annulled. ”
My whole body went cold.
“What?” I asked, because there was no universe in which I’d just heard that right.
She winced like the word itself had hurt, but she didn’t take it back. “I’m just saying that maybe we rushed into this and maybe it would be easier on both of us if—”
“No.” I shook my head. “Where the hell is this coming from?”
She tucked her hands into her sleeves, drawing her shoulders up defensively.
“I thought it would get easier after we got married, and for a little while, it did, but now, we’re basically right back where we started.
People are upset and there’s all this drama, and it’s my fault for pulling you into it all. ”
“That’s not an answer,” I said, heat creeping into my voice. I wasn’t angry at her though. I was really fucking pissed off at whatever had gotten into her head. “You’re dodging.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.” I took a steadying breath. “Why are you suddenly asking if we should get our marriage annulled?”
She looked away. “I just don’t want to keep putting you out. I don’t want you constantly having to fly back and forth between Chicago and the ranch, dealing with God knows what, only because of me. I know you have a life. Work. Family. You didn’t sign up for constant chaos.”
“I married you, so yes, actually, I did sign up for it,” I said slowly and deliberately. “It’s also not constant chaos, Charlotte. It’s been a couple of complicated weeks. That’s all.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yeah, I do. I’ve been right here through it all, choosing it day in and day out. We knew it wasn’t going to be all rainbows and daisies once your dad and Gregory found out what we’d done, but I’m still here and so are you.”
“That’s what I mean,” she said, her voice cracking at the edges and her eyes too shiny when they came up to meet mine. “You’re here now, but what if it keeps getting harder? What if it doesn’t stop? What if all of this just becomes too much?”
The pain hit fast and sharp because what she’d just said? That was the truth. The reason for all her careful words, the circling, and the deflecting.
After everything we’d been through, she still didn’t trust that I was staying. She still thought that she was somehow temporary to me. Disposable.
I sat back an inch, not because I wanted distance, but because I needed enough space to breathe past the sudden searing pain in my soul. “Do you want this, Charlotte?”
She blinked hard. “Trent—”
“Just answer me.”
She pressed her lips together. “I don’t want you put out.”
“I didn’t ask if you wanted to protect me.” My voice broke, not angry but raw. “I asked if you want this.”
Her shoulders curled like she was trying to make herself smaller, preparing to take a hit. “I want you to be happy.”
I exhaled sharply. She still wasn’t hearing me, so I leaned forward, caught her chin between my fingers, and made her look at me. “I’m not asking if you want the situation. I’m asking if you want me.”
A furrow appeared between her eyebrows, but as she stared up at me, I realized what she was really afraid of.
It wasn’t the drama or someone else’s reaction.
It was wanting me too much and losing me.
It was this notion that I’d pull away from her if things got too hard, those lies she’d grown up believing about how she had to be amenable and pleasant all the time to be considered worth the trouble.
Silently cursing Douglas again for his cold, you have to earn the love parenting style, I reached up and stroked my fingertips across her cheekbones. “That’s all I care about, Charlotte. What you want. And if you want me, then I’m not going anywhere.”
Her eyes flooded with something I couldn’t quite read, but when she finally found her voice, it came out small. “I do want you.”
Three little words. No hesitation, just truth, but then she blinked up at me with those wide, uncertain eyes, and I realized she thought that wasn’t enough. That wanting me didn’t mean she would get to have me.
“Sweetheart,” I breathed, shaking my head. “I really don’t care about all the trouble you think you’re causing me, because it’s no trouble at all. Not when it means getting to come home to you every day.”
She swallowed, her throat bobbing. “You’re going to get hurt if we keep doing this, Trent. Somehow, some way, they’re going to find a pressure point and push until you can’t take it—”
I cut her off with my mouth on hers, the kiss not rough or wild, but decisive and certain. “There is nothing they can do that will hurt me more than losing you.”
I kissed her again, letting her feel every ounce of truth in what I’d just said. When I finally pulled back, her lips were parted, her cheeks flushed, and her eyes soft enough to wreck a man.
“I want you,” I told her quietly, my thumbs brushing her jaw. “Not out of convenience, or because of your father, or business. Just you. You need to stop thinking of yourself as some kind of burden on me.”
She tried to argue. I could see it forming, but I didn’t let her get the words out.
Instead, I kissed the objection right off her lips and I didn’t stop until she was melting into me.
Her hands slipped up my chest, around my neck, her whole body leaning into mine like she was finally letting go of some impossible weight.
I lifted her easily, sliding my hands under her thighs as she wrapped her legs around me. She gasped when I stood, but her fingers stayed tangled in my hair, her forehead dropping against mine. “Trent.”
“Yeah,” I murmured as I carried her toward the bedroom, “I’m here.”
I nudged the door open with my hip and set her down gently on the edge of the bed. She looked up at me with vulnerability and heat and it damn near undid me.
“You’re my wife,” I said, brushing her hair back from her face. “You don’t get to talk like you’re some inconvenience I’m tolerating. I chose you. I keep choosing you. I want you to let me take care of you. I want you to want that.”
She shivered, a little breath leaving her in a way that told me she did want all of it, but she was still scared to believe it. Her eyes fluttered shut as I kissed down her neck, her hands sliding under my shirt, tracing my spine with a kind of desperation that made my pulse spike.
“Tell me you want me,” I murmured against her skin, not because I doubted her but because I wanted her to feel it. To own it. “Tell me you want this.”
Her fingers tightened in my hair. “I do. I always do.”
“Good. Because I’m not planning on giving you an inch of space to doubt it again.”
I laid her back slowly, kissing her like she was oxygen and I’d been holding my breath all damn day. Everything else, the lawyers, Gregory, the threats, the paperwork, and the pressure slid right out of my mind the second she arched into me, trusting me with every inch of herself.
She was pure warmth under my hands. Pure want. And she was all mine.
Something had definitely happened while she’d been out with Stella. I could feel it in the way she clung to me and how she kissed like she was terrified I might disappear, but I wasn’t going to ask again.
Not right now. Not when she was finally relaxing into me instead of retreating. Later, I’d get it out of her and I’d handle whatever the hell it was, but I was done with the drama, the strategy, and the legal threats. Done with everyone else’s demands.
All I wanted right now was my wife, and she was warm, willing, and trembling beneath me. I lowered myself over her, my breath mingling with hers and every muscle tight with need. I would have to cancel dinner with her brothers, but I’d do that later.
For now, I wanted to bury myself deep inside her and forget the outside world even existed—and that was exactly how I planned on spending my night. Everything and everyone else could wait just a little fucking while.
Just this once, I wasn’t going to let anything steal my attention from my wife. Not even her family or the brothers who had gotten me into this whole mess to begin with.