Chapter 13 Aisling
AISLING
One moment, Raf is moving inside me, lighting an inferno in my soul like he’s trying to burn through five years of anger and lust in one furious stroke.
The next, his entire body tenses—then crumples, heavy and unresponsive, on top of me.
“Raf?” My breath stutters, my pulse still frantic in the aftermath of release, my ears ringing with the intensity of it.
I was so overwhelmed by my own earth-shattering orgasm, I couldn’t say if he came or not, but I can tell something’s wrong as he instantly becomes dead weight. “Raf—”
The weight of him crushes the air from my chest as his head drops to my shoulder, breath hot, uneven. And then he mutters something, slurred and soft, the syllables dragging against my ear like a razor.
“Genevieve…”
Every nerve in my body jolts, and I freeze—every muscle, every thought. Then ugly realization comes crashing down on me. Raf was thinking about another woman, wanting another woman, while he was inside me.
My heart twists so violently, it feels like it might just rip from my chest.
He goes fully limp, unconscious, and something inside me cracks with a soft, silent sound, like glass under slow pressure.
For one trembling beat, I just lie there, staring at the ceiling like maybe it’ll crack open and swallow me whole. I’m still pulsing from the aftermath of what we just did, my body undone and loose, but suddenly, I feel sick, heavier than his weight on top of me.
I shove weakly at his shoulder. “Get off.”
He doesn’t move.
Of course he doesn’t. He’s drunk and probably concussed and apparently dreaming about someone else—someone whose name pours off his lips like a benediction.
I grit my teeth hard, plant my palms against the solid warmth of his chest, and twist out from under him.
The withdrawal is abrupt, cold, violent in its finality. He flops onto his back, arm sprawled across his forehead, mouth parted. Dead to the world.
I pull my knees to my chest for a second, staring at him through the haze of shock and humiliation.
“You absolute bastard,” I whisper, voice shredded.
A bitter laugh pushes up my throat, fractured and cruel, but it dies before it escapes.
My eyes sting. My vision blurs. My pride is screaming at me to get it together, but I can’t.
I can’t stop feeling the way he held me, touched me, kissed me like he’d been starving for me.
Like he wanted me. Like he remembered all the most intimate parts of me.
And all the while, he was thinking of her—Genevieve.
The name clings to me like tar.
God, what an idiot I am. I’m truly, sincerely, spectacularly stupid. I let him pull me into something wild and consuming, something that felt like five years collapsing into one moment—and he wasn’t even fully here. Not with me. Not really.
He didn’t even know who he was fucking. Or maybe he did and he was just pretending it was her.
A shaky breath tears out of me as I grab a throw blanket from the foot of the bed and wrap it around myself.
My legs feel weak, used, and my chest aches as I stumble toward the bathroom, needing distance from him.
The cold tiles sting my feet as I step inside. I flick on the light, and the brightness is cruel. It shows everything—the flush of my skin, my bruised, swollen lips, the faint indentation of his grip on my hips, the way I tremble in the wake of his touch.
I look wrecked, like the pathetic excuse for a woman who let the same man break her twice.
A raw sound claws up my throat, and I slap the light off and step into the shower, turning the water on as hot as it will go.
Steam fills the room quickly, swallowing me whole.
Sliding down the wall, I curl up on the shower floor, arms wrapped tightly around my knees.
The water drums against my shoulders, a relentless rhythm that should be soothing but isn’t.
Not tonight.
My vision blurs again.
“Idiot,” I breathe, forehead pressed to my knees. “You absolute, hopeless moron.”
My tears burn as they finally spill, mixing with the water until I can’t tell the difference. I let myself fall apart in the privacy of the steam, my sobs drowned by the roar of the water.
How could I have lost sight of myself so quickly, so completely?
I can’t believe I let him kiss me, let him fuck me, not after everything that’s happened, not when I know who he truly is inside.
I cry until my throat aches and my eyes are puffy, until my skin is pruned and hot and raw and the humiliation has wrung every last drop of breath from my lungs.
Genevieve. The name won’t stop echoing inside my skull.
Who is she? And why did he say her name like it meant something? Like it carved him open?
I don’t know. And I’m not sure I’m ready to find out. Not after I just handed him my heart on a silver platter—again—and he crushed it beneath his shoe without a second thought.
Eventually, when my muscles are trembling from exhaustion rather than emotion, I shut off the water and wrap myself in a towel. I don’t look in the mirror. I can’t.
When I return to the bedroom, Raf is still sprawled across the bed, naked body so lean and muscular and devastatingly perfect despite the purple bruises spreading across his cheek and ribs that it makes my chest ache.
His brow is faintly furrowed, like he’s dreaming something dark. His chest rises and falls steadily.
He looks peaceful.
My stomach turns.
Grabbing a pair of pajamas from the dresser, I pull them on with shaking fingers, then round the corner of the bed and slip beneath the covers, staying as far from him as possible.
But I can still hear the muffled sound of his breathing, smooth, even, and indifferent. And as I lie awake for hours, mind lost in a tangle of regret and self-loathing, it feels like he’s taunting me with his implacable calm.
The light filtering through the window wakes me early the next morning, and I groan at the headache throbbing between my temples after a night of too much whiskey.
My eyes are gritty, scratchy, swollen. My mouth is parched, my lips chapped.
Every inch of me feels bruised from emotional whiplash.
And a lump forms in my throat as I feel the pulsing ache between my thighs—a reminder of how completely Raf fucked me last night.
I sit up as the sound of the shower turning off alerts me to the fact that he must already be awake, and my heart stutters at the thought of facing him this morning.
I’m not sure I’ll be able to without crying, and the last thing I want to do is look weak in front of the man who knows how to break me so easily.
But before I can make myself scarce, he’s stepping through the archway, a towel slung low around his hips, showing off the deep, enticing V that directs my eyes toward his covered cock.
“Morning,” Raf says, his lips curving into that crooked smirk when he catches me staring at him. He looks like a man without a care in the world. No sign of guilt. No sign of remembering the way he touched me last night—or how he used me to fulfill his fantasies about Genevieve.
I’m grateful, in a twisted way. It’ll make it easier to bury all of this.
“Morning,” I rasp, my voice like gravel, and I clear my throat as I slip quietly into the bathroom to wash my face.
We dance quietly around each other, me avoiding Raf’s eyes at all costs while I dress in jeans and a fitted sweater, then twist my hair into a loose braid that drapes over my shoulder.
Raf’s voice pulls me up short as I head toward the bedroom door.
“Where are you off to in such a rush this morning?” he asks, crossing the room in three long strides to open the door and follow me down the hall.
“What do you care?” I ask stiffly, keeping my eyes focused forward.
His voice is irritatingly normal when he says, “I thought I might join you for coffee.”
I don’t trust myself to speak, so I just nod.
We walk in silence toward the freshly renovated dining room, and I force myself to take slow, deliberate breaths in an attempt to calm my racing heart, but all I succeed in doing is catching the scent of him.
He smells fresh, clean—mint combined with amber, bergamot, and cedarwood—infuriatingly good. I hate that it still gets to me.
He steps ahead once more to open the door for me, hand brushing the small of my back as if he intends to let it rest there, and I jerk away instinctively, swatting at his hand.
“Don’t touch me,” I hiss.
Seeming startled by the venom in my voice, Raf stops short, his eyebrow quirking.
I don’t even look at him as I add, “Did you forget this marriage is fake? Save the displays of affection for when others are around.”
He inhales sharply, and when I glance at him, I catch a flicker of surprise in his hazel eyes before it’s snuffed out.
He nods once, controlled. “Of course.”
Lifting my chin, I lead the way into the dining room.
The long table is already set, sunlight pouring across polished wood, and as Raf pulls out a chair for me, I ignore him, heading straight for the far end of the table—as far from him as possible.
He stands behind the chair for a moment, studying me, trying to read me.
Then with a long-suffering sigh, he follows me to the far end of the table, where he pulls out the chair right beside me—just to piss me off.
He finally sits, posture straight and impeccable. “We have a charity gala in a few weeks,” he says quietly, keeping the topic of conversation for my ears only as he gets down to business.
My eyes lift briefly to meet his, then I turn with deliberate indifference to see if breakfast will be served shortly—just in time for one of the maids to enter with a tray full of fruit.
“It’ll be our first public appearance as a united front. Every family who matters will be there, the Tanakas included.” His jaw tics once. “So it will be a perfect opportunity for us to get under Tatsuo’s skin.”
I take a sip of the coffee another staff member sets in front of me, already prepared just the way I like it.
I might hate Raf, but I have quickly come to appreciate the people who work for him. “Of course.”
His gaze narrows a fraction. “I believe your family will be attending as well. Perhaps you can do a better job of convincing them that we’re getting along this time around.”
Relief floods me at the thought of seeing my family—not just my brothers but my parents, Siobhan, and Riley too.
It’s only been a few weeks, but I already miss them desperately.
“Well,” I say lightly, “That should be easy, given how close we’re becoming.
Right, my love?” I pour on the saccharine sweetness until we’re alone in the room once more.
Then I let my face fall into a cold, flat expression.
“I just hope you’re ready to keep up the whole ‘loving husband’ act for an entire evening.
I imagine it must be taxing, given how foreign the feeling must come to you. ”
Raf’s stare sharpens. “I can pretend to love you just fine, Aisling.”
My breath stutters—not from the words, but the precision of them, the way they land. My throat tightens, but I force a shrug. “Wonderful. Then we’re on the same page. Now, unless you have something more to discuss with me, I think I’d prefer to enjoy my coffee in our room. Alone.”