18. Genevieve
18
GENEVIEVE
W hen I wake up in the morning, Rowan is already up.
I hear him downstairs, probably making coffee. He’ll come back upstairs before too long—he always does to make sure I can get down to the main floor without trouble. In a couple more weeks, I’ll be able to get the cast off, and I’ll be able to move around on my own much more easily. I’m looking forward to it, if only so I have more independence.
Biting my lip, I shift in bed, feeling the lingering stickiness between my thighs from last night. I glance at the clock, seeing the date, and I wait for relief to wash over me that I won’t have to sleep with him again for weeks.
Instead, I feel a pang of disappointment, one that I try to quickly push away.
My muscles all protest as I sit up. I’m sore in places that I’d forgotten I could be sore in. Rowan has been relentless for the last week, and I’ve allowed it, because that was the whole point, right? I’m supposed to get pregnant, and there’s no better way to accomplish that than by having as much sex as possible during the right time of the month.
I wasn’t supposed to enjoy it .
I tried to tell myself that I didn’t. That it wasn’t that good, that I’d be glad when my obligation for the month was over. But the truth was that every time he made me come, I wanted to let go. I wanted to moan his name and claw the sheets and feel what it would be like to let him make me totally unravel. And when I didn’t, every time, I felt like there was a cage around me, suffocating me a little bit more with every night that passed. A cage that I locked myself inside, and that I could let myself out of any time I chose.
Letting out a sharp breath, I sit up, shoving the blankets aside. There’s no point in thinking about it now. With any luck, it won’t happen again. Rowan certainly has a high enough opinion of his own virility, so maybe that will manifest in him getting me pregnant immediately. Maybe it won’t even be a question of whether or not I’m missing out, because last night will be the last time.
I bite my lip as I hobble to the shower, trying not to think about how it felt to have him inside of me last night, or all of the nights before that. How perfectly he fit inside of me. How hard it was to follow my own rules and not reach out and touch him.
Rules that I set for a reason. And every time I ache to touch him, or kiss him, or let myself feel everything that he could make me feel, I’m reminded of exactly why those rules exist.
But there are other things, too, that make it difficult. Rowan might be a playboy, a reckless partier with a past that could turn a stripper’s hair white, but that’s not the side of him I see. Since I’ve met him, he’s been relentless, irritating, and high-handed, yes. But he’s also been thoughtful. Gentle. Kind. He never leaves the apartment until he’s sure I’m settled for the day and I won’t need to go up and down the stairs for anything. He’s told me over and over that the penthouse is mine, too, and that I’m welcome to have my friends over, to do whatever I like. To redecorate, if I wanted to—even though I have no intention of it. I like the place the way it is.
Every relationship I’ve ever had has been for the purpose of making sure I was taken care of. That my needs were met, and I could focus on my goals instead of survival. They were all practical, just like this one.
But this is the first time I’ve ever felt really taken care of. The only time I’ve ever felt safe.
And I’m no closer to figuring out what I want to do after this is over.
Rowan helps me downstairs when I get out of the shower, bringing me coffee and a cherry danish from the bakery down the street, before getting his things to leave. “I might be a bit late,” he says, slinging a leather messenger bag over his shoulder. “My father wants me to meet with Dimitri and Antony soon, and he’s drilling me hard in preparation for that. If you need anything, just call. But I’ll be at the estate until at least dinnertime.”
I nod, feeling an odd jab in my chest. I look at him, unable to hide the glimmer of suspicion in my eyes. When he comes home tonight, we’ll be going to sleep, and nothing else. What if…
Rowan pauses, his eyes skimming over my face. “There’s no one else, lass,” he says finally, taking in and letting out a deep breath. “I promised you, and that’s that. I’ll be coming home to you tonight, regardless.”
Regardless of the fact that you won’t touch me. He doesn’t say it, but I hear it all the same. He hesitates, as if he wants to cross the room and kiss me goodbye, but instead he turns and walks out, the sound of the door closing louder than it should be.
I swallow hard. He hasn’t kissed me since our brief kiss at the altar on our wedding day. My rule. A rule that makes sense every time I think about it, and yet…
I keep wishing I could break it.
He comes home late, like he said, but there’s no whiff of perfume on his clothes. No hint that he’s being anything but truthful with me. We go to bed, and as Rowan slides in next to me, I feel a throb of desire ripple through me.
I want to reach out and touch him. I want to run my fingers through his copper hair and pull him in for a kiss. I want to feel his body against mine—hot and hard and muscular—wrap my legs around him even though we’re past the time when he could get me pregnant, and feel him fill me up again. My body clenches at the thought, feeling hollow, aching for him.
I roll over on my side and go to sleep.
Days pass, and we find a rhythm. The days turn into weeks, and I see them tick by on my calendar, pushing closer and closer to when I’m meant to get my period. I go to my doctor’s appointments. I do whatever workouts I can with my leg in a cast, stretching and trying to maintain my flexibility. I get better than I ever wanted to be at walking on crutches.
I try not to think about dancing. I try not to think about Rowan’s bare chest, rippling with muscle. I try not to think about the things I can’t have and shouldn’t want—the things that will hurt me when I have to accept that they’re gone forever if I let myself want them now.
The date on my calendar when I should start my period ticks by. One day. Two. I’m officially late, and I tell myself that the next morning, I’ll get Dahlia to bring me a pregnancy test. And then I wake up the next morning, go to the bathroom, and see blood.
Before I can fully internalize what that means, a jolt of excitement ripples through me. We get to try again , I think, before I realize that what I should be thinking is we have to try again .
“Can Rory take me to the store?” I ask Rowan when he comes up to help me downstairs. As good as I’ve gotten on the crutches, neither of us likes for me to navigate the twisting stairs in the apartment by myself. It would be too easy to slip, get a crutch caught between them, and break something else.
“Sure.” Rowan shrugs. “Or I can have him just run out for you?—”
I shake my head quickly. “I’d rather get it myself.”
He looks at me, and I see the split second of confusion before it dawns on him. And I see that momentary flash of anticipatory excitement in his eyes, the same thing I felt in that split second before I remembered that I’m supposed to want to be pregnant, not the other way around.
“Ah.” He nods. “Well then. I suppose we’ll have to try again soon, won’t we?” His green eyes meet mine, and I can see the heat in them. The need .
How is it that he still wants me so badly, when I’ve given him so little?
I swallow hard. “I guess so.”
“A shame, isn’t it, taibhseach ?” Rowan’s gaze doesn’t leave mine. I lick my lips, and I see his eyes drop to my mouth.
“What is?” My voice comes out higher than I’d like it to, and a smirk twitches at the corners of his mouth. He leans in, his mouth close to my ear.
“That you’ll have to spend another week pretending that I don’t make you come every time my cock’s inside of you.”
I nearly slap him. He pulls back, his eyes dancing with laughter, and I glare at him. “You?—”
“Mull over all the insults you want to yell at me, lass,” Rowan says with a laugh. “I’ll tell Rory you need to go to the store. He’ll take you right after he comes back from dropping me off.”
I press my lips together and say nothing. A part of me wants to try to insist that he doesn’t make me come, that I haven’t come a single time with him… but it would be a lie. Just like it would be a lie to say that my heart isn’t already beating faster at the thought of another week doing just that.
As promised, Rory takes me to the store when he gets back from dropping Rowan off at the estate. I spend a little time hobbling through the aisles, the movement on my crutches much easier now. I get tampons and chocolate and a bottle of wine, since I know I’m not pregnant for now, and linger at the book aisles for a few minutes. I waffle between a romance that I’ve been wanting to read and a thriller, and end up picking the thriller. The last thing I want right now, I reason, is to read about someone else’s scintillating love life. I don’t need anything to get me more hot and bothered than Rowan already does, whether I want him to or not.
And I don’t, I remind myself as I check out, swiping the credit card he left me. I really don’t .
My phone buzzes as I get back to the penthouse, and I ignore it, focusing on not tripping as Rory and I head inside. He carries my purchases in for me, setting them down on the counter, and I thank him before fishing my phone out of my pocket as it buzzes again. I expect it to be a text from Rowan, or maybe something from Evelyn or Dahlia.
Instead, my heart stutters in my chest as I see Chris’s name flash on the screen. And then it flashes again, and again, a series of texts that come in one right after the other.
Chris: Did you think I forgot about what happened, bitch?
Chris: I haven’t.
Chris: I heard the wedding went off without a hitch. Enjoy married life while you can.
Chris: I’m not going to forget.
I swallow hard, staring down at the phone. I had hoped he’d forgotten. That his threats were as empty as I believed them to be—as I still, deep down, really think they are.
Chris: You think you’re happy with that Irish asshole? You’ll regret leaving me for him. I swear to fucking God, bitch, you’re going to regret it. No one humiliates me like that and gets away with it.
I suck in a breath, dropping my phone on the counter. I stare at the text, rereading it, knowing deep down that I should call Rowan. I should tell him about this. But realistically, what is Chris going to do?
When he showed up at Dahlia’s and we argued there, he said I have no idea the kind of connections he has. But what connections could those really be? “He’s a fucking hedge fund manager,” I mutter out loud, looking at the string of texts. “He has money, but…”
Rowan is mafia. Dimitri and Alek are Bratva. They’re all more powerful than Chris or any of his connections, surely. Who would interfere with them, or do anything to anger them? How could he possibly think he really has a leg to stand on when I’m the wife of the heir to the Irish mafia in New York?
“He’s just blowing smoke.” I look at the phone again. “He has to be.”
And if I show these texts to Rowan…I don’t know if he’s as violent as Alek, if he’d actually kill Chris, but he’d hurt him. He’d go after him and beat him to a bloody pulp for this—I feel sure of that. And what would that accomplish, other than just making Chris even angrier? He’s being a piece of shit, but plenty of people have piece-of-shit ex-boyfriends.
That doesn’t mean that they should sic the mafia on them.
I grab my phone, clicking the screen off, and shove it back in my pocket. I can’t help but feel that I don’t belong in this world, that it’s definitely for the best that my marriage to Rowan is temporary. I didn’t hate that Rowan knocked him out cold after Chris slapped me, but anything beyond that…
I can’t fathom the level of violence that I know would be unleashed if I showed any of the men in my life those texts. And while a small part of me, deep down, likes the idea that Rowan would violently defend me… that doesn’t mean I actually want it to happen.
Just that the fantasy is kind of nice.
My phone buzzes again, but I don’t look at it. All I want is to stop thinking, for a little while, about how much of a mess my life has become. I want to curl up with my wine and my chocolate and my book, and make the world disappear for a little while, instead of thinking about everything that I can’t control right now—like my crazy ex, or the end of my career.
Or the husband that I’m not supposed to want, but can’t stop thinking about.