Chapter Nine #3
‘Yes,’ she confirmed, with a raised eyebrow, daring him to ask for even more damn clarifications.
He opened his mouth and closed it again, and honestly if it wasn’t for how insecure it made her feel, the entire thing would almost be funny.
She’d not exactly ever thought herself to be in the position of negotiating billion-dollar deals one minute and then half of a marital bed the next. But here she was, doing precisely that.
‘You said we’d work together. I want that. We’re married. We’re a team. And we’re going to be parents, to our child, who will need us to be together.’
‘Starting…?’
‘Is there a reason it shouldn’t be tonight?’ she asked with a lot more bravado than she felt. She was beginning to regret her decision to confront him about it. Until she remembered the hollow ache in her chest only the night before.
‘No?’
‘Is that a question or an answer Micha, because honestly—’
‘No, it’s an answer.’
‘As in no you won’t let me share your bed? Micha, I swear you make things so unnecessarily—’
‘Are you finished?’ he asked, coming to his full height, holding his hand out for her to take.
Now she was the one with her mouth hanging open like a fish, which she promptly shut with a snap. She looked up at him, knowing that this was new for them. New territory, new dynamics.
This is what you wanted, right?
Wanted? No. Needed? Yes.
And she did need it. They both did.
She placed her hand in his, heart beating, and let him gently pull her up from the seat.
They were closer than they’d been even at the church as they shared their vows.
From here, she could see the little jagged line of silver through his right eyebrow and stupidly wanted to trace it with her thumb.
But couldn’t. Couldn’t because she had to claw to claim only just a little.
Because she got the sense that if she moved too quickly, or too far, he’d disappear from her like a mirage.
The golden flecks in his eyes spun out like a snowstorm, making her wonder at all the words he was thinking that couldn’t get past his ironclad control.
‘Are you ready?’ he asked, swiftly adding ‘to sleep,’ as if she needed the clarification.
She nodded, truthfully, as a wave of near exhaustion threatened to overwhelm her, and let him lead her back down the stairs to the bedroom.
She held herself back on the threshold, knowing she had no right to ask, but unable to move forward until she had.
‘Have you…have you, with other women?’ Oh god, why was she making such a hash of this?
‘No. No one else has been in this bed, save me.’
Micha didn’t know whether he’d needed to say it as much as she’d needed to hear it, but he felt some of the tension ease following his statement.
He’d expected her to scoff, or question him, but he realised that that expectation wasn’t actually based on this Maria.
But the Maria from before. The middle Maria, he was beginning to think of as the person he’d avoided for eleven years.
The one that had, whenever they’d come into contact, bit and hissed like a cat.
This Maria was different and different again to the young Maria he’d once known, and maybe he owed it to both them and their unborn child to get to know her.
‘You can use the bathroom first if you’d like?’ he offered, and she nodded and took her toiletries into the bathroom that was accessed from back out in the hall.
He stared at the bed almost resentfully.
He’d planned to sleep on the sofa, obviously not enough of a bastard to make his pregnant wife unhappy.
But she’d been unhappy the night of her wedding.
His conscience twisted. Angry, furious, frustrated, all things he was very familiar with feeling over the last eleven years. But he’d not once felt bad.
Until now.
She’d had to ask for a damn honeymoon.
She’d felt like a stranger in his home, which—of course—she would have.
He was on the brink of really messing things up. He could feel it.
He imagined her washing her face, brushing her teeth, these deeply intimate moments of married life that others took for granted, and he just didn’t know whether he was hiding in this room because he didn’t want that, or because he wanted it so badly.
The door behind him pushed open, and her face glistened like dew, all make-up removed. She was wearing a little vest thing and a pair of silk black pants and she’d never looked more beautiful.
‘I’ll just…’ he trailed off and backed out to the bathroom, the minty scent of her toothpaste in the air, the sink wet from where she’d run the taps.
He gripped the vanity, knuckles white, head bowed.
Get it together. Get it goddamn together.
Sharing a bed with Maria would be the sweetest of tortures. To be that close to her, her warmth, the smoothness of her skin. Not once had he forgotten the feel of her beneath his hands, on his tongue, around him.
She’d asked him for a real relationship, but in order for him to give that to her, he was going to have to let her in.
But he wasn’t sure he could do that. He’d barely survived the last time they’d broken up.
Gio and the work he’d made Micha do was the only thing that had pulled him through the days, weeks and months that followed his move to Paris.
Only, this time there wasn’t even a choice. They were going to have a child.
I’ll do whatever it takes.
His own words, delivered as a threat, come back to haunt him.
A short while later he returned to the bedroom to find Maria already under the covers, the night lamp on that side of the room already switched off.
He sat heavily on the opposite side of the bed.
‘Is this okay?’ she asked quietly. ‘I don’t know what side—’
‘It’s fine,’ he hastily assured her, wincing when he realised he’d cut her off.
‘Oh. Okay. Good night then.’
‘Good night, Maria,’ he said, as he slipped beneath the covers, the distance between them an insurmountable divide. The fear that, in the night, he might accidentally reach for her terrified him. His muscles locked, not even wanting to breathe loudly in case it disturbed her.
Long into the night and the early morning, he remained awake, planning the honeymoon she’d asked for as something to do. He would absolutely do what she wanted, the honeymoon, the new home, the fresh start…but he knew with a high degree of certainty that he’d lose his heart in the process.
Just like he had before.