Chapter Fourteen
She could sense the change in him. He was pretending that nothing was wrong, and it was baffling her.
He had experienced a near personality switch after they had found out that the baby was going to be a boy, and then his mother had called him, and he had refused to give her any details about it.
But he was obviously upset. But also not flying to Vienna.
She had the chef at the estate make them a celebratory meal. She was happy they were having a boy. She would’ve been happy with anything, of course, but it was the way that it felt more real now. The way that she felt like she could actually picture their child.
A little boy like Romeo.
It made her heart ache. She loved them both so much. She loved this vision of their future. But the distance between herself and her husband felt…awful.
That was the thing that scared her the most.
But he was becoming more withdrawn, and the later that it got, the more pronounced that became.
He practically didn’t speak during their meal.
And when they were finished they began to walk toward the bedroom they were sharing, and as soon as the door closed, he kissed her.
Hard and punishing. This was Romeo as he had been months ago.
The man who had taken her like he was possessed.
This was how he had been on their wedding night. Something was wrong. This wasn’t gentle.
This was something else. Possessive, intense. Angry.
“Romeo,” she said.
“Heather,” he responded, wrapping her hair around his hand and pulling her head back, kissing her neck, her throat, down to her collarbone.
She gasped. Because even though she felt like there was something wrong, she was a slave to this. A slave to him. To the intensity of the desire between them. It was too good.
He looked up at her, something haunted in his dark eyes, and then he grabbed the edges of her blouse and tore it open, exposing her breasts.
She hadn’t worn a bra today, because everything was ill fitting and she hadn’t had a chance to get something more comfortable.
And judging by the light in his eyes, he appreciated that.
“That’s what I thought. I was staring at your breasts, trying to see if you had anything underneath. I thought that I saw your nipples get tight anytime I got near you. You want me,” he said, desperation carving an edge into his voice.
“Of course I do. I’ve always wanted you.”
“It’s a sickness. For you just like it is for me.”
She gripped his face, and stared into his eyes. “It’s not a sickness. It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
He growled, like a wounded beast, and pressed his hand between her shoulder blades, arching her back toward him and lowering his head so that he could suck a nipple deep into his mouth.
It was nearly violent, the edge to his desire gloriously unhinged.
And she was caught between the desire to soften it and to push them further.
To reassure him, or to give him a place where he could have whatever he needed.
She realized it wasn’t one or the other. It was like they had been trying to make it one or the other. All this time.
Their days were soft, their nights filled with passion. But she wanted to get back to their honeymoon. Where every moment had been both.
And he seemed desperate to draw all these lines.
She knew why. It was clear that everything with his parents was painful.
Complicated. It was clear that it had created a situation where something about emotional intimacy terrified him.
She didn’t fully understand. But she wanted to.
And if this was the doorway, then she had to let him open it like this.
If this was what he needed, then she needed to let them have it.
Needed to let it go all the way, because somehow she had a feeling that on the other side of it she would find that way to him.
That perhaps this would demolish the wall just enough for her to climb over.
Or maybe she just wanted him. All of him. His good, his ugly. His hard and his soft. His rough and his tender. She certainly didn’t want it from anyone else.
She was incapable of it. He forced her down onto her knees, and she trembled as he undid his belt. There was a place for making him beg. But there was a place for her to beg as well, and she knew that this was the moment.
“Please,” she said. “Let me have you.”
“You want this,” he said, gripping himself at the base and bringing his hardness to her lips.
“Yes,” she said. “I do.”
“Even when I’m like this?”
“Especially when you’re like this.”
He pushed his way into her mouth, and began to thrust hard against the back of her throat. Every moment that they’d resisted was leading to this. Not to that first time, but to this moment.
He was pushing her. He was testing her, and she was going to pass. She was going to do more than pass. Because she didn’t just tolerate this. She loved it. She wanted it all.
He wasn’t too powerful for her. If anything, she was too powerful for him, and this moment was proving it.
Because he was at the end of himself, and he needed her. Needed her strength. Needed her touch.
She could be there for him. She would.
He pulled her mouth away, and brought her back up to her feet, kissing her, deep and hard and bruising.
She gasped as he reached around and cupped her ass, squeezing her tight before turning her away from him, wrapping her hair around his hand again as he bent her over the bed. “Ask for it,” he said.
“Please,” she said. “Please take me.”
He thrust into her from behind, one hand on her hip, the other holding her hair fast as he lost himself inside of her. As he pushed them both to the brink.
This was what he needed.
This was what they both needed.
He released her hair, reached around and gripped her chin, held her face and turned it back toward him as he leaned down to kiss her, violently as he continued to thrust inside of her. Like he was reminding himself of who he was with. As if he needed the reminder.
“Romeo,” she said, saying his name because she knew that it would undo him. Because she knew that however much he was more powerful than her physically, she had a different power altogether.
He growled, leaned down and bit her shoulder as he thrust hard into her one last time, coming hard as he pushed her right over with him. He rested his forehead against her back, and she could feel the sweat on his brow. Could feel all of his intensity. All of his anger. Everything.
She turned, uncoupling with him and kissing him deep on his lips, moving her hands through his hair. “I love you,” she whispered against his mouth.
His whole body shivered.
“I do,” she whispered. “I love you. Do you know how much? That’s why we can be friends. That’s why we can be friends and we can be this. We can be both and everything.”
He pressed his forehead against the curve of her neck. “My mother had another episode today.”
“And you didn’t fly to Vienna?”
“No. I didn’t. Because today had to be about our child. Because everything has to be about our child.”
“I don’t agree,” she said. “I’m glad that you did that. But I hope that you did it for you. Because you’re allowed to live, Romeo. Your life matters apart from her. It just does. And you shouldn’t be made to feel like you have to drop everything to give her whatever she needs.”
“You understand. It’s me. I’m not any different from her.”
“You’re very different from her. You are not fragile.”
“No. I’m angry. So is she, and she has mental illness on top of it, so the way that she chooses to express it is different. The way that she is able to express it is different. But I am petty, and I am vindictive. Look at the way that I treated you all throughout school.”
“We were young. And you were going through things.”
“Yes. It’s true. I was. But I don’t know another way to be. And that is the honest truth. I do not know another way. And I know what it’s like to be held hostage by someone whose emotions are… It’s her. I did to my own father, after all.”
“You were a teenage boy. We spoke about this already. Your father should’ve reconciled things between the two of you.”
“Maybe. But I was also prepared to hold him at arm’s length forever. Punishment. I cannot believe that version of myself. I will not be what my mother has been to our child. I will not be that to you. Every strong emotion I have turned sour. And I will not subject you to that.”
“Maybe you should ask me what I want to be subjected to. Maybe you don’t get to make all the decisions.”
“It isn’t about controlling you. It’s about controlling myself. And I… You will fall out of love with me. This I guarantee you.”
“No,” she said. “I won’t.”
Pain tore at her chest. Because she wanted to stay with him forever.
She really did. They had a whole agreement.
And suddenly, the agreement didn’t matter anymore.
Because it wasn’t about a set of ideal circumstances that they were creating for their baby.
It was about what the two of them could have.
And what he wasn’t allowing because he was so afraid.
But she couldn’t carry on like that. So she was going to have to make this into something he couldn’t control.
Because that’s what he was trying to do.
She understood now. He was just so afraid of the strength of all of this.
So he was trying to separate things. His mother, her, their passion versus their friendship.
And this reality of having a child was what had pushed him over the edge. It was what had made it all too much.
She could understand that. She could sympathize with him.
But she couldn’t enable it. She simply couldn’t.
Not when they could have everything. And if he was going to draw lines so that he could hide behind them, so that he could give them both the least of what they could have, then she wasn’t going to be complicit in that.