Chapter Nine #2
He pushed into her slowly at first, eyes watching hers, as he braced himself over her, so her whole skin seemed to burst with the heat of the sun and her body felt tingly all over.
Air hissed from beneath her teeth as he moved deeper, and deeper, and finally, hitched himself all the way in, so she let out a slow moan as her muscles tightened and expanded to cope with his impressive size.
‘You feel so good, Rosemary. You’re so tight.’ His voice was more accented than normal, deep and husky. She could listen to him sounding like that all night.
She arched her back, riding the wave of euphoria that ebbed through her with the completeness that she felt in this moment. The sense that this was just exactly as it was meant to be.
He pulled out a little, so she dug her fingernails into his shoulder and he laughed, a deep husky sound that seemed to fill the room.
‘Please,’ she groaned, tilting her hips.
He drove into her, and she cried out. This time, there was nothing gentle or slow about his invasion. It was designed to shock and please, to bring her to a fever-pitch. Stars seemed to burst in her eyes.
‘Aristotle—’ she groaned, his name like a spell in her mouth, a magical incantation that seemed to echo with the fractured fullness of all the time that had gone before.
Then speech was impossible.
Thinking was a lost art.
All she was capable of was experiencing the unique, paralysing pleasure of this man she’d thought she hated, but had somehow agreed to marry. The man who had been front and centre of her most sexually charged dreams for many years.
They’d said that this was just sex, and it was.
It had to be. But in the back of her mind, she knew that nothing with them could ever truly be that simple.
Not because of their baby, but because of something else.
Something more. From the first moment they’d met, there’d been an undercurrent of understanding.
Even when they’d hardly known each other she’d felt that she did know him.
But there was no way she intended to dwell on those thoughts. Even if Rosie had been interested in an actual relationship—and she wasn’t—Aristotle would be the worst candidate on the face of the earth. Not least because he clearly had no interest in getting involved with anyone.
His body was collapsed on top of hers, their breathing ragged, dragged from them as though they’d run a marathon. Sweat sheened her skin and her hands ran distractedly down his back, on either side of his spine, as the fog of sensual satisfaction thickened and clung to her, sweet and addictive.
He pushed up onto one elbow and she instantly missed his body weight. His warmth. The feeling of his heart thumping against her.
His eyes met hers, then scanned her face, falling to her lips and hovering there, as his own quirked downwards, into a contemplative frown. His hand moved towards her brow, sweeping her hair back, then stayed just at her temple, fingers curled towards his palm.
‘You are beautiful.’ His voice had that same accented rawness she’d noticed earlier. Usually, he spoke English almost like a native, but right now, spent from what they’d just done, he was different.
She studied him, her heart jolting in her chest at the sight of him like that. Ever since she’d known him, she’d thought of him as wild and elemental. A man who seemed to exist half in this world and half in another, like some mythical creature.
But here, like this?
He was sheer, untamed, uncivilized man beast. And if she wasn’t very careful, she could get addicted to this—and him. Far from getting him out of her system, it would be so easy to crave this regularly.
Which she couldn’t allow to happen.
‘That was…great,’ she said, pleased her voice only sounded a little tremulous.
She pressed a hand to his chest, forcing herself to dig deep, to reinforce everything they’d agreed before.
To cling to it like a lifeline, because that resolve would save her.
It would keep this neat, just like they both wanted.
But his hand at her temple moved to her lips, stroking her there, before coming to rest on the mattress beside her.
‘Yes.’ Simple, but effective. Her heart rammed harder into her ribs. ‘You look worried.’
She blinked, surprised. ‘Do I?’
‘Are you?’
She stared at him, contemplated obfuscating. But they both needed to remember the boundaries. After what they’d just shared, it felt even more important to recommit to what they’d agreed.
‘I just want to be clear about what just happened,’ she said carefully.
‘I’m not someone who has casual sex with guys, so I don’t know how this is meant to work.
But the whole reason we’re getting married is to give our baby everything we want for them.
I know that’s not some messy, complicated situation. So…we need to be clear, and careful.’
His features were almost mocking. ‘Do you think I’m going to fall in love with you, Rosemary?’
Heat flushed her cheeks and she flicked her eyes heavenward. ‘I don’t think you’re capable of it,’ she quipped, not realising until that moment that she did, in fact, think that of him.
And the thought left her with a heaviness in her belly that she couldn’t seem to dispel.
‘You’re right,’ he said after a beat, his face carefully blanked of any emotion. ‘So there’s no risk here.’
Her lips pulled to the side. ‘Why are you like this?’
‘I could ask you the same question.’
‘You already know.’
‘So you’re going to be single forever because your parents’ marriage was a shitshow?’
She stared at him, frowning. ‘I’m marrying you,’ she pointed out.
‘For the sake of our baby. It’s not a death sentence.’
Her heart lurched. Stupidly, she hadn’t even thought about the duration of their marriage. She’d actually let the whole ‘till death do us part’ thing lodge in her brain and stay there.
‘What does that mean?’
He pushed up from her fully then, stretching to stand and looking down at her body as though needing one final sight, before he turned away and reached for his boxer briefs, pulling them on with that powerful athleticism that was innate to him.
‘It’s in the contract.’
She blinked at him.
‘A thousand years ago, or so it seems, I came in to get you to sign this.’
He looked around then reached to the ground, lifting up a stapled collection of white paper.
‘Prenuptial agreement?’
‘That’s part of it,’ he agreed. ‘Let’s go through it over dinner.’
They’d just shared an act of incredible intimacy, but with him now partially dressed and looking down at her as he resumed a calm, businesslike tone, she felt self-conscious all of a sudden.
She moved then, scrambling out of the bed and looking around for her own clothes.
They were spread too far. She unhooked the robe from the back of her door instead and wrapped it around her body, cinching it gently at the waist then letting her hand hover there, over their baby.
When she turned to face him, he was staring at her. At her stomach. A look on his features that took her breath away because it was so rich with emotion.
‘I still can’t believe it’s happening,’ he said, voice difficult to analyse. Deep and husky, rich with the same feelings that were stamped on his features.
She dropped her hand to the side. ‘It does seem… far-fetched.’
‘Improbable,’ he agreed with a nod.
‘I was on the pill, you know,’ she said. ‘I took it religiously. I never planned…’
A frown flickered across his face. ‘I didn’t think for one minute that you had.’
‘It’s just… I know some women might think this—and you—are the epitome of their dreams.’ She bit into her lip, thinking of her archaeological sites and the certainty she’d once had that those were where she belonged. For the first time in her life, she’d felt wanted and valued.
‘But you’re not one of them.’
‘It’s not you, per se—’
‘Ahh, it’s not you, it’s me.’
She smiled at that. ‘It’s my work.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Let’s have dinner—you’ll see there is a section in here that deals with that.’
The contracts were beyond thorough. Not only was there a section dealing with her work, and how they’d manage her travel needs with a baby—a combination of a nanny, his private jet and the understanding that she would avoid sites that held unacceptable risks to herself or the child—there seemed to be a section on pretty much everything.
‘This thing covers what happens if I die, you die, we divorce, we separate, we fight but don’t leave each other, where we choose to live, to send our child to school, make medical decisions, grandparent visitations, Christmas traditions. You’ve really thought of everything,’ she said.
He sat back in his chair, dressed casually in a T-shirt and jeans. ‘My legal team drafted it. Let’s talk about changes.’
She flicked through the thick wodge of papers.
At the back, there was a table of financial considerations, including an eye-watering trust fund he would set up for their child, as well as a stipend to be paid to Rosie.
It made her skin crawl, in a way. She’d worked for a long time; supporting herself was a part of that.
He’d implied in the past that her father might have married his mother for the money; she hated him to think that was a factor for her at all.
And yet, what were her options? She could do home-based work for a while, earning an income to cover her basic needs.
She had some savings on hand, though they were rapidly dwindling, thanks to her redecorating efforts.
‘I don’t want to rely on you,’ she blurted out after a beat, eyes fixed on the financial table. ‘I’ve worked since leaving school.’
He leaned forward then, his expression hawkish. ‘You’re about to have a baby.’
She nodded, brushing a hand over her stomach, heart twisting. ‘Lots of women still work.’
‘I have no issues with that. But your work is not exactly easy to accommodate with a child in tow. The provisions will make it manageable, though obviously we would need to limit the amount of time you are out of the country.’
She blinked at him.