Chapter Seven #2
Even in the little illumination, he could see the shock in her eyes. “Why did you go to such trouble?”
“I only plan to get married once, querida, and I thought it a fitting tribute to your grandparents’ memory to have it at their house.”
She pushed at him with an angry growl. “Don’t play games with me, Caio.
Please. This...what you’re proposing, it can’t have anything to do with Thaata or OneTech or anything else.
It has to be about you and me. If not, if you’re playing with my feelings for any other reason, then you’re.
..you’re a monster and I’d never forgive you. ”
Her gaze held his in a silent, soft challenge and yet her words struck him hard at his core.
Mira’s words came to him and he marveled at how well she knew Nush.
If he got this wrong, if he ruined this between him and Nush, if he fractured her faith in him, it would shatter her and that in return would destroy him.
At a level from which he’d never recover.
It was a risk with odds set high for failure because he could never give Nush all of himself. Parts of him had been lost long ago, to even himself.
And yet, the want in his gut persisted. The idea of leaving Nush behind as he watched the destruction he’d set in motion alone, thousands of miles away from her, felt empty.
All his hard work and persistence and sacrifices, everything he’d denied himself in the pursuit of revenge.
..couldn’t she be the respite he allowed himself?
Wasn’t he allowed to be selfish for once?
He knew her more than he did any other woman. He liked her company, he trusted her and damn it to hell, but he wanted to finish what she’d started in that study. He wanted to take her to his bed and keep her there until all she knew was him.
It was just a matter of making sure she knew what he could give and what he couldn’t.
And he’d begin with the truth. At least in this.
“When I made the arrangements, it was to ward off filthy rumors that I was taking advantage of you. I wanted the board and the world to see that it was more than a convenient paper arrangement. That you and I share more.”
“But we don’t share anything more and it is nothing but a filthy, monetary transaction—that you kicked me out of that room before my signature dried is proof enough.”
“I’ve been working toward a...time-sensitive acquisition for a long time,” he said, hating that he’d already hurt her. “That paperwork needed to be signed and sealed before I left town.”
“You turned the wedding into an empty mockery of the real thing when you know how much I... Maybe you were right that I don’t really know the real you,” she said in a defeated tone that sounded like a death knell.
“Not two weeks ago, you told me we can’t have that sort of relationship.
You said it was the biggest mistake of your life to kiss me. So what’s changed?”
Caio picked his words carefully. “Marriage is not some cheap, dirty affair, Nush. It’s a commitment, bigger than anything I’ve ever made to anyone. Doesn’t that say something?”
She searched his eyes. “You’re not letting me have you as some sort of medieval honor payment because I signed over my stock to you without a peep, are you?”
Hand under her chin, he tilted her face up, letting her see the desire he’d been fighting from the moment she’d touched her lips to his.
“There’s nothing honorable about what I want to do to you.
Is that answer enough?” He didn’t have to bend too much to speak at her ear and he loved that too.
He loved that she fit so well against him, that she fit so well into his life.
The shiver that wrecked her when their bodies grazed found an answering thrum in him.
“As for who’s going to have whom...we’ll see about that, querida. ”
She licked her lips and he groaned. “And if it’s horrible and boring and clunky...then what? You’ll return me with a patched-up label and the deal’s off?”
“Maybe,” he said with a laugh.
She growled and punched him and called him names and he gathered her closer. Just one arm around her shoulders, without betraying the demanding tightness of his own body.
Only then did he realize that she was shaking.
That she was nervous around him, that this bridge they were crossing to a new place in their relationship wasn’t easy or simple or uncomplicated for her and that she’d still made the first move.
That she’d thought this was worth exploring, worth being so honest about.
It was just his male ego that was flattered at her interest, he told himself and yet, the lie didn’t stick. It was more. The dark, empty corner of his psyche being soothed.
“I consider marriage sacred. Not a game, not a bargain, not a show we put on for others. Not an experiment we try until we get bored.”
“It’s not any of those things for me either.
” He pressed his mouth to her temple, unwilling to wait another second for the taste of her skin.
With his finger, he traced the arch of her neck and the pulse fluttering violently there.
A soft gasp escaped her, turning him rock hard, but she still held herself stiff.
“If it gets that bad, Nush, I’ll let you dump me. ”
“You’re an arrogant, conceited bastard,” she said, looking up at him, “and I’m not—”
Suddenly, the sky opened in dense sheets of rain. In the breadth of a few seconds, they were both completely drenched.
Caio could no more stop looking than he could stop breathing as he gathered his jacket around her shoulders. The flimsy excuse for a top stuck to her skin, revealing the stiff points of her nipples.
Desire punched him, the pouring rain no match for the heat of his body. Caio bent and lifted Nush until she was safely tucked against his chest.
For all of thirty seconds, she was quiet, overtaken by shock, one arm clutched close to her chest. Then she was demanding to be put down, yelling that he was a caveman and that she wasn’t fragile and how dare he...
Hefting her up in his arms, Caio pressed a rough, sudden kiss to her lips. Like a fierce summer storm that didn’t last too long, her ferocity died and she clung to him, moaning, licking, kissing him back.
She tasted like cold rain and liquid desire, the tips of her fingers digging into his shoulder.
He swallowed her moan of complaint as she tried to get deeper, delve closer.
The depth of her desire for him, the explosiveness of her response left him shaking and his steps faltered as he wondered if he could keep her for a lifetime without letting her see all of him.
But he’d try, because the alternative of an empty future after he achieved his goal didn’t bear thinking about.