Chapter 32
RAFE
It’s long past midnight when the party winds down. In hidden corners of the villa, people are still going, drinking, talking, dancing. But Paige and I bid them all good night and laugh at the good lucks called our way.
Too many people are staying here, and too many staff, to let down our guard for even a moment. We walk up the stairs and toward my side of the house.
I pull the door open for her, and she steps inside first. It shuts behind us. It should feel like victory.
We’ve done it. Pulled it off.
And yet this feels like a trap. Just one bedroom, and one wife I can’t stop wanting. I lean against the door and watch her walk through my bedroom.
Her wedding dress is shorter now than it was earlier. Sylvie had performed some kind of miracle to remove the train.
She looked like an angel in it, walking down the aisle to me.
Clad in ivory and striding through the gardens, her long hair loose, glossy and golden, and eyes on mine.
“You already know your way around,” I say.
“What’s mine is yours!” she says, and walks into my closet, the place she’s been in before to steal shirts and blazers. She stands in front of the mirror and tries to reach for the buttons along the back of her dress.
One direction doesn’t work, so she tries another, her arms behind her. “Damn it,” she mutters.
There’s been a lot to drink tonight, and my tongue’s looser than it should be. “I’m right here, you know.”
“I haven’t asked for help,” she bites out, and it’s so frustrated a sound that it makes my lip curl.
“Of course not. Because Paige Wilde doesn’t need help from anyone,” I say. “I’ve undone them before, you know.”
“We agreed not to talk about what happened in the kitchen.” She turns so her back is to the mirror and looks over her shoulder to try to see what she’s doing.
I need a better look. I walk up to the closet and lean against the doorframe. “This will be fun to watch.”
“I’m just barely… there… no.” She tries again, this time trying to wiggle the straps down her shoulders before reaching back. “It’s just too tight.”
It is tight.
The front is fitted snugly across her chest and down to her narrow waist. It’s clearly been tailored for her. The deep V of her cleavage is visible along the draped silk.
I shouldn’t notice that. But the image of her perfect tits is seared into my mind, as permanent as the tattoo on her skin, and I can’t get it out. It didn’t sate my curiosity. It only stoked it, made me want to touch her, to suck on those perfect nipples.
“Turn around,” I tell her.
She gives me an annoyed look, but she does what I’ve asked. I come to stand behind her.
The line of silk-covered buttons along the back of her dress is familiar by now. I undo them, one by one, my knuckles brushing against her skin.
She’s so soft. Her skin, hair. Tits. It’s a sharp a contrast to how harsh her mouth is. It feels different, undoing these buttons when she’s not heaving for breath. The last time I did this, I was focused on helping her feel better.
I undo the final button. The dress falls, and she lets it, silk rippling down her body and finally pooling down her feet. She’s wearing a pair of boat shoes, and it’s so predictable and out of place that my lips tug.
I stare at her in the mirror.
She’s wearing lacy, white underthings, and they’re so much tinier than what I saw her in last night. That lingerie was deep red, frilly and decadent.
“It’s wedding lingerie,” she says.
She’s wearing a corset. It’s a tight, sheer thing that adorns her lithe shape and pushes the curves of her tits up. There’s a tiny triangle of white silk between her legs, and it’s damn near see-through. Thin lace skims her hips to keep it in place.
It’s devastating.
Wedding lingerie is meant to be unwrapped slowly and savored. Worn only for one man. Me. But it’s not real. I’m not going to unwrap her like a present. I force my gaze away.
“Wore that for me, did you?” I ask. If she can hear the pain in my voice, she’ll hear the lie. “Sorry to disappoint.”
She steps out of the dress. “You’re attracted to me whether you choose to admit it or not.”
“Only when there’s an audience, Wilde.” I head to the dresser and slide off my vintage Artemis watch. Lying is easier when her beauty isn’t staring me in the face. “You’re not my type.”
“And what is your type?” Her voice is mocking. “Someone who is perfectly docile? A woman who’ll kneel at your throne and kiss your ring?”
I undo the buttons of my shirt. “A woman who doesn’t have the last name Wilde.”
She rolls her eyes and turns toward the rack of shirts. The sight of her ass in that thong hits me like an arrow through the chest. It’s round and perfect, and fuck if heat doesn’t rush south. I’m half hard in a single second.
Not. For. Me.
“Imagine how boring your life would be without me in it!” she says.
“I do. Daily,” I mutter. There’s a pounding in my temples. “And don’t steal another one of my shirts.”
“Too late,” she says, rifling through a drawer. “And it’s not stealing when we’re legally married.”
“It is when we signed an extensive prenup.” I shrug out of my own clothes and grab a t-shirt from the dresser. I usually sleep in boxer briefs. But I’ll have to find a pair of sweatpants for tonight, or she’ll see the evidence of my attraction.
She disappears into the bathroom. I take the time to change my pants and head toward the open windows. Not everyone has gone to bed yet, and there are sounds from the garden.
I pull the windows shut. It’s almost three in the morning, and the darkness outside is complete in a way it rarely gets in the summer.
“We need some ground rules,” Paige announces. I look over my shoulder. She’s now wearing one of my t-shirts, the tops of it skimming her long thighs. Her hair is back in a blonde braid, and she’s wiping at her eyes to remove makeup.
Thank God that lingerie is gone.
“You hate rules,” I say.
“Yes, but for tonight, we need them.” She cocks her head. “Are you going to take the couch?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Do you mean the chaise in the corner? It’s not big enough for either of us. No. I’m not.”
“That’s not very chivalrous.” She pulls back the covers of my bed and tosses away her napkin. “I think you’re only chivalrous in public.”
“Like you’re only nice in public?”
“Yes. Exactly like that.” She pulls back the covers and slides into the bed. And that image is almost as fucking arousing as the lingerie was. Paige with her head on my pillow, tucked beneath the covers.
“Stay on your side, and I’ll stay on mine,” she says.
I pull back the covers. “I have no interest in crossing the moat.”
“Good,” she says. “We are not cuddling.”
That makes me laugh. I turn off the lights, and the room is cast in darkness. Sometimes she argues so much I think she does it for the fun of it. To distract herself and me, too.
“That wasn’t a joke,” she says, but I can hear it in her voice too.
“I know,” I say. “Don’t worry. I’d rather hold a cactus.”
There’s a beat of silence. “That was pretty out there for you. You know. As metaphors go.”
“I’ve had a bit too much to drink.”
“Me too.”
“Good night, Wilde.”
“Good night.”
I wake up with a headache.
It presses like a vise against my temples, despite the soft pillow and the warm blanket. The very warm blanket. I blink my eyes open to the semi-bright daylight that always floods this bedroom in the summer season.
And all I see is gold.
Wheat-colored hair covering my chest, escaping the confines of its braid. My arm is slung around her waist and she’s half draped on top of me. Her leg is intertwined with mine, and I’m holding her tight.
Her head lifts with my sharp inhale of breath.
Fuck. So much for staying on my side.
Or for her staying on hers.
I close my eyes again. Everything hurts. The headache, the aches from the fight two nights ago, and her sweetness pressed so close.
I’m hard.
Again.
It’s starting to become a real fucking problem around her. She can’t notice it, either. I’ll never live down her taunting if she does, and despite knowing that she wants me more than she lets on, I can’t let her win that point.
I twist my hips away and lift my arm from her waist. Paige shifts her head a little. Her hair is a mess of golden tangle, gilded by the sunlight, and freckles dot across her nose.
She blinks her eyes open. They look more chestnut in this light.
“Oh,” she whispers. It’s a hint of softness, and her lips are full and so close. I know what it’s like to kiss them now. To feel her hardness melt and her taste against my tongue.
“Morning,” I mutter.
Her mouth parts in shock, and she rolls away from me. “Oh my God!” she says. We’re lying in the middle of the bed. Seems neither of us stayed put.
I sit up. “Yeah. That’s about right.”
She buries her head in a pillow and mumbles something.
“If you want to be heard, I suggest you talk to me and not to down.” I need to get up. To head straight into a cold shower. But only if she’s not looking.
She can’t know how she affects me.
“I want to pretend that never happened,” she says, voice crystal clear. “We weren’t… I wasn’t…”
“Cuddling your new husband?” I ask. I use the word the way she did last night, like it’s something dirty. It should be. Because I shouldn’t enjoy the feel of her in my arms or the weight of her head against my chest.
“Ugh. Don’t use that word.” She blows out a loud breath. “We made it through the night, at least.”
“Vaguely insulting that you thought you wouldn’t.”
“Really?” Her voice brightens. “Insulting you is my favorite hobby.”
I look over my shoulder at her and immediately regret it. She’s stretched out in bed. In my bed, in my bedroom, in my house. Wearing my t-shirt and my damn diamond ring on her ring finger.
One arm is resting above her head, and her long blonde hair is a mess on the white linen pillow. Her skin is rosy, and there’s just a hint of dark smudge beneath her eyes, like she didn’t get all of the wedding makeup off last night.
I can never let her know the deep, primal thrill seeing her here causes.
“If you truly want to insult me, you’re going to have to try a bit harder,” I tell her.
“That’s a challenge. I like challenges.” She gives me a small, taunting smile. “What time is it? We have brunch with the guests and then that sunset cruise.”
A glance at my phone reveals what I’ve already suspected. We’ve slept far too late. “Almost eleven.”
Her eyes widen. “What?”
“Yeah.”
“Shit.” She pushes up, and I take that opportunity to get up. I haven’t slept in this much clothing in years and I can’t wait to get it off. To step beneath the punishing spray of cold water and wash her touch, her scent, her feel away.
To get rid of this painful erection.
“Your mother wanted to have breakfast with me this morning,” Paige says. “Shoot, I don’t want to keep her waiting.”
I half turn. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell her to leave you alone.”
“I don’t mind,” Paige says, almost defensively, like I’m the one who’s insulted her. “I’d like to get to know her.”
Her eyes drop, and then they widen.
Shit.
I follow her gaze to the outline in my sweatpants. I can feel my cock twitch hungrily under her eyes. “Ignore it,” I tell her.
Her mouth opens and then closes. Then opens again. “Tell me you’re not attracted to me again?” she asks.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” I tell her in a hard voice. Deflect, deny. “It’s morning.”
“I know what time of day it is,” she says. But then her eyes drop to my neck, and her face turns blank. The taunting smile that played across her full lips disappears.
She looks away. “I’m showering after you,” she says and reaches for her phone.
I lock the bathroom door behind me and look in the mirror.
That’s when I see it. There’s a round bruise spreading over the side of my neck from the fight two nights ago.
It was a closer call than it should’ve been.
He landed a solid, open-handed hit against my neck, and it nearly knocked the wind out of me.
Now the bruise is angry against my skin. She saw it. Just like she noticed the bruise on my ribs at that damn couple’s massage a week ago, and the scar from all those years ago.
She sees too damn much.
And yet I don’t seem to want her to look away.