Chapter Five #2
I lean a little closer. “I don’t believe you. Haven’t you ever wondered what I’d be like in bed? What we’d be like together?”
“N-no! Of course not! You’re far too young for me.”
“I have a lot of energy. I can keep going for hours.”
Her face flames. “Oh my God, stop it.”
I chuckle and have a mouthful of wine. “We’d have a lot of fun trying to make a baby.”
She’s scarlet now. “I don’t want fun.”
My smile fades. She looks genuinely terrified. There’s something else going on here. “You don’t enjoy sex?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” She’s stiff as a board.
Some men might worry at this point that she doesn’t like sex. Not all women do. But I don’t believe that. She’s scared, and that makes me ache inside.
“Tell me what you want,” I say, “to make it work.”
She’s breathing fast, her chest rising and falling quickly with each breath. “Apart from a syringe, you mean?”
“Apart from a syringe. You’d be gaining a partner, a husband, money, support, and stability. You don’t find that attractive at all?”
She hesitates.
“So tell me what you need,” I say.
She hesitates, and I see the moment she crosses the line from refusal to negotiation.
Now we’re getting somewhere.
She swallows hard. “I can’t believe I’m really considering this.”
“Tell me.”
“If you just want to get in my knickers, then fine, but don’t expect me to fall at your feet.”
“I don’t just want sex with you,” I remind her. “I want a wife.”
She chews her bottom lip. “You’d want me to live with you?”
“That’s generally what marriage entails.”
“In your house?”
“I have an apartment in the city. We’d get our own place, maybe overlooking the ocean.
Staff on hand to fulfil your every whim.
You won’t need to cook anymore—unless you want to.
Or clean. Or do the gardening, again, unless you wanted to.
You’d be able to spend your time doing whatever brings you joy. Reading, painting, writing.”
She doesn’t answer. I think she likes that idea.
We sit quietly for a while. She looks out at the street, but I don’t think she’s seeing the sparkling fairy lights or the shop assistants in their Santa hats. I let her think, while I admire her profile and imagine kissing her.
Eventually, her gaze comes back to me. “If I did this…” She turns her glass in her fingers.
“It would need to be a marriage of convenience for me. I need to protect myself. I understand that you need a wife and an heir. And I would try to provide that. But out of the public eye, I’d want to live a separate life.
I’d need my personal freedom to do my job and see my friends. Alone.”
It’s not what I want, but I know she’s not going to agree any other way, so I nod.
“I’d want my own bedroom,” she adds. “If we have sex, I’d want to know I can go back to my own room afterward.”
I frown.
“And I’d want a contract,” she says. “That states if, after the baby is born, I ask you for a divorce, you won’t stand in my way. And a clause stating I wouldn’t get any of your money. I’d happily sign that.”
“On the condition that, while we were married, I can spend my money on you how I choose.”
She glowers.
“God, you’re hard work,” I say. “‘No, Mr. Billionaire, please don’t spend your fortune on me and my baby.’” I say it in an exasperated voice, not a mocking one, and her lips curve up.
“Are you really a billionaire?” she asks curiously.
“Personally? Not quite, but close. The offer we’ve just had for the company was for 3.2 billion dollars.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah.”
With some surprise, I realize I’m telling her details I wouldn’t normally share outside the boardroom. I already trust her.
“Caesar said it’s difficult to weed out the fortune hunters,” she says. “So it’s important that you know I don’t want your money.”
“That’s why you want the clause in the contract?”
“Partly, yes.”
“You were thinking of me.” I smirk. “I’m touched.”
“Oh stop it. It was mainly a self-protection thing.”
“No, I think you were putting me first, and that’s just adorable.”
“I want a clause about no flirting.”
“Absolutely not.”
She blows out a breath, giving me a wry look.
I reach out a hand on the table and turn it palm up. “I’m still your friend. Still the guy you knew when you were twenty-three. Can’t you trust me?”
She looks at my hand. For a moment I think she’s going to take it. Then she swallows and says, very quietly. “I’m sorry, but no, I can’t.”
Disappointed, I withdraw my hand. I top our glasses up with the wine, more for something to do than anything else.
“I know that hurts your feelings,” she murmurs. “You and Caesar always pride yourself on your principles. But this is about my experience. And your image. I don’t think you can blame me. You must know what a reputation you have.”
“Like I said, I’ve never claimed to live like a monk.”
“And that’s fair enough. You’re gorgeous, rich, and smart. Why wouldn’t you use it to get laid? It makes perfect sense. But it doesn’t make trusting you easy.” She narrows her eyes. “Why are you smiling?”
“Because you think I’m gorgeous and smart.”
She rolls her eyes. “Yeah, that’s the bit you focus on.”
“Yes, because if that’s the case, we can work on everything else.”
Our eyes meet. I feel like a nature photographer who’s spotted a rare bird flying overhead—not a wren, but the rare New Zealand falcon. I’ve camouflaged myself with leaves in the hope I can lure her closer. But she’s circling, hesitant, wary. Refusing to land.
“I need time,” she says. “I need to think about it.”
I lean back. “Fair enough. I’ll give you until Boxing Day.”
“Two days! Mars!”
I want her to make a decision before Caesar gets back to her. Because if he offers to be a donor without the complication of a relationship, I’m afraid she won’t choose me.
I don’t say anything, refusing to give way, and in the end she folds her arms and glowers. “All right.”
“I’ll start drawing up the contract, just in case.”
“God, you’re arrogant.”
“I’m confident.”
“Why?”
I lean close again, looking into her eyes. “Because deep down, I think you like me. And you know I like you. If you were to trust me, we could have something very special here. You want to trust me. You just don’t know how to. So I’ll have to show you.”
Her lips part, but no words come out.
“Can I kiss you?” I ask, looking at her mouth.
“What? No!”
“Not even to wish you merry Christmas?”
She’s breathing fast again. “You don’t need to use tongues to wish someone merry Christmas.”
I chuckle. “No tongues, I promise.”
She doesn’t say anything. So I shift my bar stool a little closer to her. Lean forward on the table. And wait.
She’s staring at my throat. But slowly, she raises her gaze to mine.
I lower my head a fraction and pause again.
She exhales, maybe understanding that I need her to move the final inch, and lifts her face.
I close the gap and press my lips to hers.
I hold them there for six seconds, then move back a fraction. Her eyelids had fluttered shut, but they open now, and she blinks slowly.
So I kiss her again. And then a third time before moving back reluctantly.
“Thank you,” I murmur, lifting a hand to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear. I let my fingers brush her cheek for a moment before lowering them.
She doesn’t say anything, but her eyes are like saucers.
“I have to go,” I say, “I’m so sorry, but I have an appointment at seven.”
“You’re working tonight?”
“The world of business never stops.” I get to my feet and finish off my wine glass. “I’ll be in touch on Boxing Day.”
She nods. “Have a good Christmas.”
“You too.”
I make my way out of the bar and head back along the high street toward where Julian is waiting for me in the Bentley. My heart lifts, despite the fact that Wren wants time to think about it.
She thought she was negotiating terms. What she hasn’t realized is that I’ve already won. Because the moment she started negotiating, she stopped saying no.
It doesn’t matter that she’s determined to remain aloof, convinced I’ll abandon her after I’ve grown bored with her. She has no idea what my feelings are for her. And now I’ve found the gap in the links of the chains she erected around her heart, I can work my way inside at my leisure.