Spanish Marriage Solution

Chapter Nine

ALICELAYON the blanket on the sand and watched Sebastián stride from the sea, magnificently naked, drops of water and brilliant sunshine delineating every hard-cut muscle of his powerful body. His tan had deepened, providing a rich foil to the smoky gold of his eyes, the colour standing out even more as he came towards her across the sand.

Her stomach clenched. Everything clenched. He was so beautiful and he was her husband. Hers.

Your husband who doesn’t love you.

That was true, but they’d already decided back in Spain that love wouldn’t feature in their marriage. There were too many reasons why it wasn’t a good idea. They’d both lost their spouses and her heart was still broken and bleeding, and she couldn’t risk giving it to someone else. Especially someone who didn’t want it anyway.

What about later? When the grief has eased? What about then?

Alice pushed the thought out of her mind. There was no point thinking about the future and she didn’t want to anyway. Not when the present was so much better. The present with him filling every moment of it.

She could hardly believe how much she wanted him. In fact she seemed to have an endless capacity. A hunger that didn’t seem to be getting any better no matter how many times they indulged it, and they’d indulged it a lot since they’d arrived.

Sebastián had kept their final destination a surprise and it wasn’t until they were in a smaller plane from Belize City and flying over the Belize Barrier Reef in the Caribbean that Sebastián had told her where they were going.

A villa on a tiny, private and very remote island. There were no other people on the island, and, apart from a small cottage on a neighbouring island that housed the staff who managed the villa, there was no one else within miles.

The island had the most beautiful white sand beaches surrounding it and the villa itself was sprawling and open-plan, with massive floor-to-ceiling windows that doubled as doors so one entire wall could be opened up. There were lazy fans and dark wooden floors and the master bedroom had a huge four-poster bed hung with gauzy white curtains.

It was the most utterly perfect place she could imagine.

The first couple of days were spent entirely sating themselves physically with each other, neither of them holding back. They didn’t talk, but talking hadn’t been the point, at least not initially. That could wait until their physical hunger was at least at a reasonable level.

After the intensity had eased a little, they explored the island, spending hours in the water and lying on the beach. There was a small boat for their use and Sebastián piloted it out to the nearby reef where they snorkelled amongst multicoloured coral and fish. It was astonishingly beautiful.

He refused to let her do a thing, cooking for her and bringing her treats, making sure her every wish was catered to, and she loved it. Her and Edward’s honeymoon had been spent in Italy and, while she’d enjoyed it, even then she’d had the nagging feeling that Edward had been far more interested in sightseeing than in spending time with her.

She had no such doubts about Sebastián. She was what interested him, and he made no secret of it. She’d never felt so desired. Except his interest seemed to be limited to the here and now, what they were doing that day and what she’d like for dinner and whether she’d like having her hands tied to the headboard of the bed as he made love to her.

Perhaps he was waiting to talk more until later, or perhaps he was waiting for her to broach the topic first. Either way though, it made a subtle tension run through her, a nameless doubt she couldn’t shake.

He came up now to the blanket she was lying on, beneath a pavilion hung with shade cloth to protect them both from the sun, water dripping from his magnificent body as he picked up a towel and dried himself off.

She made a cursory protest as water scattered over her bare skin, but she didn’t really mind, not when she was enjoying watching the play of water on his tanned skin. He dropped the towel and lay down on his side beside her, his head propped on his hand. When he smiled, her heart turned over in her chest.

‘I’m afraid of falling for you,’ he’d said back in Spain.

She hadn’t been able to get it out of her head. He’d been honest, his gaze fierce, yet there had been a grim note in his voice when he’d said it.

A shiver at the memory went through her. She’d been shocked. Firstly that he’d been anywhere close to falling for her, which she hadn’t known, and secondly, that her initial reaction had been one of pure, unadulterated joy.

In fact, if she thought about it now, she could still feel the warmth of that joy, like the Caribbean sun blazing in her heart. She’d struggled to cover it because there had been no joy in his face, no joy in his voice either. He’d said it as if falling for her would be the worst thing in the world.

That had hurt, made the knife twist hard inside her, but she was good at masking her emotions, so she’d made sure that hurt didn’t show. It was fine if he didn’t want to love her. Love had always been a fraught emotion, full of high expectations and crushing disappointments, of giving and giving and getting nothing in return. Of feeling as if she wasn’t good enough for anyone. Not for her parents, not for Edward. And maybe in the end, not enough for Emily either. Because if she had been, would Emily have had an affair with Alice’s husband?

Really, she was better off without it, and most especially from him.

Yet no matter what she told herself, she could still feel that joy inside her. The bright spark of possibility that refused to be ignored. And looking into his eyes now, she couldn’t help the rogue thought that whispered just how good it would be to be loved by him. To have all his fierce passion directed on her, and not just the physical passion. The emotional intensity that had had him claim Diego and refuse to give him up.

You want that. You want to be claimed. You want to be loved and loved passionately. You’re hungry for it.

Her throat closed with longing. Well, who wouldn’t be hungry for it? But it didn’t have to be with him. She could find some other man like him who didn’t have all the baggage and who was ready to love and be loved in return.

But there are no other men like him and you know that.

She tore her gaze away from his mesmerising smile. It wasn’t true. There were plenty of men like him. Men with smoky golden eyes and fierce passion and intensity. Men who blazed with desire when she touched them. Men who wanted her just as fiercely as she wanted them...

The strange grief in her throat got worse. No, she was lying to herself. It was true. There were no other men like him. He was the only one. And she could tell herself all she liked that she’d find someone else and fall in love with him, but the truth was that wasn’t going to happen.

No. Because you’re in love with him and you have been ever since the day you met him.

Cold prickled all over her skin, her stomach dropping, and she had to stare hard at the brilliant turquoise of the lagoon to control her expression. Her heart was thundering in her chest so loud she could barely hear anything else.

Love at first sight. The lightning bolt from the blue. She’d never believed in it. She hadn’t loved Edward at first sight. That had grown over the years he and she and Emily were at school. Maybe that was why she hadn’t recognised what she’d felt for Sebastián when it had happened. Because she hadn’t believed it would ever happen to her and yet... It had. She was in love with him, completely and utterly and she had been for the past five years. But she’d been married so she’d minimised it, told herself it was just some strange attraction she didn’t understand. Yet it had never been that.

He doesn’t want to love you in return.

She tried to ignore the lump of pain and grief that choked her. She couldn’t let that matter. She had to pretend that all of this was just sexual attraction and nothing more, because maybe if she did, it would go away. She certainly couldn’t tell him how she felt, not when doing so might ruin this special time together. And especially not when he’d been perfectly clear about what he wanted and what he didn’t.

‘Alice?’ he asked, his voice full of concern. ‘What’s wrong?’

Forcing away her emotions, she swallowed hard and braced herself before glancing back at him. Somehow she managed to produce a smile. ‘Nothing. Only...sometimes you’re just too gorgeous to even look at.’

He laughed, which made everything worse, because the sound was so warm and so devastatingly attractive. She could listen to him laugh until the end of time. ‘I know the feeling,’ he said, his gaze turning molten as it ran over her in blatant appreciation. ‘Though I think I can force myself.’

Inevitable arousal moved like a tide through her veins. God, how she loved the way he looked at her. She was as naked as he was and the obvious delight he took in her nakedness had gone a long way to boosting her confidence in her body. She’d even come to enjoy wearing nothing, especially since it meant he wore nothing too.

Yet another reason to love him.

She fought to keep the smile on her face, to not let any trace of her thoughts show. Luckily his attention had dropped to her stomach. He frowned slightly then reached to trace her surgery scar. She’d been very aware of it initially, the first time she’d been naked with him, but he hadn’t made any comment about it or drawn attention to it, and gradually she’d lost her self-consciousness.

Now though, as his fingers brushed over the thin white line just above her pubic bone, she tensed.

He glanced up immediately. ‘You don’t want me touching you here?’

She swallowed again, trying to relax. ‘No, it’s fine.’

‘It’s not fine. You’re tense.’

‘It doesn’t hurt, if that’s what you’re asking. It’s just...’

‘Painful in other ways,’ he finished for her.

What could she say other than the truth? ‘Yes,’ she said simply. ‘It is.’

He kept his hand where it was, his fingertips tracing the line of her scar with such gentleness that the full, aching feeling already in her heart became heavy and raw. ‘I’m so sorry this happened to you,’ he murmured. ‘You wanted children quite badly, didn’t you?’

She didn’t know why he was choosing now to talk about this, and, given how emotionally fragile she felt already, she should have found both his question and his touch intrusive. Yet she didn’t. He was so gentle and maybe that was why her heart hurt so much. Because she could hear the sympathy in his voice, as if what had happened to her was important to him, as if it mattered.

Yet another reason to love him.

For some inexplicable reasons tears prickled in her eyes, though she fought them back. ‘I did,’ she said huskily. ‘And it wasn’t just the baby and its future I lost, but also any possibility of having another and all the futures that went with it.’

His gaze was warm, his fingers still tracing her scar gently, as if he were soothing it and her. ‘When did it happen?’

‘About two years after Edward and I got married. It was my...first pregnancy.’

He glanced down at the scar. ‘I saw a light go out inside you at some point. I always wondered what happened. Now I know you were grieving.’

A little shock ran through her that he’d noticed the change in her because no one else had apart from Emily. But yes, he was right, she’d been grieving.

‘Edward wanted to move on,’ she said, even though it felt disloyal to say. ‘He was kind, don’t get me wrong, but he thought the sooner we put it behind us, the better. He didn’t want to discuss it either. He mentioned surrogates and adoptions initially, but...’ She stopped, stripped bare by the pain of the memories even though it had been years ago, and by another, somehow deeper pain that had only just occurred to her. Sebastián wanted more children yet she would never be able to give them to him. She would never carry his baby. Never.

The knife in her heart twisted.

‘Alice,’ Sebastián said, his expression full of concern. ‘We don’t have to talk about it if it’s too painful.’

She set her jaw, forcing away the hurt the way she always did. ‘No, it’s okay. It’s been years and I’m over it.’

He said nothing for a long moment, looking at her, the compassion in his eyes making her want to weep despite everything. ‘Were you ever allowed to grieve properly?’ he asked softly. ‘Were you ever allowed to mourn?’

The question felt as if he were twisting in the knife even harder, yet there was nothing but understanding in his expression. Grief was no stranger to either of them, she realised, and he knew loss when he saw it.

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘I don’t think I was. I don’t think I...let myself grieve. Edward was patient with me but...’ She swallowed, wanting to say it even though, again, it was another disloyal thought. ‘I always had the impression that he wasn’t as upset about it as I was and that he didn’t think it was as important as I did. Even later, he never followed up on adoptions or anything.’ She took a breath, suddenly weighed down by grief. ‘I’ll never be able to have your child, Sebastián. Never.’ She hadn’t meant to cry and yet there were tears in her eyes, and then his hands were reaching for her, pulling her close, his arms folding around her.

He didn’t speak, only held her, and somehow the warmth of his presence and the strength of his arms had her weeping into his chest as the pain cut its way through her heart. He remained silent, holding her tightly, giving her space to grieve for the baby she lost and all those futures. For her failure of a marriage and for the husband who hadn’t really loved her. And for her sister, whom she’d loved even though she’d betrayed her.

Eventually her sobs ran dry and he kept holding her, stroking her hair and murmuring soft words in Spanish that were inexplicably comforting.

Another reason to love him.

Her eyes were scratchy and her throat was sore and her heart ached and ached. She wished passionately that the day she’d met him she’d been true to her heart and recognised the feeling for what it was. That she’d been honest with her husband and left him instead of fighting for something that neither of them had wanted any more.

But she hadn’t. And now all she was left with was her broken, shattered heart that somehow still managed to beat for a man who thought the worst thing in the world would be to love her back.

She had no idea what she was going to do.

‘I could tell you that I don’t care that you won’t have my child,’ Sebastián said after a long moment, his deep voice rumbling in her ear. ‘I do care. But I also care about you and your pain. But you know that Diego will be our child in every way there is. And we will have more, I promise it.’

It did matter to him. It did. That was what she’d wanted from Edward, just some sign that he felt the loss too, yet Edward had never given it to her. But Sebastián had. And it felt good to know he felt the same way, and also that he felt all wasn’t lost.

Of course they would have Diego and others, too.

She lifted her damp face from his chest, and looked up at his hard, carved features. His expression was fierce, as was the burning look in his eyes. It was clear that this was a promise he intended to keep.

Yet another reason to love him.

She wished she didn’t keep thinking that. She wished her heart would stop reminding her that this man was the only one for her.

‘What about Emily?’ she asked, her voice still thick with tears. ‘Did you want children with her?’

He reached to gently brush the tears from her face. ‘Yes. But she didn’t, not right away. She wanted to wait a few years. That was okay with me initially, because I was busy in the stables. I didn’t insist either, because I wanted to give her time to adjust to our marriage and to living in Spain.’ He pushed a curl behind her ear. ‘Like Edward, she didn’t want to have the discussion about children. She kept avoiding it. And then Diego arrived.’

‘You really thought he was yours?’

‘I had no reason to believe otherwise. And when I did find out, it genuinely made no difference to how I felt about him. In fact, after I found out I became even more certain that he would be my son.’

‘Why? Because of your father?’

‘Yes. I couldn’t let any child grow up the way I did. Mateo was resentful of me for not truly being his. I was the evidence of my mother’s faithlessness and that needled him but, since I was also the only way he’d ever get an heir, there wasn’t much else he could do.’

The aching grief in her chest had gradually subsided and all she wanted was to lie here in his arms and ask him questions about his childhood. She was hungry for information now.

‘Did he hurt you?’ she asked, concerned.

‘No.’ Sebastián gently stroked the crease between her brows. ‘Don’t worry, mi cielo, he didn’t. Not physically. He was...exacting. Demanding. A jealous man too. I used to love visiting the stables, because I loved the horses, and I spent a lot of time with Javier, who was the best stable manager we ever had. Javier didn’t know I was his and I didn’t know he was my biological father, not then. I just knew I liked being with him. Mateo became very jealous of the time I spent with him and eventually he fired Javier and told me that Javier had lost his job because of me. Because I was disloyal and ungrateful.’

Her heart seized at the blunt words. ‘That sounds...awful.’

His eyes glinted as he looked at her. ‘Mateo already had an unfaithful wife, and he drew the line at having an unfaithful son. Especially when that son was actually the son of his wife’s lover.’

‘Still,’ she said. ‘That doesn’t excuse him being awful to you. It wasn’t fair of him to treat you like that. It wasn’t your fault that you weren’t his. It’s not as if you were allowed to choose your own father.’

‘No,’ he agreed. ‘But then being Javier’s son wasn’t the only reason he resented me.’

‘There was another reason?’

‘Yes.’ The glitter in his eyes became sharper, harder. ‘He told me that I’d killed my mother.’

Alice’s eyes went wide with shock and concern. He’d been too blunt but that was exactly what Mateo had told him and in just that way. Making him feel like a murderer.

He shouldn’t have said anything about it, of course, but she’d asked and there was no reason not to tell her. She should know about his bitter childhood so she’d understand what he hoped to avoid with Diego.

She was beautiful here, lying naked against his chest with the warm Caribbean salt-scented air feathering over both of them. Her hair was a wild tangle over her shoulders, and she still had the flower behind her ear that he’d put there that morning, a hibiscus blooming pink and gold and red.

Her eyes were red from her moment of grief for her lost baby and her lost fertility, the tracks of her tears still shiny on her skin. The sight of them made him ache.

He shouldn’t have made their first discussion about that loss, not when it was obviously still so painful for her, but when he’d come out of the water and dropped down beside her, that scar on her belly was all he could see. He knew what it was and he hadn’t wanted to say anything about it earlier, and yet after spending days making love to her, knowing it was there and knowing what it meant... He couldn’t keep ignoring it.

Her lost child, her lost fertility, her lost marriage were all things they needed to talk about, just as they needed to talk about their future and their own marriage. Everything had remained so unspoken between them for so long and they couldn’t keep doing that.

So he’d touched that scar gently, tracing the line of it over her warm skin.

She hadn’t held back when he’d asked her about it and when she’d starkly said that she’d never have his child, and he’d seen the grief in her eyes, he’d felt the same grief inside himself too. Both at realising that, yes, he wanted her to carry his child, and yet knowing she never would.

That it felt painful to him meant that the edge of the precipice was even nearer than he’d thought, and that he’d have to be careful. Yet he’d pulled her into his arms to comfort her instead, unable to stop himself.

Years ago he’d wanted to do the same thing when he’d seen the light inside her go out, but back then it hadn’t been his place to do so.

He was her husband now, though, and it was definitely his place, and, regardless of whether it was a good idea or not, he was going to give her comfort and space to grieve however he could.

They had to be able to talk to each other in order to build a healthy relationship between them. A relationship that would provide the best environment for Diego to grow up in.

Now, Alice was looking up at him, her eyes dark. ‘What do you mean you killed her?’

He tried never to think about that day in his father’s office. It had been a long time ago, yet, despite the years, it still felt as if his father with those words had reached inside his chest and gouged out his heart. The simple cruelty of it, to an eleven-year-old boy, still bothered him.

Another reason why you can’t fall in love with her.

Of course not. He’d seen the true face of love that day and it was petty and cruel and jealous. He wanted no part of it ever again.

‘Mateo never told me how my mother died,’ he said. ‘And no one knew that I wasn’t Mateo’s son. And until the day he fired Javier, not even I knew.’

Alice look aghast. ‘What? You mean he kept that all from you, only to dump it all on you then? Why?’

His father’s face had been red with fury and Sebastián had been bewildered as to why. He’d thought that his spending time with the horses was what Mateo wanted, especially learning from Javier, the most experienced of the stable hands.

‘Mateo was jealous,’ he said. ‘And vindictive. And he was furious that I’d spent more time with my biological father than him. He accused me of being as faithless and ungrateful as my mother. Then he told me that she’d had an affair with Javier, that I was Javier’s son and that my mother had died having me. And he told me all of that for no other reason than to hurt me.’

‘Oh, Sebastián,’ Alice breathed, her expression full of deep sympathy and a flickering hurt that he knew was for him. ‘I’m so sorry.’

He wasn’t sure why the rest of the words spilled out, given what they revealed, but they did. ‘He told me I was a poor replacement for her, that I wasn’t who he would have chosen for a son. But I was all he’d had to work with and so I’d have to do.’

Her hands had pressed flat against his chest, the look in her dark eyes making him ache. ‘What a terrible thing to say to a child. And how cruel.’

Yes. Mateo had been cruel and vindictive, and needlessly petty. But Sebastián knew why. He’d loved his wife and she’d been unfaithful to him and had a child by another man. Sebastián’s mere presence hit Mateo in a place where he was most sensitive—his male pride.

Another reason why you can’t love her, no matter how understanding she is. No matter how much you want to.

It was true. He didn’t know if his mother had loved Javier, but they’d clearly formed enough of a bond that she’d been unfaithful to her husband for him. And he had been the result. Just as he was the cause of his mother’s death.

After his father had told him the bitter truth, he hadn’t known what to do. All he’d known was that he was the cause of so much unhappiness and so the only way forward seemed to be trying his hardest to make up for it.

Except Mateo had made it very clear that nothing Sebastián did ever would.

It still doesn’t.

‘I got over it,’ he said, pushing the thought away. ‘Though my father made it very obvious that nothing I could do would make up for her loss. He wasn’t very good at hiding his resentment or his jealousy, and I think if I hadn’t had the horses I might have eventually decided it wasn’t worth it and left. But they were what kept me there.’

Her fingertips were warm on his skin, her gaze dark and deep, piercing him right through. She’d always seemed to see more than he wanted her to. More than Emily had. He hadn’t told Emily about his father, for example, mainly because Emily had never asked.

‘That’s why you care about the horses,’ Alice murmured. ‘Why you love them. They accepted you.’

How she somehow knew that, he wasn’t sure, but it was true nonetheless.

He stroked his thumb across her cheekbone, relishing the feel of her skin. ‘They did. They were much more accepting than my father ever was. All a horse needs is some good hay, clean water and kindness, and maybe an apple now and then. They don’t require anything else and they don’t need you to be anything else.’

‘I understand,’ she said. ‘No wonder you spent a lot of time with them.’ She paused a moment, her dark brows drawing together. ‘You know that your father was wrong, don’t you? And that the horses were right. He should have learned from them. He should have accepted you the way you were, just like you accepted Diego.’

A thread of impatience wound through him. He didn’t want to keep talking about this, because what was the point? The past was immutable. He couldn’t change it now even if he wanted to.

‘Perhaps,’ he said, dismissive. ‘But he didn’t. And in his mind, my mother’s death was my fault and so how could anything I do ever make up for that?’ He’d been bitter once, but he’d lost that over the years, because there was no reason to dwell on it. Mateo hadn’t accepted him and had continued to blame him right up to the day he died, and it was what it was.

Alice reached up and took his face between her hands, her fingertips cool on his cheeks. ‘You’re not supposed to make up for it,’ she said. ‘You were a child. A baby. You didn’t do anything to anyone.’

‘I know that,’ he said. ‘But he blamed me for it anyway.’

‘He shouldn’t have,’ Alice said insistently. ‘He might have been grieving and angry, and all of those things, but that was his issue. He shouldn’t have made it yours.’

But there must have been something bad about you, something wrong. Why else would he have been so cruel? Why else would you have caused such unhappiness to so many people?

Something twisted painfully in his heart, as if she’d touched on an old wound, an old doubt that had festered even though he’d tried to forget it.

‘Perhaps I should have helped him,’ he said, even though he didn’t want to say it. ‘Perhaps there was something I could have done to make it better.’

Alice’s fingers pressed a little harder. ‘Tell me,’ she said, that light in her eyes that had drawn him to her so powerfully flickering. ‘If Emily had died having Diego, would you have told him the same thing eventually? That he killed her? Would you expect him as a little boy to make it up to you?’

A shock went through him, bringing with it a ferocious protectiveness. ‘No,’ he said flatly before he’d even thought it through. ‘Never.’

‘No,’ she echoed. ‘And there was no excuse for him to treat you like that, either. You didn’t deserve it, Sebastián.’

There was so much conviction in her voice, so much warmth in her eyes that he teetered on the edge of the precipice, the wind threatening to take him over. It would be so easy to fall, so very easy. To name what he felt for her as love and let it take him.

But he couldn’t. He already had one person in his life that had a claim on his heart—Diego. The thought of potentially failing him was crushing enough. He didn’t want to add any more weight to the one he was already carrying.

‘Whether I deserved it or not doesn’t matter,’ he said. ‘But now you know why I will put Diego and his happiness before everything else. Why I want him to have a mother as well as a father. Why I want him to have a family, somewhere safe where he feels he belongs.’

Her gaze flickered, as if something about his response had disappointed her, though he wasn’t sure what it had been.

This is how it starts. Failing her.

No, he wouldn’t. This time it would be different, he’d make sure of it. Love wasn’t a possibility but he’d give her everything else. A home. Children. Comfort. Companionship. He’d support her career too and anything she chose to do. She could have just about everything she wanted.

They could have it.

And if she wants more?

But she didn’t want more. She’d told him back in Spain that she didn’t want love, that she felt the same way he did about it, and besides, she’d agreed to marry him. He’d told her what to expect and she’d still said yes.

Doesn’t she deserve love, though? After everything she’s lost?

Oh, she did. She deserved to be loved completely and utterly, but he wasn’t going to be the one to give it to her. And if that meant she’d eventually leave him and find someone else who would, then he’d have to deal with that. He would never get in the way of her finding happiness, even if that was with another man.

Even if that thought makes you feral with rage.

He ignored the thought, shoved it away. That was a thought his father would have, one of those jealous, vindictive thoughts and he wouldn’t be like him. Ever. If Alice wanted to leave him, he’d let her go, but... That didn’t mean he couldn’t make the decision a difficult one. In fact, he’d make it as hard for her to leave him as he could.

He turned her in his lap so she was facing him, her thighs spread on either side of his hips, the soft, damp heat of her sex pressing against his aching shaft. She gave one of those delicious little shivers that she always did whenever she was aroused, the darkness of her eyes seeming to glow and get molten.

‘Of course you do,’ she murmured. ‘I want all those things for him too.’

‘I know you do.’ He settled one hand on her hip while he slid the other between her thighs, stroking the hot, soft folds he found there, making her gasp. ‘But that doesn’t mean that there can’t be anything for us.’

She moaned, her hips flexing, arching against his hand. She was already wet for him, her nipples hard, her skin flushed. ‘Such as?’ she asked, her voice husky.

‘This.’ He moved his hand and gripped her other hip, sliding into her in one long, slow, deep thrust. ‘And it’s not just sex, mi cielo...my sky.’His voice had roughened at the tight clasp of her sex around his. ‘It is more. We have a connection and it’s not only physical.’

She slid her arms around his neck, her lovely body pressing hard against his. Her eyes had gone very dark, inches from his own, and he was captivated by the currents in them, light and shadow like the sun moving over a dark river.

‘What else is it, then?’ she asked softly. ‘Tell me.’

He couldn’t look away from the emotion shifting in her gaze. He began to move, watching as the building pleasure became part of those currents, turning into something powerful and deep, glowing in her eyes. ‘It is emotional too,’ he said, his voice even rougher. ‘And I will be there for you, understand me? I will give you everything you need to be happy. Because your happiness is as important to me as Diego’s.’

She stared back at him, unflinching, those currents in her eyes shifting and swirling. But she didn’t speak, she only leaned forward and kissed him, her mouth hot and open and sweet. Yet he could also taste desperation, though he wasn’t sure what she was so desperate about.

Are you certain? Are you certain you don’t know?

But he pushed that thought aside as the pleasure began to get deeper, wider, and soon he wasn’t thinking at all. There was only the rhythm between them and the friction that drove him out of his mind, the heat and the blazing passion that always seared both of them down to their souls.

And if a small, nagging doubt crept into his heart, it was soon lost under the relentless tide of ecstasy, as it washed over both of them and carried them away.