Her head jerks up, and pink blooms on her cheeks. “I didn’t hear you.”
“The stairs are carpeted. They muffle the sound.” I cross to the bed and help her stand. My shirt lands about mid-thigh, and I allow myself a brief scan before bringing my eyes to her face. “Do you need to use the bathroom again?”
“No. I just wanted to get out of bed. I think I might be getting bedsores,” she jokes.
The corner of my mouth quirks up. “I can check for you.”
“No. No. I’m good.” She scoots herself along the mattress. I let her escape to the other side of the room. “Can I open the curtains? Nothing weird is going to jump out at me?”
I join her on the other side of the room. She stills when I near. I lean forward, stretching my arm past her head, letting my body envelop her and draw the curtain to the side. “Nothing but a garden and a few chairs.”
She inhales a slightly shaky breath. “And a pool. You forgot about that.”
“Yes.” From my vantage point, I can see the crown of her head, the tip of her nose, the slight jut of her breasts as she tries to stay calm. If I pushed her hair to the side, the pulse at the base of her neck would be thumping wildly.
I brush a finger across my nose and force myself to step back before my arousal makes itself known. The simple scent of her, the warmth from her body, her mere presence is driving me crazy with lust.
Even if fate hadn’t dropped the perfect tool for revenge into my lap, I would’ve kept her. I make my feet move until they reach the seating area in front of the fireplace. I take a seat, propping an ankle on the opposite knee. The motion pulls at my balls, but I need the pain to ease some of my desire.
“Come and sit. We should talk.”
Aurora’s shoulders slump for a second. I might’ve missed it if I hadn’t been watching her so closely because soon after, she stiffens her spine and spins around. With a determined glint in her eyes, she marches over and drops onto the sofa.
She leans forward, elbows on her knees. “This seems like a big place based on the size of this bedroom.”
“It is.” I wonder where she’s going with this.
“How many bedrooms does it have, if you don’t mind me asking.”
“I don’t mind you asking. It has ten.”
“Ten?” Her eyes nearly bulge out of her face.
I can’t suppress a smile. She’s adorable. “Yes. There’s also a detached guest house to the right of the property, and we, my brother and I, own the house across the street where Marco and Ruby live. They are not related nor are they lovers, but they share a residence as it’s conveniently close to ours.” I don’t make mention of the security people that are in and around the grounds.
“Okay. That’s good.” She’s doing some fast calculation in her head. “Ten bedrooms, and you probably have half that many bathrooms so you probably have to pay a lot to clean this place.”
Ah, she’s angling for a job. That makes my proposal so much easier. “At the accident site, you said you were eighteen. Is that true?”
She hesitates and then says, “I’m legal.”
“To vote? To drink? To gamble?”
“To gamble? There’s an age limit to losing your money?”
I laugh again. I didn’t expect her to be funny. What a bonus. “Yes, in Vegas you have to be twenty-one to gamble, and I suspect you aren’t twenty-one.”
She wrinkles her nose. “Yes, I’m eighteen. I’m legal enough to vote but not to drink or to gamble or whatever it is that twenty-one-year-olds are allowed to do that eighteen-year-olds are not. It’s dumb, don’t you think?”
“Yes, but that doesn’t matter because you’re old enough to accept the offer I’m about to make.”
“What’s that?” A wariness enters her voice and her eyes. She draws back slightly as if to put a distance between the two of us. I don’t like it. I curl my fingers into my palms so I don’t reach for her and scare her off. I’m good at making deals, and my instincts tell me to be forthright here. She’ll reward that, and I’ll be less likely to wake up, as my brother suggests, with a knife in my chest.
“I’ll give you this place, and in return, you marry me.”
5
AURORA
I stare at Mikael wondering if I’ve heard him right. I thought I was getting better. I think it’s been about four days since the accident, but I could be wrong. I sleep so much and never leave this room, except for the one time I went to get the CT scan and was given a clean bill of health.
“Aurora?” I love the way my name rolls off his tongue.