More Than a Convenient Marriage?

Kind of a big deal? Nicodemus Marcussen was the owner and president of the world’s largest media empire, not to mention a celebrated journalist in his own right. His work these days tended toward in-depth analysis of third-world coup d’état stuff, but he was no stranger to political exposés and other investigative reporting in print or on camera. Running a background check would be something he did between pouring his morning coffee and taking his first sip.

Gideon reassured himself Nic had no reason to do it, but tension still crawled though him as they continued their tour.

“My number is on the speed dial,” the woman said to Adara. “Please call if you need anything. The Kyrios was most emphatic that you be looked after. He’s hurrying his business in Athens as best he can, but it will be a couple of days before he’s able to join you.” She made the statement as she led them into a regal guest room brimming with fresh flowers, wine, a fruit basket, a private balcony with cushioned wicker furniture and a massive sleigh bed with a puffy white cover. “I trust you’ll be comfortable?”

Gideon watched Adara count the number of beds in the room and become almost as pale as the pristine quilt. She looked to him, clearly expecting him to ask for a second room. Any day previous to this one he would have, without hesitation. Today he remained stubbornly silent.

Color crept under her skin as the silence stretched and she realized if anyone made an alteration to these arrangements, it would have to be her. He watched subtle, uncomfortable tension invade her posture and almost willed her to do it. He wanted to share her bed, but he suddenly saw exactly how hard it was for her to stand up for herself.

She gave a jerky little smile at the woman and said, “It’s fine, thank you,” and Gideon felt a pang of disappointment directed at himself. He should have made this easy for her. But he didn’t want to.

The woman left. As the distant sound of the front door closing echoed through the quiet house, Adara looked to him as if he’d let her down.

“Do we just take another room?” A white line outlined her pursed mouth.

“Why would we need to?” he challenged lightly.

“We’re not sharing a bed, Gideon.” Hard and implacable, not like her at all.

“Why not?” he asked with a matching belligerence, exactly like himself because this issue was riling him right down to the cells at the very center of his being.

Her gaze became wild-eyed and full of angry anxiety. “Have you listened to me at all in the last twenty-four hours? I don’t want to get pregnant!”

“People have felt that way for centuries. That’s why they invented condoms,” he retorted with equal ire. “I bought some before we left the hotel. Do you have an allergy to latex that I don’t know about?”

She took a step back, her anger falling away so completely it took him aback. “I didn’t think of that.” Her brows came together in consternation. “You really wouldn’t mind wearing one?”

He stood there flummoxed, utterly amazed. “You really didn’t think of asking me to use them?”

“Well, you never have the whole time we’ve been married. I wasn’t with anyone else before you. They’re not exactly on my radar.” She gave a defensive shrug of her shoulders, averting her gaze while a flush of embarrassment stained her cheekbones.

Innocent, he thought, and was reminded of another time when they’d stood in a bedroom, her nervous tension palpable while he was drowning in sexual hunger.

Anticipation was like a bed of nails in his back, pushing him toward her. On that first occasion, she had worn a blush-pink negligee and a cloak of reserve he’d enjoyed peeling away very, very slowly.

Don’t screw this up, he’d told himself then, and reiterated it to himself today. The first night of their marriage, he’d had one chance to get their intimate relationship off on the right foot. He had one chance to press the reset button now.

The primal mate in him wanted to move across the room, kiss her into receptiveness and fall on the bed in a familiar act of simple, much-needed release.

But it wouldn’t be enough. He saw it in the way her lashes flicked to his expression and she read the direction of his thoughts. Rather than coloring in the pretty way he so enjoyed watching when he suggested a visit to her room, she paled a little and her lips trembled before she bit them together.

“You don’t...” Licking her lips, she looked to him with huge eyes that nearly brimmed with defensiveness. “You don’t expect me to fall into bed with you just because you’ve got a condom, do you?”

Expect it? The animal in him howled, Yes.

“It’s always been good, hasn’t it?” He bit out the words, perhaps a little too confrontational, but his confidence was unexpectedly deserting him.

She crossed her arms, shoulders so tight he thought she’d snap herself in half. “It’s always been fine.”

“Fine?” he charged, gutted by the faint praise.

She sent him a helpless look that made him feel like a bully.

“I can hardly deny that I’ve enjoyed it, can I?” she said, but the undertone of something like embarrassment or shame stole all the excitement he might have felt if she’d said it another way. “I just...”

“Don’t trust me.” He ground out the words with realization. It was an unexpectedly harsh blow. “Come on,” he said, holding out his hand before he lost what was left of his fraying self-control.

She stilled with guardedness. “What? Where?”

“Anywhere but this room or I’ll be all over you and you’re obviously not ready for that.”

A funny little frisson went through Adara as she took in the rugged, intimidating presence that was her husband. He held out a commanding hand, as imperious and inscrutable as ever, but his words had an undercurrent of...was it compassion?

Whatever it was, it did things to her, softening her, but it scared her at the same time. She was already too susceptible to him.

And his desire for her was a seduction in itself. Her insecurity as a woman had been ramped to maximum with everything that had happened, but things had shifted in the last twenty-four hours. She was looking at him, hearing him. His sexual hunger wasn’t an act. She knew the signs of interest and excitement in him. His chiseled features were tense with focus. A light flush stained his cheekbones—almost a flag of temper if not for the line of his mouth softened into a hungry, feral near smile.

Her body responded the way it always did, skin prickling with a yearning to be stroked, breasts tightening, loins clenching in longing for him.

Oh, God. If she stayed in this room, she’d beg him to be all over her, and where would that lead beyond a great orgasm? She didn’t know what sort of relationship she wanted with Gideon, but knew unequivocally she couldn’t go back to great sex and nothing else.

She moved to the door, not expecting him to fall in beside her and take her hand. A zing of excitement went through her as he enveloped her narrow fingers in his strong grasp. Stark defenselessness flared and she wanted to pull herself away. Why?

“It’s not that I distrust you,” she said, trying to convince herself as much as him while they walked down the stairs, her hand like a disembodied limb she was so aware of it in his. “I know you’d never hurt me. You can be stubborn and bossy, but you’re not cruel.” It still felt strange to speak her mind so openly, increasing her sense of vulnerability and risk. Her heart tremored.

“But you don’t trust me with who you are,” he goaded lightly.

Her hand betrayed her, wriggling self-consciously in his firm grip. He eyed her knowingly as he reached with his free hand to slide open the glass door on the back of the house.

An outdoor kitchen was tucked to the side of a lounge area. A free-form pool glittered a few steps away, half in the sun, the rest in the shadow of the house. The paving stones dwindled past it to a meandering path down the lawn to the beach. The grounds were bordered on one side by the vineyard and by an orange grove on the other.

“Swim?” he suggested as they stood at the edge of the pool staring into the hypnotic stillness of the turquoise water.

Working up her courage, she asked softly, “Do you trust me, Gideon?”

His hold on her loosened slightly and his mouth twitched with dismay. “I don’t wholly trust anyone,” he admitted gruffly. “It’s not because I don’t think you’re trustworthy. It’s me. The way I’m made.”

“The “it’s not you, it’s me” brush-off. There’s a firm foundation.” Disgruntled, she would have walked away, but he tightened his hold on her hand and followed her into the sunshine toward the orange grove.

“Would it help to know that I’ve been more open with you than I’ve been with anyone else in my life? Ever? Perhaps you learned to keep your feelings to yourself because you were afraid of how your father would react, but after my mother died, no one responded to what I wanted or needed. Even when she was alive, she was hardly there. Not her fault, but I’ve had to be completely self-sufficient most of my life. It shocks me every time you appear to genuinely care what I’m thinking or feeling.”