She felt raw. Sore in the absolute best way. She liked him when he was rough. When he was uncivilized. When he was the man beneath the veneer.
What she didn’t like was him walking away while her world was shattered around her feet.
She stood up and put his shirt on, buttoning it as quickly as she could, on her way out to the living room.
“Hey,” she said. “What the hell? Unless you’re just getting a glass of water, in which case I’ll have one, too.”
Ajax was pacing up and down the floor like a caged tiger, his posture tense. And he was still completely naked. He was beautiful, even like this. Tense and upset, and clearly on the edge.
“What’s up, Ajax? Walk me through your thought process here. Because we were making love and doing this whole ‘get to know each other’ thing and then you...left.”
“Are you okay?” he asked, his voice rough.
“Fine. A little wobbly, but I think you should be after something like that. Means you did it right.”
“Stop. Stop trying to make a joke out of everything,” he said, the words torn from him. “I was rough with you. I don’t even know... I can’t even remember what I did.”
“Let me refresh your memory.” She walked down to the center of the room. “You lost control. You thrust into me so hard it took my breath away. And it gave me pleasure that went...way beyond anything I’ve ever experienced before.”
“Did I hurt you?”
“No. Well, I mean I’m sore in places, but the good kind.”
“There’s no good kind of pain. Dammit, Leah, if you had told me to stop I might not even have heard you. I don’t know if I could have stopped. That’s the kind of monster I am.”
His words hung in the air, stark and revealing.
“You didn’t hurt me, Ajax, and you never would. It’s...it’s just...don’t you trust that I know what I want? That I know what I like? That I would never in a million years lie to you if you hurt me just to salve your conscience? You know me. You know I would never do that to you, to us. I have been honest with you,” she said, and then bitterly regretted saying it.
Because she hadn’t been honest with him. She hadn’t even been honest with herself. She’d pushed at him, had tried to cover up the growing, expanding emotions inside of her with layers of protection.
So that she wouldn’t fall in love.
So that she wouldn’t have to be in love alone.
She’d walked into her marriage with an impression she had of Ajax based in fantasy, not in reality. Thinking that she was in no way susceptible to this man. The man she hadn’t known.
And since then, she’d met the reality. She’d seen how far down his damage had gone. She’d had to face who he was, where he came from. That he wasn’t a shining beacon of male perfection, but a damaged, wounded soul who was starving for love, for affection, and to find some kind of peace within himself.
Because the inside of Ajax was a war zone. A place without rest. A place where he stood vigil against any desire he possessed. She doubted he even let go in his own mind. He was enslaved, in bondage.
He had tied her hands at first when they’d made love, but he was really the one that was bound.
And faced with that, with all he was, all he had been, and all he might not be, she knew her feelings had changed.
And she couldn’t keep them in anymore. Not now, not after everything they’d shared. She couldn’t protect herself when the victory over his demons might depend on her honesty.
“I love you,” she said. It was true now. Truer than it had ever been. And the risk didn’t matter. The possibility of him never returning it didn’t matter. It would hurt, but sharing it was so much more important than protecting herself.
In Ajax, she’d seen the danger of holding it all in, and she wouldn’t do it. Not anymore. Not ever again. It didn’t matter that the press didn’t think she was the pretty Holt Heiress, or that it must suck for Ajax to have her instead of Rachel.
It didn’t matter. All that mattered was how she felt. That she loved him.
“What?” He looked at her with black, blank eyes, and the lack of emotion in them nearly broke her then and there.
“I love you,” she said. “I have...well, I’ve loved you, or at least I thought I did, for most of my life. And there was a time when...when I tried to dig it out of my chest. To make it go away. Because I needed to protect myself. Because you chose her. Because the press told me who I was. That I wasn’t special or pretty, and I thought... I was sure I couldn’t ever be enough for you. But you know what? I could keep it inside then because I didn’t really love you.”