A Vow of Obligation (Marriage by Command 3)

‘You’re so different from the other women I’ve known. I didn’t want to get it wrong with you,’ he admitted gruffly, a delicious tension stretching out the moment as she angled her mouth up and he took the invitation with a swift, sure hunger that released a moan of approval from her throat.

Navarre straightened again and a gave her a breathtaking smile. ‘I dare not touch you until we get back home. I’m like dynamite waiting on a lit match,’ he groaned, studying her with hot, hungry intensity. ‘It’s been too long and I’m too revved up.’

Alight with all the potency of her feminine power, Tawny grinned and whispered curiously, ‘How long?’

His brow indented. ‘You know how long it’s been.’

‘You mean … I was your last lover? When we were together that last time in London?’ Tawny specified in open amazement. ‘There hasn’t been anyone else since then?’

Navarre gave a rueful laugh. ‘I’ve always been more into quality than quantity, chérie. I’m past the age where I sleep with women purely for kicks.’

Tawny tacitly understood what he was confirming. Even when their short-lived relationship had appeared to be over he had not taken another lover. Obviously he had not met anyone he wanted enough, which with the choices he had to have was a huge compliment to Tawny. Even more obviously, if she accepted his word on that score, it meant that he could not be engaged in even an occasional affair with Tia Castelli. Perhaps he had once loved Tia and, although it was in the past, he retained a fondness for the beautiful film star, she reasoned feverishly, desperate to explain what she had seen between them on her wedding day.

But she was seriously surprised by the news that he had been celibate for months on end. Meeting his level scrutiny, she believed him on that score one hundred per cent and it was as if the weight of the world fell off her shoulders in the same moment. Suddenly she was furious with herself for not asking questions about Tia and demanding answers sooner. She had conserved her pride and remained silent but unhappy and she wasn’t proud of the reality that she had behaved like a coward, frightened of what the truth might reveal and of how much it might hurt. Loving a man who could be so reserved might never be easy, but she needed to learn how to handle that side of his nature.

In the vast bedroom that she had become accustomed to occupying alone she let him unzip the coat and part the edges to look down at her scantily clad curves with smouldering appreciation.

‘I’m going to have to start buying you stuff,’ she began shyly as he laid her down on the bed and started to carefully unzip her boots.

‘No, this moment is my gift,’ Navarre countered huskily, burying his mouth between her breasts and running a skilful hand along the extended length of her thigh to the taut triangle of fabric between her legs.

Her body was supersensitive after all the months of deprivation. The pulse of need she was struggling to control tightened up an almost painful notch. Sadly the lingerie that had brought them together received precious little attention and was cast aside within minutes while Navarre’s shirt got ripped in the storm of Tawny’s impatience. She ran her hands over the gloriously hard, flat expanse of his abs and then lower to the blatant thrust of his arousal. His breath hitched in his throat as he protested that he was too aroused to bear her touch.

‘You mean you’re only good for one go … like a Christmas cracker?’ Tawny asked him deadpan.

And, startled by that teasing analogy, Navarre laughed long and hard as he studied her with fascination. ‘Where have you been all my life?’

He kissed her passionately again and matters quickly became extremely heated. He tried to make her wait because he wanted to make an occasion of what he saw as a long delayed wedding night, but she was in no mood for ceremony and she refused to wait, holding him to her with possessive hands and locking her slim legs round his waist to entrap him. She had expectations and she was unusually bossy. He was trying for slow and gentle, she was striving for hard and fast, and with a little artful angling of her hips and caressing and whispered encouragements she got exactly what she wanted delivered with an unrivalled hunger that left her body singing and dancing with excitement. Desire momentarily quenched, she lay in his arms, peacefully enjoying the fact that he was still touching her as if he couldn’t quite believe that he had now reclaimed that intimacy. He stroked her arm and strung a line of kisses round the base of her throat while still holding her close to his lean, damp body and at that instant, with all that appreciation coming her way, she felt like a queen.

In fact when he got out of bed she almost panicked, a small hand clamping round his wrist as if he were a fleeing prisoner. ‘Where are you going?’

Navarre lifted the phone with a flourish. ‘I’m ordering some food, ma petite—we both need sustenance to keep up the pace.’

‘And then?’ she checked, heat and awareness still rippling through swollen and sensitive places as she looked at him.

‘We share a shower and I stay … all night?’ He was looking hopeful and she knew she wouldn’t be able to disappoint him, particularly when she just didn’t want him out of her sight for a minute.

‘And if you should feel the need to wake me up and jump me during the night at any time,’ Navarre drawled silkily over supper, ‘you are very welcome.’

‘Well, the pregnancy damage is already done.’

‘Don’t say that even jokingly,’ he urged, feeding her grapes and Parma ham and tiny sweet tomatoes and reminding her all over again why she loved him so much. ‘I can’t wait to be a father.’

In the secure circle of Navarre’s arms for the first time ever, Tawny slept blissfully well. To his great disappointment she didn’t wake him up for anything so that he could prove all over again that he had nothing in common whatsoever with a Christmas cracker. When she wakened it was late morning and she blinked drowsily. Stretching a hand over to the empty space beside her in the bed, she suppressed a sigh even as she stretched luxuriantly while lazily considering their marriage, which she was finally convinced had a real future. He was gone, of course he was long gone, he left for the office at the crack of dawn most weekdays. Only when she had stumbled out of bed to move in the direction of the bathroom did she realise that Navarre had not even left the room—he was actually seated in an armchair in the dimness.

‘My word, I didn’t see you over there … what a fright you gave me!’ She gasped, stooping hurriedly to pick up her robe from the foot of the bed and dig her arms into the sleeves because she was still somewhat shy of displaying her pregnant body to him. ‘Why are you still at home?’

‘May I open the curtains?’ At her nod, he buzzed back the drapes and light flooded in, illuminating the harsh lines etched in his taut features. ‘I’ve been waiting for you to wake up.’

‘What’s wrong? What’s happened?’

‘Your cell phone has been ringing on and off for a couple of hours … your sisters, I assume, your family trying to get in touch with you … I didn’t answer the calls.’ Navarre lifted a shoulder in a very Gallic shrug and surveyed her with brooding regret. ‘I switched off your phone because I wanted to be the one to tell you what has happened—’

‘I need to use the bathroom first!’ Tawny flung wildly at him and sped in there like a mouse pursued by a cat, slamming the door behind her. She didn’t want to know; she didn’t want to hear anything bad! She had wakened feeling happy, safe and insanely optimistic for the first time in a long time. How could that precious hope be taken away from her so quickly?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

ONCE Tawny had freshened up and mentally prepared herself for some sort of disaster, she emerged again, pale and tense.