Meddling with a Millionaire (Case Brothers 1)

“It must be one hell of a business deal,” she grumbled, reaching over to flip on the lights.

Floor lamps chased away shadow. She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the brightness.

“The biggest one I’ve ever done.”

“Then I guess marrying me is a small price to pay.” The bitter taste of the words gave her tone a sharp bite. “What’s wrong?”

Her spirits drooped still lower. With a big business deal on the line, Nathan wouldn’t be receptive to her pleas to turn her father down.

“I don’t want to marry you like this.”

“Like this?” he echoed dryly, picking up on how those last two words had betrayed her. “Is there some other way you’d like to marry me?”

Emma ignored the gleam in his eye. “I don’t want to marry anyone like this.” She didn’t want to marry a man her father could manipulate. She couldn’t respect such a man, and she knew she’d never trust him. “I resent being used as a bargaining chip in my father’s deal with you.”

“And I don’t like being a pawn in your father’s attempt to control you,” Nathan countered without heat, speaking as if he found the whole mess completely reasonable. “However, I suggest we make the best of the situation we find ourselves in.”

His eyes burned with sexy intent as he located her gown’s side zipper and slid it down. Before she voiced a protest, he stroked the straps off her shoulders. Her breath rushed out as she caught the dress before it fell. Her dress. Her defenses. Let one drop and the other would follow.

“Let me remind you how amazing we are together,” he coaxed, sliding his lips into the spot on her shoulder he’d mentioned earlier.

“I don’t need reminding, Nathan.” Anxiety and anticipation fluttered in her midsection like drunken fairies. Although she couldn’t shake her misgivings about his reasons for marrying her, the memory of his body mastering hers proved a powerful aphrodisiac. Marriage to Nathan would be like bronco riding: dangerous, exhilarating, uncertain. He would trample her heart, oblivious to the damage he’d inflicted, then race off to take on his next challenge. “But great sex isn’t enough to base a marriage on.”

He reached out and took her chin in his fingers to turn her face toward him. “It is if we don’t indulge in unrealistic expectations.”

She almost laughed.

In her darkest moments, when she’d contemplated her life if forced to go along with her father’s plans, she’d pictured herself living the way her mother had, married to a businessman who worked long hours. She’d imagined herself spending her mornings shopping, followed by lunch at the club. Eventually, she’d indulge in a torrid affair with her golf coach or her daught

er’s French tutor. From observing others in their social circle, she’d assumed that she and her husband would live completely separate lives, coming together for business dinners and parties. Sex would be infrequent and only if she became sufficiently tipsy.

That was not the life she would have with Nathan Case, a man who left her weak-kneed and wanting with a look. For him, she’d pore through lingerie catalogs and work out at the gym to make sure she maintained her perfect figure. She saw herself planning luscious dinners for two and vacations to exotic locales. He would become her life, her obsession.

Emma shivered.

And what would she get in return? Would he be a faithful husband? Or would he indulge in extramarital affairs that would drive her to become like her father: Suspicious and watchful to the point where she drove him away? She’d watched her mother grow more and more miserable until Emma’s junior year of high school, when she’d filed for divorce and moved to Los Angeles. She’d never remarried, and Emma often wondered if her mother was less afraid of losing her alimony than she was of risking her heart again.

Recalling his flirtation with the blonde in the library, doubts marched in and rang a warning bell.

“Unrealistic expectations?” she echoed. “Such as fidelity?” There, she’d said it.

“I intend for this to be a real marriage, Emma.” Lightning danced in his gray eyes. His fingers slipped whisper-soft against her cheek. “You will be the only woman in my bed.”

But what about his heart? How could a marriage be real without love?

Emma fought the panic trembling through her as she considered what sort of emotional seesaw awaited her as Nathan’s wife. When her father had barred access to her trust fund ten months ago, complaining that the amount she spent on clothes and shoes proved she had no grasp of fiscal responsibility, she thought he was just trying to teach her a lesson. She never truly believed he’d force her to marry someone.

Reaching to fidget with her jewelry, Emma tugged on her earlobe and recalled Nathan pocketing the sapphire and diamond drops. They were one of her earliest designs. She’d dabbled at making jewelry since graduating from college, but a two-year stint as a goldsmith’s assistant had dampened her enthusiasm for executing other people’s designs. But when her father cut her off, she’d stubbornly decided to live on what she could make selling her own line of jewelry.

She realized after six months of slow sales that even if she lived without luxuries like designer fashions and spa visits, making enough to pay her mortgage, put gas in her car and food in her refrigerator would require her to work a lot harder than she ever had. And not just for a year, but for the rest of her life.

Or she could get her trust fund back. If she did what her father wanted and got married. Within one year. It was the one condition he’d put on restoring her funds.

She was tired of fighting. Fighting her father’s will. Fighting the temptation to spend money. Fighting to pay her bills. This year had been hell. It would be so easy to quit. To do what her father wanted. Marry Nathan. Let him take care of her. No more eyestrain or aching muscles from sitting at her worktable for hours at a time. No more fretting over whether she could afford to keep her membership at her favorite yoga studio.

Emma straightened her spine. “May I have my earrings back?”

“I think I’ll hold on to them for a little while.”