When we were together, I’d been eager for this conversation, for the moment when we would really cut out all other lovers. Condoms would be dispensed with because they would be unnecessary. It was just the two of us…and we wouldn’t be separated by anything. We’d only made love that way a couple of times, and they were the best nights of my life. I wanted to have them again…just not now.
Maverick gave me a slight nod before he turned around and headed up the stairs. He probably hoped something would happen tonight. If he’d been celibate like he promised, it must have felt like an eternity.
But no, I wasn’t ready.
We weren’t ready.
The winter season brought inhospitable weather, so there was nothing to do but stay indoors. I couldn’t use the pool or jog around the grounds because we were in the middle of a storm. So, I did something unexpected—I went to the gym.
I’d just reached the hallway when Maverick stepped out of the double French doors. In just his sweatpants and workout shoes, he had a streak of sweat on his bare chest that shone under the lights. It was the same way he looked during sex, hot, sweaty, and pumping with blood. A towel was over his shoulder.
When he crossed my path in the hallway, he looked over my outfit. “Is this a dream?” he teased.
I smacked his arm playfully. “I’m bored, and there’s nothing to do outside. The weather is too crazy to go anywhere. So, I thought I would walk on the treadmill or something.” When my eyes glanced up his body, I noticed my ring sitting on a chain around his neck. I stared at it for a couple of seconds and wondered how long he’d been wearing it.
“So the only way to get you to exercise is through boredom?”
“I guess…”
He gave a slight smile, his pretty eyes lighting up. “You know, there are other ways to exercise…” He brushed his arm against mine as he walked by, pulling off the comment when no one else would have been able to.
“I prefer doing it alone.”
He stopped and turned around, his eyebrow cocked at my choice of words.
“You know what I mean…”
“Yes. But I’m going to pretend I don’t.”
When it finally stopped raining, I headed to Florence before my performance and went shopping. Christmas was just around the corner, and I wanted to pick up a few things for Abigail and the servants.
I also wanted to get something for Maverick.
He was a difficult man to shop for, being as he already owned anything he could possibly want. He had a three-story estate and only used the second floor for the gym. The rest were guest bedrooms that were never filled.
Sometimes I wondered why he lived there at all. It was too big for one person.
Well…I technically lived there too.
I didn’t have a lot of money like Maverick, so I couldn’t afford the designer stuff he usually wore, but I found a shirt that would look great on him. The color of Bordeaux wine, it was a collared shirt that would suit his large frame. He would never wear it to a fancy event, but maybe he would wear it around the house. It was still steep for my budget, but I got it anyway. If he didn’t like it, I could wear it with a belt and some leggings.
I went to the theater and prepared for my performance. After a wardrobe change and new makeup, I went on stage, sang my heart out, and then finished the show. As much as I loved being a singer, the repetitive nature of the job had started to wear me down. It wasn’t good for my vocal cords either. The director wanted to use me more often than the understudy, but that meant I had to sing three times a week…which was a lot of work on my throat. Sometimes I wondered if I should take Maverick’s suggestion and just do my own thing. But that would force me to rely on him completely, financially. If that were the case, I wouldn’t have even been able to buy his Christmas present on my own.
I was pulling the pins out of my hair, deep in thought, when Brandon approached me from behind. “Uh…what are you doing?” I turned around in my chair and stared at him blankly, relieved Maverick wasn’t there to put a gun to his head.
“Your husband picked up the phone, and we never got a chance to talk.”
I got to my feet, my eyebrow cocked like he was crazy. “Brandon, I ended things with you a while ago.”
“Through text,” he snapped. “We never really talked about what went wrong. You didn’t even give me a real chance.”
“Brandon, nothing went wrong. I just got back together with my husband.”