The Marriage He Must Keep

“Please don’t pity me. It is what it is.”

He drew a breath and stood, coming to her side where he held out a hand.

“What—?” She looked up, up, up to muscled shoulders straining the pin-striped fabric of his shirt. His stance was one of invitation, not intimidation, but her heart still skipped in alarm. She caught the faint scent of the aftershave he’d applied this morning. Its spicy fragrance was overlain with the more simple, masculine fragrance of him, heady and drugging.

“The music has started. Let’s dance.”

“I— Here?” She glanced around at the room containing a handful of empty tables, sparks of light glancing off the glass of the framed sketches. “There’s not a lot of room.”

“We don’t need a lot of room. I’m going to hold you very close.”

Little shivers went through her as he picked up her hand and she found herself standing, letting him draw her to him. He’d done this before, on their honeymoon, when she’d been so apprehensive about their wedding night she had bordered on telling him to “just get it over with.”

He had done this, though. Held her. Soothed her. His touch was light, yet confident. He was warm and strong, his arms a place of safety while the brush of their bodies revealed he was aroused.

She wanted to weep with relief that she could still affect him, but anxiety struck at the same time. “You know I can’t—”

“I know. I still want to hold you,” he murmured, lips brushing her brow. “I wish you’d told me about your parents before. You want a better life for Lorenzo, don’t you? We can have one, Octavia. I promise you we can. Give our marriage another try,” he coaxed, more gentle than dictatorial, but it was a command, not a request. “We’ll both give it a proper try.”

Oh, he was smooth, lulling her with the lazy circles of his palm on her back.

“I suppose I should take heart from the fact you’re saying that even though we can’t sleep together,” she muttered, turning her curled fingers on his chest to look at her fingernails.

“We’ll sleep together, cara.” He stopped swaying and tilted up her chin. His strong thumb caressed her skin while he lightly cupped her throat in his wide hand.

She instinctively turned her hand on his chest to press, staying him from making an advance.

Their gazes locked.

He must have felt the way her pulse was kicking. Beneath her palm, she was surprised to feel his heart punching with similar ferocity, making her tingle all over, as if they were caught in a force field that held them joined and motionless, frozen with anticipation.

He was going to kiss her.

“Do you want to?” he asked in a graveled tone. He wasn’t asking about a kiss. He was asking if she wanted to sleep with him.

She wished she could look away from his gray-green eyes. “I just told you I can’t,” she reminded him.

A very faint smile tilted his mouth. “That’s not what I asked.”

And she was transported back to the first time he had kissed her. After spending two hours locked in her father’s office, days after their first meeting at the gala, he had left the room and his tracking gaze had found her and locked in. He’d come across to put a ring on her finger and asked, “Shall we seal the deal?”

She’d already been nervous while he spoke to her father, then terrified as she realized what he meant. It hadn’t been her first kiss, but it had certainly been the first one she’d felt like pure spirits burning down her middle. Heat had poured across her skin and made her fingers and toes tingle. She’d opened her mouth instinctively, accepting the exploration of his tongue. She’d loved it.

A thousand kisses had followed, all of them exquisitely delicious. She loved kissing him. Nothing compared.

But if she kissed him now, it would imply agreement.

Doubts continued to float and burst like rainbow-colored bubbles around her, but her gaze dropped to his mouth. She was giving in. She could feel herself surrendering the fight...

Because she really, really wanted him to kiss her.

His head lowered.

She expected a crush of ownership. Triumph even.

He kissed her like he had that first time. Lightly. Sweetly. Gradually coaxing her to part her lips and let the heat and dampness spread.

She was the one who slid her arms around his neck and leaned in and encouraged him to increase the pressure. She opened her mouth and fisted her hand in his hair and punished him for making her wait so long to feel alive. She had missed the sexual energy, the rush of excitement, the provocative differences in their bodies that stimulated her in ways she couldn’t even explain. She kissed him hard and drove her tongue into his mouth and made a noise of anger and relief.