The Secret Beneath the Veil

He made himself roll away and sit up, to prove himself master over whatever this thing was that threatened him in a way nothing else could.

She stayed inside him, though. In his body as an intoxicant, and in his head as an unwavering awareness. And because he was so attuned to her, he heard the barely discernible noise she made as he pushed to stand. It was a sniff. A lash. A cat-o’-nine-tails that scored through his thick skin into his soul.

He swung around and saw only the bow of her back, still curled on her side where he’d left her. He dropped his knee into the mattress and caught her shoulder, flattening her so he could see her face.

She gasped in surprise, lifting a hand to quickly try to wipe away the tears that stood in her eyes. Self-conscious agony flashed in her expression before she turned her face to hide it.

His heart fell through the earth.

“I thought you were with me.” He spoke through numb lips, horrified with himself. He could have sworn she had been as passionately excited as he was. He had felt her slickness, the ripples of her orgasm. Was he kidding himself with how well he thought he knew her?

“You have to tell me if I’m being too rough,” he insisted, his usual command buried in a choke of self-reproach.

“It’s not that.” Her expression spasmed with dismay. She pushed the back of her wrist across her eye, then brushed his hand off her shoulder so she could roll away and sit up. “I used to be so afraid of sex. Now I like it.”

She rubbed her hands up and down her arms, the delicacy of her frame striking like a hammer between his eyes. Her nude body pimpled at the chill as she rose.

“I’m grateful,” she claimed, turning to offer him a smile, but her lashes were still matted. “Take a bow. Let me know what I owe you.”

Those weren’t tears of gratitude.

His heart lurched as he found himself right back in that moment where he had impulsively told her to pursue her interests and she had searched for reassurance that she would be with him for the long haul.

I don’t know how long I’ll be with you.

It had struck him at that moment that at some point she would leave and he hadn’t been able to face it. He skipped past it now, only saying her name.

“Viveka.” It hurt his throat. “I told you to keep your expectations low,” he reminded, and felt like a coward, especially when her smile died.

She looked at him with betrayal, like he’d smacked her.

“Don’t,” he bit out.

“Don’t what? Don’t like it?”

“Don’t be hurt.” He couldn’t bear the idea that he was hurting her. “Don’t feel grateful.”

She made a choking noise. “Don’t tell me what to feel. That is where you control what I feel.” She pointed at the rumpled sheets he knelt upon, then tapped her chest and said on a burst of passion, “In here? This is mine. I’ll feel whatever the hell I want.”

Her blue eyes glowed with angry defiance, but something else ravaged her. Something sweet and powerful and pure that shot like an arrow to pierce his breastbone and sting his heart. He didn’t try to put a name to it. He was afraid to, especially when he saw shadows of hopelessness dim her gaze before she looked away.

“I’m not confusing sex with love, if that’s what you’re worried about.” She moved to the chair and pulled on his shirt from the night before, shooting her arms into it and folding the front across her stomach. She was hunched as though bracing for body blows. “My mother made that mistake.” Her voice was scuffed and desolate. “I won’t. I know the difference.”

Why did that make him clench his fist in despair? He ought to be reassured.

He almost told her this wasn’t just sex. When he walked into a room with her hand in his, he was so proud it was criminal. When she dropped little tidbits about her life before she met him, he was fascinated. When she looked dejected like that, his armored heart creaked and rose on quivering legs, anxious to show valor in her name.

Instead he stood, saying, “I’ll send an email today. To ask how the investigation is coming along. On your mother,” he clarified, when she turned a blank look on him.

She snorted, sounding disillusioned as she muttered, “Thanks.”