The simple answer was that it was Leah’s fault. She was doing things to him. And he had no idea how she held that power. How, when he had thought himself in love with another woman. When he’d held on to his control for so long.
“What about it?”
“I’m wondering why we’re bothering to defer anything. I think it was pretty clear last night what we both wanted.”
“And we’ll have it, but when we have time to focus on that.” Again, he felt edgy, restless. Not ready to confront the physical part of their relationship.
It was because of her, he decided. Because it had been rushed. Because what she’d done, for the company, and for him, was very much like selling herself. And he felt uneasy about it. If he had a doubt that she wanted him, wanted to be in the marriage, it would make him feel like he was one of his father’s henchman after all. And that was why he’d run away in the first place. To escape that fate, no matter what.
You. In my bed. Every night.
She’d said it, but the vows were spoken. And whether or not she would ever admit it, she was bound to him. And that put her in his care. And if he didn’t care for her, then it put her under his thumb, and he would be damned if he was ever that man.
“When?”
“On our honeymoon. I did have one planned. It’s in two weeks. That should give ample time to get everything sorted out at Holt, for you to deal with any issues your stores are having due to the quality control glitch, and for us to have convinced the press that everything is, in fact, fine in our relationship.”
It would give him time, so that he didn’t feel like a marauder, mindlessly claiming husbandly rights simply because she was his bride. And whether or not she cared if he thought of another woman while they were in bed together, he found he did.
He didn’t have the stomach for using people. And that was, in his mind, what it would be.
He’d had his fill of using people. He couldn’t use Leah, too. Not like that. He could not make her a prostitute, paying her in the form of safety for her company.
And he couldn’t make love to her while he had feelings for someone else.
Although, it was becoming harder to picture Rachel. With the memory of his and Leah’s kiss burned into his mind, a watermark over his every thought for the past twelve hours, it was hard to think at all.
And that made it harder to pretend it was the reason he hadn’t touched his wife. He pushed the thought aside. Of course it was a reason. It was practically the reason.
“Two weeks? And then we just start...living as a real married couple.”
“It has to happen sometime. Preferably when we can focus on each other.”
“I see...and...and besides sex, what is marriage to you, Ajax? Is it love? Is it companionship? Friendship? What will I be to you?”
“I...I will share your bed,” he said, his voice rough. “I will protect you. I will give you children. If you reach out in the dark...I will be there.”
These were his real marriage vows. His promises to her. And he found he meant them. That he would carve them onto the remains of his soul if necessary.
He was changing direction, but this was still a path he could walk. Love wasn’t necessary. There was no need for a heavy, emotional attachment. Not when there was honesty. Not when there was faithfulness. Loyalty.
He wasn’t even certain now if he knew what love was. Rachel had been the symbol of his dreams. His finish line in so many ways. She had come to mean so much to him in what she had represented that it had been easy to imagine it was love.
But now he wondered. Leah had accused him of seeing Rachel as an ideal, not as a woman. Perhaps that was true.
Perhaps he was simply incapable of love. In a strange way, he found that comforting. Love was an awfully big emotion, one he imagined was hard to control. He couldn’t have such a thing.
“Nothing more?” she asked.
“That is everything, Leah. From me, that is everything.”
She looked away from him, lifted her hand and scrunched her ponytail, the curls springing back the moment she released it. And he remembered sifting his fingers through it last night. It had been straighter then. He wondered how it felt with all the curl in it. She bit her lower lip, and he remembered doing the same last night. And the little sound of pleasure she’d made.
His stomach tightened, and so did his groin. His lack of control stunned him enough that it took a while to get any back. All he could do was look at her, look at her and focus on the heat that was coursing through his body.