The Marriage He Must Keep (9 page)

BOOK: The Marriage He Must Keep
4.81Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

“Water it down,” Alessandro suggested, nearly making the sommelier drop the bottle that likely cost four figures.

“He’s joking,” Octavia assured the man, biting back a smile as she admonished Alessandro with a look, but she’d just glimpsed the playboy from her honeymoon and wanted to laugh with sheer and hopeful joy. “I’ll have a very short glass and please don’t be offended if I don’t finish it.”

When the man left, she told Alessandro, “That was mean,” then clinked glasses with him.
“Salud.”

He lifted a negligent brow, settling back to regard her, fingers tracing the base of his glass where he set it on the table.

She sipped again. The wine was excellent. She’d have to be careful, nervous as she was. That would go down too easily if she let it.

“Where are your rings?” Alessandro asked, stilling. He looked from her hand to her eyes, accusation sharp in his gaze.

“I took them off weeks ago because my hands were swelling. I can’t get them back on yet.” She tucked her hands into her lap.

“It’s not symbolic then?” he asked, lifting his glass, but regarding her over the rim without tasting.

She parted her lips, but found too many words coming into her mouth, all jumbled and hard to speak. Meeting his gaze grew difficult and she dropped her attention to the middle of the table.

The silence grew heavy and loaded. “You were happy in our marriage, Octavia. You can be happy again.”

Because he decreed it?

“It wasn’t a marriage, Alessandro. It was an
affair
.” Her voice thinned and her cheeks burned. It was hard to face the truth. Hard to speak it. “You took three weeks off work and I had a lover for the first time in my life. We did nothing but eat, swim and make love. Of course I was happy. But the minute we returned to reality, you set me aside.”

The injury of that slow realization, as their sense of closeness was eroded daily by neglect, made her voice unsteady. “I wasn’t sharing your life. I was the sex toy you took to bed at night.”

His head went back. “That’s insulting to both of us.”

“You didn’t have any use for me once we were told I couldn’t have sex.” She looked down at her hands knotting in her lap, peeled three fingers into a salute that she held up. “Three duty visits,” she reminded him.

He looked away. His grip on the stem of his glass looked as if it would snap the delicate strand.

“Is it any wonder I believed Primo when he said you were cheating?” she added.

“I didn’t even
think
of other women while we were apart. I only want
you
,” he said in a tone that fell somewhere between frustration and fury.

Yet, when he brought his attention back to her, his eyes glittered with banked lust. He looked at her like he had on their honeymoon. As if he’d battled his way past the guards and was opening the chest of booty.

Her heart stuttered in her chest. Her nerves tingled and the pit of her belly burned as though she’d swallowed half a bottle of gin. She held her breath, trying to withstand the huge rush of sexual excitement that suffused her.

“It’s not like this for everyone, you know,” he said. They were speaking Italian, were alone in the big room, but she blushed as he added, “You were a virgin, so you may not realize that, but we have something not everyone does,
cara
.”

“The sex doesn’t matter,” she said, the color in her cheeks increasing under his incredulous stare. “It’s not enough,” she clarified, lifting a fatalistic hand, stammering out, “There has to be something else and obviously there isn’t because nothing about me drew you here while I was pregnant. Not even your unborn son.”

The remembered loneliness crept up to sting the backs of her eyes, making it hard for her to continue.

“How are we supposed to have any sort of marriage if you weren’t interested in something as basic as friendship? If all you want from me is my body?” It absolutely crushed her to say it, but she had to face it. “I’m nothing to you. I can’t be
nothing
, Alessandro.”

“I regret not coming,” he said, catching at her hand before she could tuck it back into her lap. His grip urged her to look at him. His dark brows formed a pained line over a gaze that reflected agony. “I will regret not being here for the rest of our lives because it might have prevented some of this...stage play we’re barely surviving. You and I would not be so far apart right now if I’d used that time to get to know you the way I should have.

“What can I say?” he continued, massaging her hands as though he wanted to work his words into her skin. “I’m
arrogant. I believed we had the rest of our lives. Perhaps there was even some immaturity on my part, not quite ready to accept the yoke of marriage. My life has been one of autonomy. I wanted to be married, not domesticated. I’m not proud of that attitude, but I’m man enough to admit that’s where my head was at.”

“And now you’re ready to be domestic?” she chided, letting her hand stay in his because she craved his touch. Even after all this time, all her anger and disappointment and reservations, she wanted to hold still for his touch.

“Now, like many people who only realize the true value of something when they almost lose it, I am ready to commit wholeheartedly to our marriage,” he said in a tone that made it a vow.

Hope pulsed in her arteries. Everything about him weakened her: the control and confidence his posture projected, the handsomeness of his godlike features with that glint of determination in his eyes.

“But I can’t say the same,” she admitted, wavering slightly as he flinched and sent her a fierce look. “I went into this marriage so anxious for it to be perfect, so certain it would be better than my parents’, I never disagreed with any of your decisions. You made all of them. I can’t be that person you married. I won’t.”

“I’m not asking you to,” he said, holding her hand a little tighter as a more avid light came into his eyes, like a hunter pouncing on its prey. “But does your first demand of me have to be that I allow you to leave me and take our son? That’s unreasonable. Try again.”

She released a husk of a disbelieving laugh, sitting back and stealing her hand away from his. “I suppose asking you to quit being so arrogant is also unreasonable?”

“And unrealistic,” he said without a hint of sheepishness or apology. “I don’t compromise, Octavia. That’s not who I am, but I’m trying to do it for you,” he added sincerely. “For my wife. To save our marriage. Do you see that?”

She swallowed, weirdly affected by that statement. A sip of wine was in order, to help her digest everything he’d said. Warmth ran down her limbs.

“Believe it or not, I don’t want a spineless wife,” he said. “Yes-men annoy me. That’s why I’m furious to learn that all this time, when I thought you were content, you’ve been miserable and keeping it from me.”

She bit the insides of her lips before she said simply, “It never mattered to anyone how I felt. My parents didn’t care and boarding school—” She shrugged that off. No welcome for whiners there.

Their
feuilletés
arrived, distracting them for a moment as they broke the delicate puff pastries. They were tiny, only two bites, and shaped like fish. Creamy salmon and asparagus filling oozed out.

“Tell me more about your parents. You said a few days ago that your father didn’t have your best interests at heart, but he was very shrewd in our meetings. He wanted a good marriage for you.”

She dipped her chin, reproving him for thinking her father’s demands had had anything to do with her. “If you are a caretaker of your family fortune, he is a hoarder, one who is frustrated that he can’t take his money with him. He wanted a successor and got a vessel. I told you about my mother’s miscarriages. I didn’t fully appreciate how horrible that must have been for her until now, when I have my own baby, but I’ve always felt...” She shrugged. “Obligated to do what they wanted, otherwise why did she go through all that to have me? But given her delicate pregnancies and bouts of depression when she lost them... I assume she went through spells of refusing to sleep with my father and so he cheated. It didn’t make for a very happy home to grow up in.”

Her fork went under the last minuscule bite of the delicious starter. As she swallowed, she looked up to see him watching her. Was that compassion in his gaze? Concern?

“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.

He locked hard arms around her, holding her tight, just short of squeezing her. His hands moved with possessive familiarity, one splaying under her bottom and angling her hips into his groin.

She rubbed against him, inciting him with the grind of her hips and the scrape of her teeth against his lips. She wanted to bite him. Hurt him.

He grunted, kissing her harder as he took control, holding her with restrained power just short of crushing her while he pulled at her lips and ravaged her mouth.

To hell with her recovery and the tenderness across her belly.
She wanted him
. Her body went weak, signaling her willingness to be taken.

She felt the reaction in him, the gather of his muscles as if he would pick her up and carry her to the nearest surface. The floor. He had in the past.

He tore his mouth from hers instead, one hand moving to the back of her head to tuck her crown under his chin where he held her as though protecting her from the fireball that had exploded into flames between them. They panted, hearts slamming.

To her eternal shock, she realized they were in a restaurant. Voices drifted over the music from the other rooms.

BOOK: The Marriage He Must Keep
4.81Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Into the Shadow by Christina Dodd
Event Horizon by Steven Konkoly
Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo
Annie and Fia by Kiersten White
Improper Advances by Margaret Evans Porter