Page 26 of Sleeping with the Frenemy
Victoria
Ifelt my eyes go wide. Did he just propose?
“Marry me,” he repeated.
Yup.
My mouth opened, but no words emerged.
He came to the edge of the bed and stopped. “As my wife, your debts become my debts, and vice versa. The same with wealth. It wouldn’t matter how much you owed.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Actually, no. He looked completely sincere. And sane—even though what he was saying was crazy. My mind whirled, my thoughts tumbling so fast I couldn’t form an adequate response. Or any kind of response. I still wasn’t fully recovered from the shock of seeing him again after seven years. Now he wanted to get married?
“Our families hate each other,” I blurted.
He shrugged. “That didn’t stop Romeo and Juliet.”
“Everyone dies at the end of that story!”
“It’s fiction, Victoria.”
“The feud between our families isn’t.” My heart squeezed, and I lowered my voice. “What about your father?”
Chase’s expression hardened, his green eyes growing chilled. Menace rolled off him in a way that made me realize he wasn’t just the playful and curious eighteen-year-old I’d known. He was a grown man and the de facto ruler of a billion-dollar hotel empire.
His lips curved in a humorless smile that sent an icy finger down my spine. “There’s not a damn thing he can do about it. I’ve had lawyers crawl over every inch of the trust. There’s nothing in it about marriage. I doubt he thought me capable of having a normal relationship, if he even bothered thinking of me at all. Narcissists can’t imagine other people wanting love or companionship, because they don’t really understand what either of those things mean. If he tries to amend the terms, I’ll challenge it for lack of mental capacity. It’ll be tied up in court until he dies. He won’t do that to the business.”
I tried to process his words. Everything made sense. And it might just work.
Except…
“You’re thinking again,” he said quietly. “Don’t do that, Victoria. Just say yes.”
I wanted to.
Didn’t I?
It was a solution to all my problems. But marriage was so…big. So final.
Chase waited, his muscled body sexy as sin in nothing but a pair of tailored suit pants. His hair had dried in thick waves, and a mischievous lock spilled over his forehead. Any woman would jump at the chance to call him her husband. But was marriage really something to be jumped at? Shouldn’t it be more of a long, slow glide?
I took a deep breath. “Chase, I appreciate what you’re trying to do.”
A rueful expression touched his features. “But you’re turning me down.”
“It’s not that.”
“We’d be good together, Victoria.” Heat flared in his gaze. “We are good together, and if you’ve forgotten just how good, I’m happy to give you a refresher.”
Right on cue, my sex clenched and my nipples tightened. If my body was doing the decision-making, I’d already be on my way to the nearest courthouse.
“There’s more to marriage than just sex,” I told him.
“It’s a pretty big part of it.” He smirked. “Probably the best part of it.”
