“Exactly how many rules do you expect me to follow?” she demanded, her head cocked, lips pressed together, but her eyes, her eyes looked lit with happiness. Then she blinked, her dark lashes fanning downward, and when they raised once more, whatever emotion he’d thought he’d seen there was gone.
“Just one,” he said, knowing he had no right to say what he was about to, given the circumstances he now found himself in and was forcing on her, but he could not stop the words as possessiveness trumped reason. “I demand fidelity always, even after you are no longer living here.”
Now, he could have sworn triumph flashed in her intoxicating eyes, but again, she blinked, and it was as if the reaction he’d thought he’d seen had been a trick of his imagination. Considering the state his mind and body were in, he could not dismiss the possibility that he was seeing things he would have once wished to from her. She crossed her arms and met his stare with a challenging one of her own. “If you expect fidelity, then I believe it perfectly acceptable for me to expect to be…to be,” she sputtered, her face reddening, “to be serviced—evenafter I am gone.”
Every inch of his body hardened at the realization of what she was saying, and then jealousy hit him square in the gut. “Have you found,” he asked, his voice lethally calm even to his own ears, “that you have a healthy appetite for a man’s touch?”
“Yes,” she replied. She sprang from the bed and turned on her heel to head for the door.
He closed the distance between them in a flash, his blood rushing wildly through him. He had her wrist in his grasp, turned her, and tugged her flush against him before it registered in his head what having her pliable body pressed to his, something he’d dreamed about for so many months, might do to him. A savage hunger for her ripped through him. “Who?” he growled, her warm breath fanning his face and her breasts rising upward as she gulped. Her eyes widened, but she didn’t speak. “Who?” he demanded again. “Ross? I’ll kill him. I’ll kill him today if you…if he—”
“No!” She pressed her hands to either side of his face. “No. Your cousin has never touched me.” He started to exhale, but then she said, “Well, once he did try to kiss me, but I…I could not stand it, and I turned my face to break the kiss.”
The dark desire to find Ross and rip out his heart beat through Callum. “If not Ross, then who made you realize you crave a man’s touch?”
“How quickly you’ve forgotten our time in your art studio.” The memories flooded his head in brilliant flashes of color. The cream of her inner thighs. The rose of her nipples. Her warm eyes shining almost gold with desire. Her dark hair free of pins and dangling about her shoulders. Her face flushed from the introduction he had given her to a woman’s pleasure.
“I’ve not forgotten that day,” he said, his voice hoarse and his body throbbing.
“Then you should well know that it was you, you fool, who made me realize I crave a man’s touch.” Her accusing glare snapped the tentative hold he’d regained on his self-control. Before he knew it, his mouth was slanting over hers, devouring her.
It was not a gentle kiss. It was a ravishment. It was desperation. It was a plea to be forgiven for that which he could not yet confess, perhaps never confess. He plunged his tongue into her mouth and plundered its warm caverns, and the familiar sounds she made of pleasure from deep within her throat drove him to a near frenzy. He teased her lips and nipped them, and then he started toward her neck, determined to work his way slowly down to her breast, but her palm suddenly pressed against his forehead, and she shoved him back hard.
“What the devil was that for?” he demanded as her palm dropped away.
“That,” she said, breasts heaving, “was to make you stop.”
“I thought you said you wanted my touch? Wanted me to service you?” When and how the roles had flipped he couldn’t say, and he damn well didn’t care. All he cared about in this moment was touching her.
“And I thought you said you didn’t want to start tonight,” she flung back.
He had said that, damn it, but his body had taken over his mind, and his body wanted release from the torture he was in. “It’s currently midday,” he said, making a grab for her, but she skirted his reach and pressed herself against the door.
“If you wish to demand faithfulness even after you send me away, then I wish to demand terms, as well.” Her eyes were shining, and her chest was heaving. She was bloody magnificent in her current incensed state.
“Terms for what?” he asked, unable to get his mind to think beyond tossing up her skirts and burying himself within her. That wouldn’t do at all. When he came together with her, he needed to be detached. Granted, he wanted to please her, but he needed to keep control at all times while doing so. He was begrudgingly glad she had stopped him from trying to kiss his way to the heaven that awaited him under all those layers of fabric.
“Terms for my fidelity,” she said, fanning herself with her hand, which made him chuckle. Her eyes narrowed to slits. “It’s ridiculous to think we will both live apart as celibates for the rest of our lives.”
Hell and damn. He hadn’t thought this part of his plan through properly at all.
Her expression became stormy. “Do not tell me,” she huffed, “that you intended for onlymeto be celibate and you would live as you wished.”
He had not thought that bloody far into the future. He just wanted to get her away from him to protect her and achieve his revenge to get justice, so the nightmares would hopefully stop, so he could hopefully heal and be worthy to even ask her for her forgiveness.
“You did, you devil!” she said, misinterpreting his silence for an admission of guilt. “That’s just like a man to demand a woman be pious while he is not. If you’re going to be wicked, then you can fully expect that I’ll be wicked, too!” He opened his mouth to respond, but she went on, staring and giving him a solid poke to the chest. “And I don’t care about the rules or what you may threaten. Threaten all you like! I—”
“One visit a month after you are gone,” he interrupted, desperate to get her to quit talking about her wickedness. Just the word from her mouth made him want to take her in his arms and kiss her. Not only was his head pounding but his groin was throbbing still, too. He wanted her in a very bad way. But he would not touch her until the craving had dulled. Several beatings should do that trick. He also could not service her at night. Never at night. That’s when sleep came and with it, the demons of his past. He would not take the chance.
“And,” she said, pausing to nibble on her lip, “I want to be properly courted as you started to do before.” Her voice turned shy.
His gut twisted at her words. He remembered. How could he ever forget? His painting her. Their sitting under the stars while she told him of the moon. His introducing her to her own body.
He gave his head a little shake. “No courting. That man never existed,” he lied. “I told you, it was a ruse to get your money. Don’t try to make me into a hero. I’m a rogue.”
“Yes, yes,” she said petulantly, waving a dismissive hand at him as she turned toward the door, giving him her back. “So you say. Fine. We have a deal. Shall we say you shall start servicing me tomorrow night after we dine?”
A picture popped into his head then of her spread on the dining table naked, fruit and sweet tarts balanced on her body. He would eat them off her. Oh yes. Yes, he would. One by delectable one. Wait, no. No, he could not do that. Their time together had to be as dispassionate and as boring as possible. He didn’t know how he was going to manage it, but he had to.
