by Lucy Monroe
It wasn’t love, but it wasn’t merely lust, either. Not when her love was so consuming and his sense of possessive connection so overdeveloped.
He lightly pinched her nipple and she cried out against his marauding mouth.
He broke the kiss to laugh in triumph. “You are mine.”
“You are even more arrogant than I knew.”
Espresso eyes glittered down at her. “Admit it. This baby in your womb and the woman who carries it, you are both mine.”
“Yes, we’re yours, but you’d better remember that comes with a lot of responsibility for our welfare and I’m not talking about providing materially for us.” She had a job and could support herself just fine.
“I know.” His handsome face set in serious lines. “You believe I will hurt you as my father has my mother all these years, but it will not happen.”
“Your father could never have hurt your mother like you can hurt me.” Not even if his mother had felt some type of love for King Fedir when she demanded marriage in exchange for a child.
Maks’s eyes flared in surprise and then narrowed in understanding. “Because you love me.”
“Yes.”
If Queen Oxana had loved King Fedir as much as Gillian loved Maks, she would not have forced him into the sordid life of a married man carrying on an affair with his one true love.
His happiness would have been paramount. Just as Maks’s happiness was for Gillian.
If she thought marrying him would hurt him, she would refuse to do it. Of that she was absolutely certain. She knew her own heart and what it was capable of. She had a lifetime of testing and stretching it.
“You won’t stop saying it because I do not return the sentiment?” Maks asked as his hands and hard thigh continued pushing so much pleasure into her body she thought she might explode with it.
“Do you care if I do?” she gasped out.
For a split second in time he went still, unmistakable vulnerability flashing before it disappeared. “I find that I do.”
“I won’t stop saying it.” Who knew? One day, he might even truly understand what she meant when she did.
She could only hope he’d learn through feelings for her and not someone else.
“Stop it,” he ordered, his voice harsh.
“What?”
“You are doing that thing again, that pessimistic thinking.”
“How can you possibly know?”
“You get this look on your face, like all joy is in danger of being sucked from your life.”
She dropped her gaze, not wanting the level of insight this man was capable of at that moment. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
He let out a frustrated sound and then his head lowered again, not to kiss her but to launch a sensual onslaught onto her vulnerable neck.
Delight spiraled through her as he reminded her he knew exactly how to bring her, Gillian Harris, the maximum sexual reaction.
And just like that, she was on the verge of climaxing again. This time, he didn’t allow for conversation, or interruption, taking her up and over that pinnacle of pleasure without ever directly stimulating her clitoris.
She screamed out her pleasure, no hope of holding the sound in as her body shook in convulsions so powerful they should have been able to shatter bone.
Afterward, he stripped her naked, right there in the kitchen, and tore off his own clothes, before pushing her up against the wall. He lifted her legs, using the power of his muscular six-foot-four-inch frame to hold her in place as he spread her legs wide.
His erection pressed against her entrance, the bulbous tip spreading tender tissues for his invasion.
He paused there, the muscles of his neck corded with the strain of holding back. “You are the only woman I have ever had sex with without a condom between us.”
“Even when you were young and stupid?” she gasped out as his erection pushed inside a single slow inch.
“I was young once, never that stupid.”
“You never worried about diseases with me.”
“I saw your medical records.”
“Not stupid.”
“Do you want honesty?”
“Always.”
“It never entered my mind.”
He hadn’t even considered the possibility. That made her warm deep inside.
She smiled. “Good.”
“Impractical.”
“I won’t tell.”
He laughed, the sound strained. “I know. You would die of embarrassment.”
“I’m not sure I can face Demyan as it is.”
“You can.” Then whatever restraint Maks had been under seemed to break and he pushed all the way inside with a single powerful thrust.
The sound of satisfaction that came from deep in his chest sent another wave of desire crashing over the first one caused by finally having the connection of full intercourse.
Whatever veneer of civility still intact over Maks’s features and actions disintegrated in that moment and he began to make love to her with animalistic intensity. His powerful body pistoned in and out of hers, bringing intense pleasure with every potent thrust.
His breath came in harsh gasps, hers no better.
“Never again,” he ground out between clenched teeth as he swiveled his hips on the next thrust, causing her clitoris to pulse with pleasure.
She agreed, not sure what she was agreeing to, but hearing the need for her accord in thought in the two words. “Never again.”
“Ten weeks is too long.”
Without sex. She understood and though she wished he needed her emotionally with the same intensity, his sexual need was its own type of relationship guarantee.
“Come for me again,” he demanded as his body possessed hers so completely she would never again doubt who she belonged to.
Not that she had ever really been in doubt.
She said nothing, though, too intent on how her body seemed perfectly able to accede to his demand. The wonderful tension built inside, tightening, tightening, tightening…until it released with another life altering culmination.
This time, he came with her, his sex first swelling inside her, pushing her own pleasure toward the edge of unbearable before she felt the heat of his orgasm inside her.
He buried his face in the join of her neck and shoulder, his muscular chest rising and falling with harsh breaths as he repeated a single word over and over. “Moja.”
Mine.
And though there’d been nothing gentle about this coupling, the profundity she’d felt that night ten weeks ago washed over Gillian again, bringing tears to sting her eyes.
She did not know how he knew, but suddenly Maks’s head came up and he searched her face, his own expression unreadable. “Too much?”
“No,” she denied.
“Why the tears?”
“I can’t explain.”
“Pregnancy hormones.”
“Maybe,” she hedged.
His eyes narrowed. “I wonder.”
He lifted her left hand to his lips, kissing right above the ring he’d placed there, the message of possession in his dark gaze unmistakable and undeniable.
Then the gentleness came. He withdrew from her body, carefully lowering her legs to the floor. But he did not leave her to stand on her own; he simply changed his hold and lifted her again.
This time he cradled her against his chest and carried her through to the bathroom. Nothing like the master bath in his penthouse, her bathtub was barely big enough for one. There was no hope of them bathing together unless they showered.
And somehow she knew that was not his plan.
But she didn’t want to let go of the connection. She’d learned her lesson about clinging early in life, though, so she said nothing as he lowered her to the side of the tub.
He turned on the tap, adding her favorite bath salts. She watched the level rise, glad for his unconscious hand on her thigh as he swirled the salts so they melted into the hot water.
�
��The smell of rosemary reminds me of you.”
“Isn’t that the way it works? Rosemary for remembrance?”
“It’s the scent of your bath salts. Rosemary and mint. I like it.”
He’d said so before and she’d stopped buying other fragrances for her bath. She didn’t admit that now, though. “I like it, too,” was all she said.
He nodded before gently lifting her and placing her with what could be mistaken for tender care into the tub.
“I don’t need this kind of help,” she protested. “I’m pregnant, not helpless.”
“We have just made the most passionate of love. I will see to your comfort if I like.”
“You’re kind of bossy.”
“You’re very independent.”
“If you were looking for a leech, you shouldn’t have dated me.”
“I do not want a leech. A little clinging wouldn’t hurt, though,” he grumbled under his breath.
She couldn’t believe her ears. “Men like you hate women who cling.”
“I do not know where you come by your vast knowledge of men like me.” He frowned down at her, even as he began to wash her body with a bar of glycerin soap and gentle caresses. “But I would enjoy you clinging.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Allow me to know my own mind.”
“You get very formal in your speech when you are annoyed, did you know that?”
“It has been mentioned.”
“Good, I wouldn’t want you to be ignorant of a tell that could hinder your diplomatic or business negotiations.”
“For my country they are often one and the same.”
“For most countries, I think that’s the case.”
“You may well be right.” He continued to wash her.
“You’re still bossy.”
“It is a trait you are more than capable of withstanding.”
“You have a lot of faith in me.”
“I chose you for my princess. Of course I do.”
And though he’d rejected her it hadn’t been for reasons to do with her character. “The world is very black and white for you, isn’t it?”
“I know what I must do. I know what I want. I know how to go after both.” He settled on the large fluffy rug she kept beside the bath and then continued to wash her as if every single toe and finger needed his undivided attention.
“Am I something you want as well as something you must do?” she asked, not sure she wanted the answer.
“You can ask that after what happened not ten minutes past?”
“This is me clinging.”
Incredibly, he smiled. Lifting his head, so she could see the expression had reached his gorgeous eyes, he nodded once. “Good. Yes. I want you. Very much.”
It wasn’t love, but it was better than pure duty.
*
Maks held Gillian in his arms, her body lax in sleep, her features soft and vulnerable as they would not be awake.
The sun had risen thirty minutes ago and his schedule for the morning was tight, but he had not gotten up.
He could not help feeling like he’d narrowly averted disaster. Even more disconcerting was his inability to identify how he’d done it.
He did not know why Gillian had agreed to marry him.
No question, she’d taken their baby’s welfare to heart. And she said she still loved Maks, but neither gelled in his mind as the reason for her reversal on her stance about agreeing to marry him before she hit her second trimester.
Was it the sex?
The physicality between them was explosive, but was it enough to push her over that mental precipice she’d been balancing on?
He was grateful she had agreed to marry him without doubt, but Maks did not like when the motives of others were cloudy to him. Perhaps it was the way he’d been raised, or his position, but it was never enough to simply know, he had to know why.
His life fit into neatly ordered compartments; it always had. The one where Gillian resided had been destroyed ten weeks ago when Maks read the results of her yearly medical examination. Her agreement to marry should have created a new compartment that he could understand and rely on.
It hadn’t.
The compartment he had marked for his wife was no longer defined and measurable. And while that made him uncomfortable, he could not regret Gillian’s willingness to align her life with his.
Though he found it hard to admit, even to himself, she filled empty places in his life he hadn’t realized existed. He was not entirely convinced those places were not supposed to remain empty.
The last months had been hollow in a way his life never was before the recognition that his role and responsibilities might not be enough.
One night of incredible sex, a few days of connection and that hollowness was gone. The possibility it could return made something tighten in his chest.
He was never letting this woman out of his life again.
She thought the prenuptial agreement was for her protection, but he was as eager to have her sign it as she was to take measures to protect the future of their family. Unlike his parents, or her own, theirs would be a real marriage for a lifetime.
Sliding his hand down her arm, he let it come to rest over hers, the large square-cut diamond of her engagement ring pressing into his palm, giving him a deep sense of satisfaction.
The expensive piece of jewelry marked her as his, but not as primally, and therefore satisfyingly as the passion mark he’d left on her breast, or the slight razor burn on her neck that evidenced his passion of the night before.
The desire to own and be owned surged through him.
Yes, he was a possessive guy. He would be king; absolute allegiance was something he’d been taught to give and expect.
What shocked him was the equally strong desire for others and Gillian herself to acknowledge that he was hers. Her fiancé, soon to be her husband.
The father of her child, the one and only man she would ever expend her passion on.
“What have you woken up thinking about?” she asked, her voice laced with amusement and sleepy desire.
“What do you mean?” he hedged.
She shifted slightly so his hardened sex rubbed against her hip. “What do you think I mean?”
“Oh, that.”
“Yes. That.” She laughed, the sound so pleasing his erection jumped against her hip.
“My desire for you is nothing new.”
“No, it isn’t.” She turned so her beautiful blue eyes could meet his. “I like it.”
“I also.”
“Want to do something about it?” she asked with a comical leer.
It was his turn to laugh, the sound going from his mouth to hers as he claimed her lips with a ferocity only this woman had ever sparked in him.
Their lovemaking was passionate and drawn out, Gillian giving as good as she got, and Maks had reason to appreciate her agreement to be his wife once again.
Afterward, she cuddled in his arms, clinging as she so rarely allowed herself to do and in a way he found himself craving more with each passing day.
As much as he enjoyed the moment, he could not prolong it. His day’s schedule had been set before he’d arrived at her apartment the night before and he would already have to cancel the phone conference he had planned for before his early morning flight.
With more regret than he wanted to admit to, even to himself, he pulled away to get out of the bed. “I have to fly to Volyarus this morning.”
It was not lost on him that she made no effort to hold him back. Gillian was no doubt correct that many men like him would find that reaction a relief from their lover. He would have been one with any other lover before her, but she was more than the woman who shared his bed.
Gillian Harris was the woman he had chosen to spend his life with.
For all her claims to love him, she did not act like a woman whose happiness depended on his presence. In any way.
He did not like the suspicion that he
might find her presence in his life more necessary than she found his.
She sat up, pulling the sheet and comforter with her as she did so, maintaining a modesty unnecessary between them.
But strangely appealing nonetheless.
Was there anything about this woman he did not find attractive? Her lack of clinginess notwithstanding, he could not think of one.
“Okay.” She tucked her blond hair behind her ear. “You’d better take a shower then.”
“You could ask when I have to leave, or how long I plan to be gone.” Did she not have even the most rudimentary interest in his plans?
Her brows furrowed and Gillian’s head canted to one side. “You want me to quiz you on your schedule? Wouldn’t it just be easier to sync our calendars?”
Annoyance surged through him. “You’re very tech-oriented for an artist.”
“What can I say? I love my smartphone, but you know that.”
“Yes.” He should have gotten her the newest one on the market instead of a ridiculously expensive ring from Tiffany’s.
“Whatever you’re thinking isn’t very nice. I think you’d better keep it to yourself.”
“You think you can read my mind?” he scoffed.
“Your expression isn’t exactly stealthy right now.”
Affronted, he drew himself to his full impressive height. “My ability to hide my thoughts is second to none.”
He’d been training at it since birth.
“When you’re making an effort, yes, it is.”
“Perhaps I have allowed myself to become too relaxed around you.”
“We’re going to be married.” Her brows furrowed and her lips formed a straight line. “I don’t think I would like it if you hadn’t.”
“Oh.” He had not considered that angle. “My parents are not trusted confidants to one another.”
“We have already established that we are not going to emulate them in important ways.”
“And this is one of those ways?”
“Absolutely.”
He nodded, accepting that she expected a similar level of trust to what he gave his cousin.
Shockingly the prospect did not bother him. “I would like you to go with me.”
“This morning?” she asked, her expression not promising.
“Yes.”
