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Grace pressed her lips together as her eyes narrowed. That’s when I saw it. Genuine fear. Anger. I blinked in confusion as she shoved me back and headed towards the bed. What had changed in that instant?
“All the same.” She grumbled as she sat down on the edge of the bed.
My gut clenched as I looked at her. Still wearing her wedding dress that we’d bought two days ago. The neckline was high, and the sleeves long. Soft white lace covered her body from head to toe. But it was tight, displaying her ample curves.
Curves I was going to enjoy watching as they jiggled while I shoved my cock in her. That I couldn’t wait to grasp as I fucked her hard. I wanted it now, but I couldn’t ignore her words.
I might be a monster, but not with this woman. Not anymore, at least. She wasn’t my brother’s wife now. She was mine. I didn’t have to stay away. Put on a mask. Keep my distance.
I could get close. Learn all her secrets. I wanted to know her. Not just every inch of her body, but every corner of her soul.
“You need to explain that statement.” I stood leaning against the wall. Something told me I shouldn’t go to her. That if I crowded her space, she’d shut down.
“Never mind. Let’s just get this over with.” Ouch. I guess my first performance hadn’t been good enough.
I wondered if she was thinking about him. If she was wishing, it was him here instead of me. But she was the one who wanted to move on. She’d come to me.
I knew that wasn’t exactly true. She hadn’t asked for this. But I couldn’t let her go. I didn’t care if that proved how much of a monster I really was. In my heart, she’d been mine since that first night, and I wasn’t going to miss this chance.
I might have forced her into this marriage. But I wanted her to be happy. And that started tonight. With understanding her. By not taking what I wanted.
“No, explain.” I crossed my arms over my chest to keep them to myself. I itched to touch her. To skim my fingers along all her smooth, creamy skin. “If you tell me, I won’t fuck you tonight.”
“Really?” Her gaze flipped to mine, and the hopeful expression in her royal blue eyes gutted me. It was laced with fear and pain.
I hated that she thought I’d take without her permission. The idea disgusted me. I was a criminal. A murderer, and I didn’t regret those choices. But a man who could hurt a woman was the lowest of the low. I’d send a man like that to hell without an essential body part.
She might not have begged for me, but before, her body had been giving me the green light. She’d wanted it but wouldn’t express it. Held back her desire for me like I had for her.
Right now, it was screaming ‘no’. From her stiff shoulders. To her nails digging into the comforter. The way she barely sat on the bed like she was ready to jump up any second. Something was off. Every instinct I had was blaring.
Why would she think that I would still take her when she clearly didn’t want it? Did she believe I was that depraved? Or had something happened? Is that why she really wanted to leave? Had someone in this house done something to her?
My jaw clenched at the thought. Rage exploded in my chest. I’d fucking kill them. Cut off every finger on the hand that touched her. Shoot their dick off and watch them bleed out. Slowly. Painfully.
But for the moment, I’d let her believe that I would take without asking. If it got me the answers I needed, I’d let her think I was a rapist even as it made my skin crawl.
“Really. Now tell me what you meant.” Grace’s expression hardened as she looked at me.
Her shoulders snapped tight as she twisted her fingers in her dress. She was scared but trying to fight it.
She made a disbelieving sound in her throat. “Like you don’t know how he was.”
My own spine filled with steel as I pushed off the wall. I didn’t move to her, but my fists opened and closed at my side. Was she referring to…no. I’d seen the way he’d looked at her.
“You were close. You guys talked about everything.”
Fuck, she was. She meant Mitchell. I swallowed the lump in my throat. “We didn’t talk about you.”
It was an unspoken rule. I didn’t know if my brother had figured out my feelings for her. Or if he believed, like everyone else had until recently, that I hated her, but we never spoke of Grace.
I couldn’t. Couldn’t hear about her, them, not when I wanted her so desperately. “I thought you loved him. I saw the two of you together. You had a perfect marriage.”
She let out a harsh laugh that held no humor. Her eyes blazed with rage and a pain so deep it gripped my throat. “No. I was a toy. He took me off the shelf to display as the perfect wife for the family, for his business colleagues. And at home…”
Her voice trembled as it trailed off.
Fuck no!
