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She whirled around to face him. “Why should I? So you can insult me some more? Throw your lover in my face?”
“You got it all wrong.” He was climbing the steps and coming toward her, the shadows of night hiding the expression on his face, but Melanie could guess he was looking smug.
“I don’t want to hear it,” she grated but by this time he was standing right in front of her and he was looking anything but smug. On his face was a scowl.
“Well, you’re going to hear it, whether you like it or not.” He reached behind her and unlocked the door then took her elbow in a grip from which she could not wrest her arm even if she tried. “You’re going to sit and you’re going to listen to what I have to say.”
Realizing resistance was futile, Melanie let him lead her across the foyer and toward the den where he deposited her on the sofa and sat down beside her.
“Listen to me, Melanie,” he said, his face stern. “I know what you’re thinking but you’re wrong. There’s absolutely nothing going on between Zena and me.”
She glared back at him, not believing a word. “No? So why was she giving you all kinds of googly eyes? And then you went to the door with her for some sort of secret conference.” She clenched her fists. “I heard you guys laughing out there. You didn’t even care that I could hear you.”
“That was Zena you heard, not me.”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. You were there with her so you’re guilty by association. And why did you ask me to marry you, anyway, if you’re still in love with…Zena?” As she said the woman’s name her voice dripped with venom. She was working herself up into a state, she knew, but she didn’t care. The situation called for it.
To her surprise, Sloane reached out and covered her hand with his. “Look, I know you’re angry and not knowing the whole story, that’s understandable. All I ask is that you hear me out and then you can decide whether to be angry or not.”
Melanie bit her lip, dying to tell him to go to France – which was her way of saying go to hell – but how could she say no? He was calm and what he was asking was not unreasonable. If she refused she would simply be acting like a fool.
She heaved a sigh. “All right. But this had better be good.”
He nodded. “Zena was my first serious girlfriend back in high school then we went to college in two different countries. She went off to France and I stayed in Montreal so the relationship dissolved and we moved on. When she came back home we sort of picked up where we left off but we had issues.” He shrugged. “We had frequent arguments so our relationship was more like ‘on again, off again’. And then one day she said she’d had enough. We should either be together permanently or not at all. I thought, what the heck, and asked her to marry me. At the time I thought settling down would be the best cure for both of us.”
As she listened to his words, Melanie’s heart went still. He’d said ‘what the heck’ and then asked Zena to marry him? As casually as that? Was that how he saw marriage, as casual and insignificant? Was that how he saw their marriage?
He continued speaking, seeming not to notice her distress. “She agreed and we were engaged for about five months. And that was when things fell apart.”
That pulled her attention from her worries and back to his narrative. “You broke up again?”
“Worse than that,” he said, his tone bitter. “I dropped by her place and found her in bed with another man.”
Melanie gasped. “Good grief.”
He gave a hollow laugh. “Good grief is right. I didn’t say a word, just turned and marched right out of there. She ran after me but I told her I didn’t want her in my life. I told her,” he said, his mouth twisting with an ugly emotion, “that she disgusted me.”
Melanie didn’t know what to say to that so she only stared, watching the memory of the betrayal darkening his face.
“Outside of glimpses of her in the tabloids I haven’t had any communication with Zena since then, not until tonight.” He shook his head. “After what she did to me that day, I couldn’t trust her or any woman again.” His eyes were bleak as he stared straight ahead as if seeing the ghost of his past in the distance.
His words were not lost on Melanie. Trust, probably the most significant element in a relationship, and he couldn’t share that with any woman. This was important. She decided to venture a question. “You married me…but you don’t trust me?”
Sloane spared her a glance. “This is different. I know you’re not after love or money and the way you are, you're not going to be looking around for other men. You made it clear that all you want is a baby.” He shrugged and looked away again.
She decided to press him further. “I can see what I get out of this, but what about you? What do you get?”
“Stability. A family. I’m almost forty, Melanie. It’s about time.”
“And that’s all you want?”
His gaze swung back to her. “What else is there?” And then his face softened in a wry smile. “Except for a whole lot of good sex?”
With each word, Melanie’s heart slid lower and lower. She’d known what she was signing up for when she agreed to be Sloane’s wife but after weeks of living with him, stupid or not, she wanted more.
And the thing she now found she wanted most was the one thing it seemed he did not have in him to give…his love.
***
When Melanie got up and walked away Sloane realized that had been the dumbest thing he could have said. What he wanted out of marriage was good sex? It was already understood, so what woman wanted to hear that?
He made to follow her but then decided against it. She probably needed some time alone and he could do with some time himself. He’d better gather his thoughts before he went after her and put his foot in it a second time.
The truth was, things were getting a whole lot more serious than just sex, but how could he tell her that? It would be more than dumb to say anything when he wasn’t even sure where his head was. So he’d begun to care for her, but that was normal when you’d been living with someone for weeks. But did he love her?
That was the question and he wasn’t sure he had the answer so, for now, he’d just say nothing.
With a grunt he got up and headed for the bedroom. He had a feeling he’d hurt Melanie with his thoughtless remark and he needed to do damage control before he had a weeping woman on his hands.
As expected, she was sitting in the middle of the bed, her arms wrapped around her tucked-up legs, her chin on her knees. She looked depressed but, thankfully, she wasn’t crying. He could deal with pretty much anything except tears.
Saying nothing, he went to sit on the bed beside her then pulled her into his arms.
Immediately, she sank into him and wrapped her arms around his waist. She seemed drained, too exhausted to speak, and he understood. Sometimes emotional trauma was more draining than the physical. Right now what Melanie needed was comfort and reassurance. Healing.
Sloane leaned down to kiss the top of her head and then he lifted his hand to softly stroke her hair. When she sighed and tucked in closer he tilted her face toward his and gave her a kiss that was gentle but firm, his small way of giving her the reassurance he knew she needed.
She clung to him like she would never let go. It was the emotions – the uncertainty, the sadness – coming to the surface. Right then she was at her most vulnerable.
Seeking to comfort her he leaned down, pressing her into the pillows, deepening the kiss when she moaned. When he finally released her lips and pulled away she reached for him, so he kissed her forehead, her eyelids, her cheeks, her collarbone and when she shivered he smiled and went lower still. He slid her top off and kissed her shoulders then his lips tickled her upper arms and the soft hollow by her elbow and she shifted in the bed, seeming anxious for his attention elsewhere.
He obliged. He spent the next few minutes worshiping her breasts, cupping the mini-globes in his big hands, catching the nipples between his teeth and nibbling till she sucked in her breath and reached up to tug at his shirt.
Sloane needed no further encouragement. In quick time his clothes were gone and he was pulling Melanie’s jeans down her legs. Both naked now, he climbed back into the bed but this time he lay on his back and pulled her on top of him. “Ride me,” he whispered. “Tonight, you’re in control.”
For a moment she looked nervous but when he made no move to help she bit her lip then straddled his hips and planted her hands in the middle of his chest. She positioned herself over him then slowly, gingerly, she began to descend.
He could see the uncertainty on her face, the fear that this would hurt. Immediately, he reached up and began to tickle her nipples and her nostrils flared as the thrill ran through her. Then she drew in her breath and sank down on his rigid shaft.
