Isaac’s low tone is frustrating, but the throb in my throat still jumps up a few decibels. “If that’s the case, why haven’t you set a date yet? I want you to be mine, Isabelle—”
“Iamyours, Isaac. A wedding won’t change that. Besides, this isn’t about us.”
“It is now. You opened this bag of worms, so I’m running with it.” After plucking me from his chair, he sits in it, then tugs me until I’m sitting side-straddled in his lap. “This is the one thing I can give you that I can’t give anyone else. I can give you my last name.”
That lowers my defense as much as it does when he cups my jaw. When he drags his thumb across my lips, frustration switches to compromise. “Have the prenup redrafted.”
“No,” he mutters without pause for thought. “Everything I have, I want to share with you.”
I fight back with just as much gall. “You’re not sharing, Isaac. You’re giving me everything.”
He remains quiet, incapable of denying the truth. His prenup isn’t the standard one that will protect his assets if we divorce. It will leave him as decimated as it would me if we ever traveled down that road.
“I don’t want your money or your empire. I just want you, but I’llneverhave that if you keep pushing the prenup you had Regan draft.” It’s low of me to do, but with my emotions teetering from discussing my brother, and the early hour, I can be forgiven for my next set of words. “It hurts knowing you distrust your love of me so much, you feel you need to display it so elaborately. I understood your inability to express your feelings at the start of our relationship, Isaac, but you have no excuse now. Ophelia is alive. She didn’t die the night you told her you loved her, so I don’t need extravagance to know you care about me. I just need you to tell me.”
With my eyes close to spilling the moisture brimming in them, and before Isaac has time to protest, I leap up from his lap and exit his office. He growls my name in a low, demanding tone, but I keep walking, needing space before one of us says something we’ll later regret. I love Isaac in a way many can’t understand, but that’s why I’m adamant this needs to happen.
People can’t comprehend my objection to his prenup. If I’m confident in our relationship and am certain nothing will come between us, why don’t I just sign it? The simple answer is once I accept the prenup, what other elaborate ideas will Isaac conjure up to prove his devotion?
He used his only favor from a mob boss to have my brother extradited to Russia when he was looking at spending the rest of his life behind bars, and he bought my sister to stop her being part of a sex trafficking ring before she turned four. He doesn’t need to prove his devotion any more than he already has. He just needs to learn how to express himself without the gimmicks he believes I want.
I’ve read many hurtful articles about myself in the media the past six months. They wouldn’t sting as much as they did if there weren’t some truth to them. I don’t want to be seen as a money-hungry wench, but I won’t be given the chance if Isaac doesn’t stop showcasing me to the public as if I am one.
* * *
Isaac finds me in the shower of our master suite twenty minutes later. Although my emotions are still on edge, the fact he came to me eases them—somewhat. I could never be accused of having a clear head anytime he’s in my presence, much less when he’s stripping out of his clothes.
With each article of clothing he removes, my vulnerability lowers just as quickly. I should feel weak and hopeless when standing across from a man as powerful as him, but it’s the susceptibility only he can unearth that showcases my true strength. When subjected to Isaac’s wrath, grown men quake in their boots. My thighs quiver in excitement. If that doesn’t reveal the integrity of my backbone, nothing will.
When his cock springs free from its tight restraints, my breathing grows rampant. Angry, palpable tension is still bristling between us, but it will never be strong enough to overtake the inane sexual chemistry that will forever bind us.
My pulse quickens when he steps into the shower. His ticking jaw exposes he is still frustrated, but a glint in his eyes tells me it isn’t as bad as I’m predicting. “Allow me.”
He removes the shampoo bottle from my hand before squirting a generous dollop onto his palm. The tingles racing through every inch of me double when he massages the fruity cleanser through my hair. This is how I need him to show he cares. I don’t want the promise of billions of dollars—way more than I realized he had.
If Isaac’s businesses are all run above board, he’s funding the entire division of the IRS just on the tax he pays on his earnings each year.
Once my head is covered in bubbles, Isaac tilts my head back. “Close your eyes. I don’t want you to get suds in them.”
An outsider would believe the concern in his tone. I know he isn’t panicked about burning corneas. He needs my eyes closed so he can express himself freely. He can’t look at me without having his vulnerability exposed. It’s why he demands my eyes to his during sex. He needs to see them when they’re open, exposed, and raw as his are now.
“Years of bad choices are a hard habit to give up, Isabelle. As I’ve said previously, I never thought I’d experience something like this again, and that was before I knew what we have is so much more than anything I thought possible.”
I swoon like crazy, loving both the tenderness in his tone and how he’s handling me. He’s never been more gentle.
“But, in saying that, I’m a protector before I am anything. It’s how I show the people I care about how much I love them. It’s how I express myself. I need control, Isabelle. I need to know you, and now Callie, will be taken care of in the event I’m incapable of doing so. That’s what my prenup is about.”
His words are like a knife to my heart, but they don’t stop me from saying, “That’s what a will is for, Isaac. If you’re worried about how your assets will be divided when you’ve passed, have Regan draft a will.” God, you have no idea how hard that was to articulate. Just the thought of Isaac not being here shreds me to pieces.
“This isn’t about death, Isabelle.” When I pop open my eyes, confused, he tilts my head under the water so profoundly, my vision is blurred by the torrent sliding down my face. “It’s about so much more than that.”
Even with shampoo-primed water rolling down my face, I keep my eyes open. The uniqueness of his alluring gray eyes hits me full force from his closeness, but it has nothing on the trouble glossing them. They’re beautiful, yet troubled.
“What’s going on, Isaac?” The last time I saw him this bothered was when he told me about Col’s grudge and how he felt responsible for Ophelia’s supposed ‘death.’ “Is it my father?”
“No.” His head shake should add to the assurance in his tone. It doesn’t. Not in the slightest. “It’s something I can’t tell you right now, Isabelle. But when I can, I will.”
My heart slides into my stomach. “No, Isaac. We’re not doing this again. When Callie came into our lives, we promised there would be no more secrets between us.”
