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Zach didn’t waste any time. He picked up the phone and started barking orders to his lawyers.
****
The rest of the week flew by for Katie. Every moment was precious when she felt like the noose was going to close at any minute. She spent the days finishing up with her students. They were special to her, they always would be because they were her very first class. At night, she packed things up, organized her finances, and as Zach requested, went shopping. She didn’t feel bad spending his money, because he’d demanded it, and because she knew that whatever he stipulated to her on Friday, she would have to agree to. She had no choice. She couldn’t see her parents and Josh lose the family homestead. She couldn’t do it to them. Not when she had a way to save the farm, literally as well as figuratively.
She closed her eyes and refused to think about how she would possibly get through the act of sleeping with him, on an ongoing basis. One step at a time. She would get through this the only way she knew how, one step at a time.
****
Friday afternoon at one sharp Katie sat in reception and waited to be called into Zach’s office. Her stomach was tied in knots and she knew that her life as she knew it would be put on hold for a while, possibly for a long while. She felt queasy because she’d gone to visit a doctor and started taking the contraceptive pill. She wasn’t used to the hormones, and her stomach was roiling. The doctor had warned her that it might make her a little sick at first, but she didn’t see any way to avoid it. The pill seemed the best solution. She absolutely couldn’t risk a pregnancy. The thought of having Zach’s baby sent terror screaming through her. He would take it away from her, she knew. He had all the power and plenty of money at his disposal. She wouldn’t even be able to afford a lawyer to fight him. She couldn’t risk it.
By the time she was led into Zach’s office, she was green around the gills and prayed she wouldn’t embarrass herself in front of him and his team of lawyers.
She took one look at the conference table where he was sitting with three other men, and she knew she wasn’t going to make it.
“I’m sorry. May I use your restroom please?” Her words were shaky and she was holding on to the back of the chair she was supposed to sit down in.
Zach must have seen the pinched look on her face and realised something was wrong. He stood up and directed her to an unobtrusive door that led to his private bathroom.
She gratefully went inside. She turned on the cold tap and held her wrists under the cool water. She refused to vomit and have those men hear her. She swallowed several times in an effort to control herself. She felt so alone. Tears came to her eyes and slowly began to roll down her face as she sagged against the sink.
There was a light tap on the door and then Zach walked in. She had forgotten to lock the door, and he didn’t seem to have any qualms about invading her privacy. She would have to remember that for future reference. More tears welled at the thought and bile rose in her throat as she valiantly tried to suppress it.
“What’s wrong with you?” Zach stood against the closed door watching her. “The thought of being with me, sleeping with me is so abhorrent to you that you’re reduced to tears?”
Katie hesitated. She was embarrassed to be in this situation, and even the small amount of privacy she needed was being denied her. Her reserves of anger had been depleted by the queasiness in her stomach, and trepidation was a constant knot in her chest. He wanted an intimate relationship with her? Let it start now, by God. “I’m nauseous. I’m trying not to be sick.” She put her hand to her mouth and looked at him in the mirror. “I’m sorry, Zach.”
“Did you eat something bad? Are you running a fever?” He punched the questions out like a drill sergeant, but came closer and laid the back of his hand against her forehead in a gentle touch. “Are you trying to pretend that being with me repulses you so much that it makes you ill? Because believe me, Katie, it’s not going to work. I had you in my arms three days ago. I may inspire several different feelings, but trust me, babe, I know nausea isn’t one of them.”
Katie shook her head and twin tears ran down her face. “I’m worried about it.” She looked away and then slowly lifted her eyes back to him. “But you don’t repulse me.” She knew she was looking at him as if confessing her greatest sin, but she had no strength for lies or subterfuge. She knew in that moment that she told the truth. Sex scared her. Zachary McIntyre’s touch might alarm her, but in no way did he repulse her. “I’m sorry. I know you told me not to cry. I started taking the pill last night and it’s making me ill.” Her eyes dropped from his and her lips quivered. “I’ve never been so queasy in my life. I don’t want those men to hear me retching.”
Zach stood across from her, his gaze focused on the tears that rolled down her face. “You started taking the pill last night? The contraceptive pill? Is that what you’re saying?” It was obvious from his tone of voice that he was confused by her explanation.
Katie wondered what was so difficult to understand. “Yes.”
Zach walked over to the small cabinet above the sink vanity and retrieved a wash cloth. As he ran cold water over it and handed it to her he asked, “Why?”
At his instigation, Katie sat down on the closed lid of the commode and gratefully took the damp, cool cloth from his hand. She rubbed it lightly over her face and neck, trying to control the raging heat flowing through her veins. “Why what?”
“Why would you start taking the pill now?” He bit the words out one at a time as if he were asking something of a small child.
“It should be obvious. I don’t want to get pregnant with your child.” Katie answered him in shaky, stilted words.
Zach winced at her answer. “I get that part, Katie. Of course you don’t want to get pregnant. What I’m trying to understand is why would you change your method of contraception now? When you have so much other upheaval in your life?”
The question took Katie totally by surprise and she didn’t know how to answer. Her private life was just that, private. He was taking her by storm, calling all the shots, practically demanding her body, life and soul.
As she tried to think of a way to answer him without giving anything away that wasn’t his business and that she couldn’t bring herself to tell him right then, she looked up at him.
Zachary met her eyes and saw the guarded expression in them. As the list of possible reasons for her continued silence ran through his mind, he expelled his breath as he realized he wanted to knock down all her walls. He wanted her without defenses. He wanted her totally at his mercy. Totally in his control. She had secrets, things she didn’t want him to know, and he didn’t like it. Why would she go running scared to her doctor? Several suspicions came to mind, and he wasn’t pleased with any of them. Nothing he could think of that would paint her in his mind like he needed to see her. A sudden need for birth control could only mean one thing. She hadn’t needed it before. There could be several reasons for that, but nothing he wanted to acknowledge, or even think about. He didn’t want to think about her being innocent. Innocent of sexual experience, or innocent of deserving what he was dishing out. Because he already knew she didn’t deserve this, and the guilt from that was almost crippling him.
He ruthlessly pushed the guilt aside for now. He wanted to get the goddamn contract signed. For some reason, he needed it signed, like he needed air to breathe.
Katie continued to watch him while she took shaky breaths, her silence underlining her intent for some continued space between them. Zach moved toward the door.
“What do you need? How much time do you need to compose yourself before we get this underway? I want this contract signed today. Now.” He waited for her answer as he held the door handle in his hand.
“I’m all right now.” Katie wiped the tear stains from her face and stood to her feet. She swayed slightly, and Zach was there in an instant, putting his arm around her.
“Have you been eating? There’s got to be more to this than starting on the pill. Y
ou look like a strong breeze would blow you over.” He lifted his hand and smoothed the hair back from her cheek. “You need to be strong for what I have in store for you.”
She trembled at that last statement and her eyes fluttered up at him in agitation.
He immediately saw her fear and tried to calm it, even as another lash of guilt slammed him. “Baby, I’m kidding. Your summer is going to be spent lounging on the beach, reading, shopping, whatever you want to do while I’m working. I promise, nothing strenuous.”
And then he unknowingly negated the words he had intended to be soothing. “Your nights will be mine.” He lifted her face to his and placed his lips on the salty tracks marking her cheekbones. “All mine. As long as you come naked to my bed every night, lie down and open up for me, everything will be just fine.”
Katie closed her eyes against the picture he painted for her. Her immediate future would be mapped out. Nothing to do. Nothing to worry about. No problem. As long as she pleased Zach McIntyre. Pleased a man in bed when the last thing on earth she wanted to do was go to bed with any man. And Zach McIntyre didn’t have a pleasant bone in his body. He didn’t have any love for her or her family or her circumstances. Sure, if she could just forget all that and give over her body to him every night, everything would be okay. Sure, no problem. She could submit to someone who disliked her. That’s just what she’d always dreamed of. To let a caveman like Zach McIntyre brutalize her. Yes. Great. Just great.
And to top it all off, nobody could ever know about the agreement she was entering into with him. Not her parents, and Jesus Christ, not Josh. She felt like she was caught in the middle. As far as she knew, Josh and Zach had never met, yet the past had made them enemies. And they didn’t even know the worst of it. She suppressed a tiny, hysterical little giggle that tried to come out. Zach didn’t know that Josh owned his precious little sister, heart, body and soul. And Josh could never, ever find out what Zach was doing to her.
