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He didn’t look at her, intent on what he was doing. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘I mean, you put food on my plate when we ate, and then you insisted on washing me and now you’re drying me. I can do all of those things myself.’
His hand ran down her calf to her heel, urging her foot up, and she had to put her hands on his broad shoulders to keep her balance. ‘I know you can.’ He held her foot in his hand and began to dry it, his touch making her shiver. ‘But I want to do it.’
‘Why?’ His skin was hot underneath her hands, his muscles tensing and relaxing with his movements. He was so very strong—she could feel the power in him—yet he touched her carefully and with great gentleness. It made her heart feel tender for reasons she didn’t understand. ‘What do you get out of it?’
‘I think you know what I get out of it.’ He put her foot down, then reached for the other one, glancing up at her briefly, wickedness glowing in his eyes. ‘Sex, of course.’
He sounded flippant, but the muscles beneath her hands were rock hard with tension. He didn’t like this particular topic of conversation, did he?
Perhaps she shouldn’t push it, make a nuisance of herself. Then again, she kind of wanted to know.
‘That would make sense if we hadn’t had sex,’ she said. ‘But we have. Yet you’re still taking care of me like this, so...why?’
He finished with her foot, releasing it, then rising to his full height, wrapping the towel around her as if she was a child. ‘You don’t like it?’ He lifted a brow. ‘Shall I stop?’
Clearly he wasn’t going to make this easy for her.
Glory frowned. ‘You shouldn’t answer a perfectly valid question with another question.’
He smiled faintly, putting a thumb between her brows and smoothing it like he had done earlier downstairs. ‘You shouldn’t frown like that. You’ll get wrinkles.’
‘I don’t care about wrinkles and next you’ll be telling me I should smile more.’
‘You should.’ He bent and picked her up in his arms, turning to the door and walking through it. ‘You have a beautiful smile.’ He glanced down, brandy-coloured gaze holding hers. ‘I would like to make you smile more.’
Glory’s chest went tight as some strange, powerful feeling coiled uncomfortably inside her.
‘You do, Castor,’ she murmured, touching the smooth skin of his chest. ‘And I’d like to do the same for you too.’ She stroked him. ‘But I’m not sure I can. You hardly ever smile at me.’
His expression shifted, the fierce glow in his eyes becoming softer. ‘Didn’t you tell me that I didn’t have to pretend with you? Well, I don’t,mikri alepou. All that charm is what I do for them.’
She’d already worked that out for herself, but she liked that he’d told her that anyway. ‘So, what? You’re actually a pretty serious person, then?’
His expression shifted again, a bleak look crossing his face that made everything inside her clench tight. But then he glanced away, the bleakness vanishing as quickly as it had come. ‘Well, now, that’s for me to know and you to find out.’
He doesn’t smile, not at all. Because something terrible happened to him.
The thought was instant and cold, like ice in her veins, and worse, it felt like the truth. It had to be, didn’t it? Something was driving him to put himself at risk the way he did, and she’d already sensed it was personal.
And it could only be something terrible. Why would he choose to infiltrate those trafficking rings? Why pretend to be one of those awful people for nothing?
You can’t ask him. You don’t have the right.
No, it wasn’t any of her business. She might be his wife and he might have decided to give her a wedding night, but it was only sex. It wasn’t her place to demand his secrets, no matter how badly she wanted them.
She stayed silent as he carried her into the bedroom, setting her down on the huge bed, before turning and going over to a dresser that stood against one wall.
She stared at him as he pulled something out of a drawer, trying to distract herself from the sharp edge of worry that sat inside her, and his body was certainly a good distraction. Tanned, golden skin and carved muscle, with a narrow waist and long powerful legs.
Oh, she could stare at him all day.
‘Y-you’re quite extraordinary too,’ she said at last, trying break the thick silence. ‘I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you that, but it’s true.’
Castor turned around, holding something in his hand. He didn’t smile, but the flickering gold in his eyes leapt. ‘What makes you say that?’ He came back over to where she sat and pulled the towel carefully away from her. Goosebumps prickled all of her skin as he looked down at her, all his attention very focused.
‘What you’re doing,’ she said quietly. ‘Your...mission. You’re helping people regardless of the cost to yourself and that...that’s extraordinary.’
