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‘What for?’ he asked, hopelessly confused now.
‘I made a terrible mistake not telling you about Ruby. I didn’t trust you, but I can see now a lot of the way I reacted was all wrapped up in the way my father had rejected me and Milly. I blamed you for what he did. I didn’t even know you. And yet I judged you. I assumed you would be a terrible father. And that wasn’t fair.’
He frowned, feeling strangely threatened by the forthright apology, her easy acceptance of the way he had behaved. ‘I was an arrogant, entitled bastard that night, let’s be honest, which might also have had something to do with why you kept Ruby from me.’
Why was she letting him off the hook so easily?
She squeezed his hand, a smile spreading across her face. ‘True,’ she said, with a complete lack of anger. ‘But I was a clueless idiot, so I would say we’re even. And, if you can forgive me, I can certainly forgive you.’
He turned his hand over to link his fingers with hers, the need to touch her suddenly about more than just sex, more than just the intense physical connection which he had exploited so vociferously in the last seven days.
She’d met every one of his demands with demands of her own. And he’d enjoyed the time he spent with her—not just in bed, but out of it too. Lacey had a playful, adventurous nature which intrigued and excited him. And in the last seven days, as she had spoken at length about their daughter, he had come to realise what a good mother she was too. Patient, supportive but also fascinated and amused by Ruby, despite the circumstances of her birth.
‘I know you don’t trust people easily, Brandon,’ she said as she held onto his hand. ‘And I think now I know why—because the people you should have been able to trust as a little boy both let you down horribly. You asked me why being Ruby’s mum isn’t enough for me, and I want you to know that it absolutely is. I love her with everything I am, and everything I’m ever going to be, but I don’t see being a mother and a career woman being mutually exclusive,’ she continued. ‘I know I can do both. And I want you to trust me on that, if you can.’
He tensed, drawing his fingers out of hers as the crack in his chest threatened to become a chasm.
‘Okay,’ he said, his voice thick with an emotion he did not want to feel, was determined not to feel ever again. He did trust her, he realised, perhaps much more than he should. How had that happened without him even realising it?
Because it made him think of that young boy who had begged his father for affection—for so long—and had never received it.
He wasn’t that kid any more. But the thought of her being able to see that boy scared him. Because that boy could be hurt.
Placing his free hand on her waist, he tugged her into the lee of his body, letting her feel the erection which was never far away. ‘Although I’m not sure what any of this has to do with you working for Roman Garner,’ he said gruffly.
He didn’t want her working for Garner, for the simple reason she was his. Eventually she would figure out there was a limit to what he could offer her. But he intended to ensure she was bound to him by then, in every way that mattered.
She smiled, then rubbed against him, making the erection harden. ‘I just wanted to establish that this is a partnership, Brandon. One in which we can both get what we want. If we’re open with each other.’ She grinned, the sparkle of affection in her eyes as spellbinding as it was disturbing.
Grasping his hand, she drew him towards her cabin, making his heart beat a hasty tattoo against his ribs. She was taking the initiative, and for once he felt no need to fight it as arousal roared in his gut.
This is about sex, and making a home together for the child you share. Nothing more. Nothing less.
He climbed the wooden steps in silence, clasping her hips as she threw her arms around his neck and stretched up on tiptoes to capture his lips. He drove his tongue into her mouth on her sob of need, but let her lead the dance of temptation and retreat. Let her feast as the hunger raced through his blood. He needed to have her, to keep her, by whatever means necessary.
But as they made love, first fast and furious on her bed, then slow and easy in the rainfall shower—and she gave him everything, while holding nothing back—he kept that hidden, vulnerable part of himself ruthlessly in check.
Because he was never going to give anyone the power to hurt him again.
But, as he lay in her bed hours later, he listened to the low hum of the cicadas outside and the soft murmurer of her breathing and struggled to close the chasm in his chest the only way he knew how.
Lacey felt Brandon shift in the bed beside her and forced her eyelids to open, her exhausted body still humming from the intensity of their love-making. But, as Brandon eased her out of his arms and threw off the sheet, she reached out to grasp his arm.
‘Brandon, where are you going?’ she murmured, hating the neediness in her voice, but hating the hollow ache under her ribs more.
Was he leaving her bedagain?Tonight?Why? When she had been sure they had made so much progress?
He glanced down at her, his hand covering hers, before his thumb skimmed down her arm. ‘You’re still awake?’ he said, his voice gruff. Her heartbeat accelerated, the warm, seductive touch triggering an instant response in her abdomen. ‘I thought I had exhausted you.’
It wasn’t an answer, but she forced herself to let go of him.
‘You did,’ she said, flopping back onto the bed. ‘Were you going to your own cabin?’ she asked. ‘You don’t need to,’ she added. Did he still think she would hold him to that asinine promise about separate bedrooms after everything they’d shared this week? ‘I’d like to wake up with you in the morning.’
He chuckled, but the laugh sounded strained somehow. Evasive...? Or was this her insecurity talking again?
‘You’re insatiable,’ he said.
This wasn’t about sex, or not just about sex, not to her. She wasn’t even sure she could have sex again, after all the times he’d had her that night already.
