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All I wanted was some help. Not a freaking husband.
“This makes sense,” he says, his voice a purr, his lips turned into a crooked smile as he watches me. At least he doesn’t get up and come closer. “I don’t want to marry Robin. I never did, not from the start, but I was willing to do my duty for my family. And because I had no other prospects. But then you come strolling along, carrying my child.”
“Didn’t you say ending your engagement would be really, really bad?” I wave my hands in the air. “I’m not about to start some, like, mob war or whatever.”
“This is going to be bad no matter what, but I also told you thatfamilyis extremely important to my father, and children are about the biggest deal possible. If I marry you before anyone can stop me, they’ll have to accept you and my child into the organization, into the family, and once that happens, you’ll be set for life. You and my child.” He slowly stands, staring into my eyes. I back up until I bump into the wall, my heart racing into my throat.
“I don’t want to marry you,” I whisper. Although the idea of making sure my child is provided for feels tempting, the price is too high.
“But you do want to make sure our child has every opportunity in the world, don’t you? It’s one thing to provide money, but there’s so much more my family can do. There’s education, connections, friendships, partnerships, everything that comes with being a Crowley.”
“Houses across the street from Boston Commons?” I ask, blinking rapidly, head dizzy.
“Exactly,” he says, coming closer and closer. I want to scream, run away, but there’s something in the way he’s taking, in the way he’s looking at me, that keeps me pinned. “Once you’re my wife, I can protect you for real. Even if my father is angry, he would never hurt his daughter-in-law. But if you were simply a mistress I knocked up?” He tilts his head to the side, considering, and leaves the rest unspoken. “This is how I’ll protect you. This is how I’ll make sure our child is given everything in life. And in exchange, you’ll help me get out of an engagement I loathe. This is the way out for both of us.”
I let it sink in. He stops a few feet away, not close enough to touch me, but near enough that I’m aware of his body, of the way he holds his posture, so upright and intimidating. The man’s sculpted, cut from a cloth meant for gods and kings.
Here I am, a nothing girl from a nothing family, struggling to keep my head afloat.
He’s offering me a way out.
Wealth, money, power.
All I need to do is shackle myself to a stranger.
Dive head-first into murky, shallow, shark-infested waters and pray I don’t get ripped to shreds.
“I can’t,” I say, my voice a squeak. “I can’t just—I can’t justmarry you.”
“You can. And you should. But take the afternoon to think about my offer. This will change your life, Dara. It will set our child up for a future you could never dream of. All you need to do is marry me.”
“Why would you want this? Why go from marrying one stranger to marrying another?” My pulse races as sweat beads my back. The thought of being his wife. Of sleeping in the same bed as him. Of being close to him, day after day. It’s terrible in how addictive it feels.
“Think about that night we spent together. I’ll never have chemistry like that with Robin McLaren. But with you?”
“Don’t pretend like this is about that night. This is about… getting what you want.”
“Who says I can’t want you too?”
I lick my lips, looking away. Images of that night flash in my mind. His mouth between my legs. His cock in my throat. Coming, over and over, legs shaking, moans ripping from my clenched teeth. “I have to think, okay?”
“Looks like you already are. Imagining how it would feel to be my wife?”
“More like trying to think of a way out of this mess.”
“Please, you could do a lot worse than me.”
“Somehow, I doubt that.” I shake my head, slipping away toward the hall. “I’m going for a walk.”
“By all means. But don’t go too far.”
“Why? Going to hunt me down?”
“Yes,” he says, and I believe him.
What did I get myself into? What nightmare is this? A man like that should never even look my way, but now—
He wants to make me his wife.
