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“Aristos, you’re reading this all wrong.”
“Am I, really?” He rubbed a finger over his temple, as if willing that vein to not pop. “Tell me, Mira. Have you made plans to raise the children all by yourself even before our contract ends?”
“No, that’s not what it means at all. I didn’t even think of you—”
A long shuddering exhale left him.
“Look, it’s not a reflection on you, okay? You know me, Aristos. I’m a penny-pincher. If Yana operates on one extreme, I operate on the other. I always, always prep for the worst-case scenario, for disasters, for...” When he’d have moved away, she caught his hands, willing him to understand as she splayed her deepest vulnerabilities open. Self-indulgent tears threatened. “It’s a defense mechanism against...being hurt, against the risk of being abandoned. Materially and emotionally and... It will take me time to trust someone other than myself. It doesn’t mean I don’t trust you.” His jaw was so tight that the man was going to need dental work if he didn’t relax. “In retrospect, I should’ve booked myself a first-class flight.” She rubbed her lower back again, willing the twinge to go away. “I just needed to walk more.”
“Why? Is something wrong?”
“No, nothing’s wrong.”
“Unless you want me to wake up the entire household and have a team of doctors here within the next half hour, Mira, you will tell me why it’s so imperative that you have to walk right now.”
“My BP is a little out of... It’s been a little erratic. Nothing to worry over at this stage.” She cast a look at her feet and he cast a look at her feet and Mira dropped the robe to cover them up but it was too late.
Before she knew it, Aristos nudged her to the bed, dragged her ass to the edge with a firm grip that she wanted to sink into, pushed the flimsy robe up her thighs, took her foot in his broad palm and gently pressed at her inflatable balloon-esque flesh with the tips of his fingers.
Mortified at his scrutiny and more than aroused at his other hand cupping her knee, the tips of his fingers spread out toward her thigh, she tried to pull away. His dark head bent, the thick hair begged to be caressed by her fingers.
“Should I call a doctor?”
“It’s just swelling, Aristos. I was sitting for too long without moving. It happens even to people who are not pregnant. It’s just water retention. And please,” she said, trying to jerk her foot free of his hold again, “will you let go of my foot?”
His head jerked up, his mouth twisted into a snarl. “Why? Is there a condition I have to meet before you’ll allow me to touch you again,thee mou?”
The words were soft, silky, and yet full of so much bitterness underneath. She hated herself for making him doubt her so much.
Mira sunk her fingers into his hair, and tugged, fear that she’d already lost him pricking like needles. A vein flickered in his temple, his nostrils flaring at the rough grip of her fingers. His gray gaze threatened to devour her. But she didn’t care. “Right now, my feet are fat and swollen and... I’d just rather you didn’t look at them too closely. It hurts my vanity, okay? My body’s changing every day. My clothes fit weirdly already. I feel ungainly most of the time,andI don’t want you to look at my swollen feet.” She closed her eyes, hating how insecure she sounded. Dratted hormones!
His fingers under chin made her eyes pop open. Tenderness filled his eyes, and Mira wanted to drown in them. “You’re growing two babies inside you. I couldn’t even begin to imagine all the changes your body’s going through. And yet, you’re more beautiful today than I’ve ever seen you. Even with exhaustion leaving its mark on you.”
His fingers drew trails of heat over her thighs, his throat moving on a hard swallow. “You don’t believe me?”
“I want to believe you,” Mira whispered, her heart inflating to a size bigger than her damned feet.
He didn’t break eye contact with her as he gently lifted her foot and brought it to rest on his crotch. They hadn’t even touched except for his fingers on her feet—her swollen feet—and yet, he was hard and thick and so...ready. A surge of excitement and arousal jolted through Mira, her breath releasing in a soft whimper.
“You want me.”
A smile curved his lips, no humor reaching his eyes. “I always want you.”
He said it like the sky was blue or the earth was round or that the world was a green wonder. It stole into her like a blessing, a benediction. Her sex contracted and released, making its achy emptiness known. She wanted to blame her horniness on the hormones too but God, she’d always panted over Aristos.
Mira wriggled her feet gently, tracing the heavy weight of him with her heel, and his breath shuddered out of him in a sibilant hiss. His shoulders rose and fell, the muscle in his jaw jumping.
With a shake of his head that made her belly swoop in disappointment, he lifted her foot from him and scooted back. Something about the tightness in his face told Mira she’d done him a disservice—months ago and now.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”
The temperature between them dropped immediately. Apparently, her husband could still blow hot and cold as if all it required was a button to be pressed. Before he could push her away, Mira slipped off the bed and into his arms, landing awkwardly on her knees between him and the bed. Her knees straddled his and if he’d only give her a little welcome, she’d have crawled into his lap shamelessly.
“Christos, Mira! Be careful.”
“If you leave before letting me say what I want to, you’re forcing me to chase you, and believe me, I’m exhausted already.”
He regarded her with a pensiveness she didn’t like seeing in his eyes. His words came back to her.A wounded animal...
