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‘You’re an intelligent woman, Imogen. You had an idea. Give me your best guess.’
Dear God, this was not the conversation she’d expected to have with Zeph first thing in the morning. But then, hadn’t the last twenty-four hours been the most intensely peculiar of her life?
‘From what the media speculated on from your private life before we married, you didn’t date the same woman for more than a few months. And more than one of those women gossiped that while you were...’ she paused, licked dry lips ‘...generous with your time and attention up to a point, you weren’t the romantic type. And in an interview when you were younger you stated that you would win a bet against anyone who claimed that any woman who dated a wealthy man didn’t have an ulterior, long-term motive.’
His expression didn’t change but she sensed a shift in the air, perhaps even a whisper of bewilderment. Or was she fooling herself? His hardening face moments later said perhaps she was.
‘I sense it’s the sort of conclusion someone with first-hand experience reaches,’ he drawled.
Stung by the biting admission, she shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t know.’
Dark blue eyes pinned her in place. ‘Had we met before this...agreement between us was struck?’
She shook her head, her breath frozen in her lungs. ‘No. But you were acquainted with my father. And if you’re wondering so, no, I wasn’t your type.’
He rolled onto his knees with the agility and grace of a panther, the motion rendering her immobile as he reached out and wrapped his large hand around her jaw and nape.
‘And exactly what do you think is my type?’ he enquired in a low, deep bedroom voice that steeped the charged atmosphere.
‘Heiresses. Supermodels. Daughters of presidents. Some of the most beautiful women in the world have called themselves your lovers.’
His eyes narrowed a fraction. ‘You alluded to that yesterday. And I recall responding that this past you seem intrigued with didn’t stop me from putting a ring on your finger. From giving you my name.’
‘No...you...’
His grip tightened a fraction as if imprinting his words into her skin. ‘I am a powerful man. And I am not unintelligent. I believe I have several recourses to any situation I face. Think about that when you wonder why I chose you.’
No.The protest shrieked louder inside her. Because to take him at his word meant...
‘Why do you want this? Why do you want me?’ The words ripped from somewhere deep inside her, a peculiar, secret yearning rearing its head that wouldn’t be silenced.
The question seemed to momentarily startle him as much as it startled her. Then that formidable self-assuredness reasserted itself. ‘Because you’re the first woman to evoke such an...interesting reaction in me since I woke up in Efemia,’ he drawled.
‘And that’s it? Iinterestyou? What’s to say you won’t find the next woman who walks onto this deck equally interesting?’
His eyes narrowed. ‘I didnotcheat on you.’
The certainty with which he stated that dropped like an anvil on them both. ‘No.’
‘Then do not insult me by suggesting that I would be so fickle.’
She cursed the flush that damned her in that moment. ‘You were about to marry another woman when I found you.’
It spoke volumes to the imperious nature of her husband that he accepted that tossed-out argument with a mere inclination of his head. ‘True. But if it reassures you she didn’t interest me as much as you do, and I’m confident she was only marrying me for her own motives.’
‘Did you...propose to her?’ Why was that so important to her? Why did it make her heart stutter to even think of Zeph going down on one knee to another?
‘Not in traditional terms. There was a general, informal discussion, which then seemed to take on a life of its own.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It means out of the three people involved, Petros was the most keen on the marriage happening.’
As she recalled the older man’s hostility when she’d interrupted his daughter’s wedding, Imogen’s fists bunched on her thighs.
Zeph’s gaze dropped to them before rising. ‘Why, my dear, you look positively livid,’ he said with a musing smile.
She breathed out slowly, willed the discordant thoughts into composure. ‘I’m not...it’s just...’
