AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We were both from the same world. A world with too much on our plates and not enough time for any meaningful connection. We hadn’t discussed it, but we both knew we were getting something other than love from our marriage.
She was getting the connections and money of my family name, and I was getting the family business, a telecommunications company named James Bank, which my grandfather had founded in 1971.
He had started with nothing, but now, James Bank was worth fifty billion. If I played my cards right, it would be passed down to me directly from my grandmother. I wasn’t going to fuck this up.
The plane dipped with turbulence, and my stomach followed suit. I looked down to see if the movement woke Allison, and it was like she felt nothing. How she slept so soundly was beyond me because sleep eluded me. Which meant I had nothing but time to watch her sleep and think about everything that had transpired over the day.
I had done it.
I married Allison Banks, making my family happy. She was the trophy wife my father wanted, the daughter my mother never had, and hopefully had a healthy uterus to give my grandmother the great-grandchild she couldn’t stop talking about.
Again, my gaze slipped over her face, and I noticed the darkness dotted beneath her eyes. She was exhausted. I hadn’t noticed it before with all the rush and chaos of our wedding day, but taking a minute to look at her now, I could see how much of a toll the day had taken on her.
Then again, she hadn’t been acting like herself all day, and when we pulled away from the reception hall, she had remained quiet on our drive to the airport. It was unlike the woman I had gotten to know over the past six months.
I reached over and brushed a stray curl away from her face, letting my fingertip trail over her soft cheek, down her jawline, and around her full bow-shaped lips. When a small gasp escaped from her lips, a surge of protectiveness washed over me. She was exhausted.
Once we had gotten on the plane and surged into the sky, she had grown limp against my side, her eyelids heavy with sleep until finally, she had passed out with her cheek pressed against my shoulder. She woke up once to eat, and then she had gone quiet again. Throughout all of it, a pretty pink blush had lingered on her cheeks. It was odd. Almost as if everything was new to her. As if I was new to her.
The entire marriage was new to both of us, and I supposed we would both need some time to adjust. Suddenly, I wished we had taken more time. We should have had a longer engagement—more dates to get to know each other—and we definitely should have moved in together before marrying, but my family had been insistent, and I had let them pull my strings.
The lights signaled, and the pilot spoke over the speaker to let us know we were approaching our destination. I gently nudged Allison’s shoulder to wake her, and she grumbled a bit.
It was kind of cute.
“Allison, wake up. We’re about to land.”
Her blue eyes popped open, and she dazed sleepily up at me. A tiny smile tugged at the corner of her plump lips before she blinked several times, then sat up quickly as if she had just woken from a dream. She rubbed at her eyes, smearing her makeup and leaving dark smudges beneath her eyes.
I had never seen her not put together. Allison tried for perfection. She never had a hair out of place, and her makeup was always applied perfectly, so I was seeing an entirely different side of her now. One with hair spilling from her ponytail and sleepy smudges beneath her eyes. And the funny thing about all of it was, I liked her this way so much better.
Maybe this was the Allison no one knew about. The private Allison. A butterfly in public and a cozy caterpillar in private.
“Did you sleep at all?” she asked quietly, before covering a yawn behind her tiny palm.
The large diamond I had purchased glistened from her finger, and something I had never felt before grew within me.
Possession.
She was mine.
“I can’t sleep on planes. I’m not sure how you were able to.”
Again, her cheeks flushed, and she looked away as though embarrassed. “I, uh … I took a sleeping pill. I don’t like flying very much, and I knew this would be a long flight. I somehow doubted you wanted me clinging to you every time there was a little turbulence.”
I didn’t say anything, but I grinned down at her because honestly, I didn’t hate the idea of her clinging to me. I liked the idea of her curves pressed against my body.
“We’ll be there just in time for dinner.” I quickly changed the subject. “Is there anything you wanted to do afterward? Did you get a chance to look over the brochure my assistant sent?”
She looked down at her hands in her lap, and my gaze followed, noticing her fingers turning white from how tightly she gripped them. Reaching out, I lay my palm over her hands.
“Hey, are you okay?” I asked.
She nodded. “I’m fine. Just tired.” She leaned her head back and took a deep breath before she spoke again. “We’re staying at the Grand Beach Resort and Spa, right?”
Her sudden change in topic gave me whiplash.
“Yes.”
