Page 32 of Spanish Marriage Solution

He’d realised not long after they’d returned from Madrid that he was on a precipice. That the more time he spent with Alice, the closer to the edge he got and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to let his desire for her carry him straight over it.

The fantasies he’d had of being able to have her whenever he wanted and no one to stop them this time had been heady and intense, and also too much. So he’d decided that keeping himself distant during the day and only letting the leash off at night, in bed, was the answer. Made sure it all stayed about sex and nothing else.

There had to be clear boundaries. His emotions always led him astray and then he’d end up failing the people who mattered to him, the way he’d done with Mateo and Emily, and he wasn’t doing that again. He couldn’t. He didn’t want to give Alice any false expectations either.

So yes, he should let her walk away and yet he found himself reaching for her all the same, his fingers closing around her bare arm and holding on tight, stopping her from leaving. ‘Wait,’ he said in a low voice.

She halted and turned back to him, and, even though she was trying to hide it, he could see the hurt glinting in her dark eyes.

Dios. He’d been a bastard to her.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, hating her hurt and wanting to give her the truth, because she deserved it. ‘I know what you gave up to come here and marry me, that it was a sacrifice. You did it for Diego and I appreciate that. He is the most important thing in the world to me, and knowing you will be a mother to him is the best outcome I could have hoped for.’

She stared up at him, her lush mouth losing the hardness around it, the glint of hurt in her eyes easing. Her skin was so warm beneath his fingertips, and he could feel his desire for her begin to coil like thick smoke in his veins.

‘But I’ve been deliberately putting distance between us these past two weeks, Alice,’ he went on. ‘And yes, it’s because of you.’

Surprise flickered over her face. ‘Why?’ Then the surprise faded, leaving yet more hurt behind it. ‘What did I do?’

Look at you. You failed Emily and now you’re failing Alice.

No, he wouldn’t. He couldn’t hurt her the way he’d hurt Emily. He tugged her closer. ‘You did nothing,’ he said. ‘The problem is me.’

She gave him a searching look. ‘How?’

It was going to be difficult to articulate the complicated need he had for her. The strange compulsion that had gripped him the moment he’d first seen her, that had caused him to constantly crave her presence even though he was married to her sister.

He knew it wasn’t love. He’d already experienced love and it was cruel. Love had made his mother betray her vows and caused his father’s bitter resentment. Love had made him a target for Mateo’s anger and been the reason Javier had lost his job. Love wasn’t something he’d ever wanted to give anyone else, though he’d tried to give Emily a facsimile of it and it had caused her nothing but heartache.

He couldn’t make that same mistake with Alice.

‘When you’re around I...can’t think,’ he said slowly. ‘I can’t do anything but imagine you beneath me and it’s...consuming. It interferes with everything. I told you, it’s an obsession, and there has to be some boundaries, understand? It’s easier to keep my distance.’

‘Easier for you, you mean?’

He could deny it, give her some lie and then walk away, but he couldn’t do that. It wouldn’t be fair, not to either of them. ‘Yes,’ he said bluntly.

‘So what about me? Am I supposed to...what? Just accept that I can’t even talk to you? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Alice—’

‘How is that fair? I’m not asking for your heart on a plate, Sebastián. Only a conversation.’

His fingers tightened on her arm, frustration coiling through him. ‘It will never be just a conversation, that’s what I’m trying to tell you.’

‘So? What are you so afraid of?’

‘You,’ he said before he could stop himself. ‘I’m afraid of falling for you.’

The words crashed into the silence like stones through a window, shattering the nice little lie he’d told himself that this was all about physical obsession.

He didn’t want to fall for her. His first wife was only two months dead and he’d failed her.

Just as you failed your father. Just as you failed Javier.

And that was the truth, wasn’t it? He hadn’t been his father’s son and he hadn’t been Javier’s, even though he was Mateo’s by adoption and Javier’s by blood. He’d been nobody’s. And so nothing he’d done had ever been good enough.

It won’t be good enough for her either...

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