Page 118 of The Rogue and His Flower

“Of what?”

“I’m afraid that my need to feel so desperately wanted is blinding me from the truth,” I rush out as a sudden sharp pain lacerates my heart. I flick my gaze away, dragging in a shuddering breath.

“What truth?”

“That you?—”

“Daisy, what truth?” he persists, reaching for me, his hand wrapping around mine, squeezing gently.

“That you truly are incapable ofeverloving me.”

He hesitates for a moment, a frown appearing between his eyebrows. “Do you want that, Daisy? Do you wantmeto loveyou?”

“I’ve always wanted to feel loved, Dalton,” I say, blinking back hot tears, refusing to let them fall.

“But do you wantmeto love you? Do you want me to make love to you,wife?” he persists, and the way he calls me his wife makes me tremble with need.

“I want that more than anything. I want to be loved, Dalton. I want it so badly that it hurts,” I whisper, rubbing my chest where my heart swells painfully. “But more than that, I wantyou, and it terrifies me that you only want me for one thing. Part of me still believes that I’m just a means to an end, an itch you need to scratch, an addiction you need to appease, and I’m scared that what I’m beginning to feel forming between us isn’t real.”

“Daisy, look at me,” he demands softly, urgently.

I don’t. I can’t. More tears well in my eyes, and I hate that I’m so vulnerable.

“Look at me now,” he repeats, more forcefully this time, and my eyes snap up to meet his.

I suck in a breath at the heat in them, at the way he seems to drink me in like a man desperate to quench his thirst.

“I’mnota sex addict, Daisy,” he says, leaning closer and cupping my face, his thumb trailing over the tears that glisten on my skin. “Despite really enjoying sex, and despite what everyone thinks, it’s more complicated than that,” he explains, blowing out a shuddering breath of his own. “If I’m being honest with myself, it isn’t the sex so much as…”

“What, Dalton?”

He levels his gaze with mine. “When I’ve fucked women before, for a brief moment in time, I was their everything. That mademefeel wanted, adored, desired, loved,” he adds softly. “And as much as everyone thinks I’ve used those women to get myself off, they’ve used me too for the exact same thing. No one has ever fought to keep me. No one has ever cared for me, not really, not in the way that matters. The women I’ve been withbefore have only ever truly wanted me for my money, for the notoriety of ensnaring the heir to a fortune. I walked away before they could do the same to me. Just like my own mother did. You’re the only one who’s stayed. I know you’re bound to me, but the sheer fact you’ve not run, that you aren’t interested in my family’s fortune, that you want to be friends, that you trust me with your pain, that you see something in me that others never have, it means a great deal.”

“Dalton, I didn’t realise,” I say, my heart aching for him.

“It’s different with you,” he continues, pressing on. “I want you. God help me, I do. But I don’t just want to fuck you. Iwantto make love to you.”

“You do?”

“Yes. So much, and I will, one day, when I truly understand the meaning of the word,” he says, pressing his hand to his chest, mirroring me. His honesty both causes a crack in my heart, and simultaneously heals it.

“You truly want me, forme? You could love me?”

“Yes, Daisy.Yes,” he replies emphatically, pressing a tender kiss against my knuckles, his lips lingering against my skin. “I think I’ve wanted you for a long time now, but I kept you at a distance. I encouraged the animosity between us because you were off-limits to me. I refused to look too closely at why it drove me crazy when I saw you with other men,” he admits.

My heart rate kicks up a notch at the honesty of his confession, at the helplessness he so clearly feels. Like me, he’s been cast adrift, consumed by the current of our developing feelings, helpless against them.

“What do we do now?” I ask, hopeful, willing to tread water, to keep afloat whilst we learn how to swim, together.

“Right now, I need you to bear with me, Daisy. Will you do that? Will you be patient? Will you give me the time to explorewhat’s growing between us? Because the next time I sink inside of you I want it to be out of love.”

“Yes,” I reply without a moment’s hesitation, wanting to give him that, wanting it more than anything. Then I push back my chair and stand, tugging on his hand. “Come with me?”

He nods, rising to his feet as he follows me into the lounge. I guide him towards the main bedroom suite where I’ve been sleeping. There are two bedrooms in this bungalow, but we haven’t shared a bed since we arrived. Perhaps it was because we felt the need to give each other space, or maybe it was because we were both afraid of what sharing a bed for an entire night could mean. There’s something about holding each other in sleep that is far more intimate than fucking, and I guess neither of us were truly ready for that, but none of that matters now as I stop at the end of the bed, turning to face him.

“What are we doing?” he asks. There’s a wariness in his gaze, but also a willingness, and it emboldens me.

“Take your clothes off, Dalton,” I whisper.

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