Page 44 of Contractually Wed

The cold frost in his eyes broke, and his mouth twitched. “You are insane.”

“I know there’s no potion, Apollo. I just made a decision, is all.”

His hand snuck under her top, and his palm felt abrasively delicious kneading her hip. “You don’t need one with me. You could simply ask.”

“And you would give it to me?” she said, feeling feverish and elated.

“Anything.”

She rubbed herself up against his chest, and groaned when her nipples peaked to hard points. “Before I tell you how I plan to leave behind that gothic heroine in the making...”

Distracted by the play of his muscles, she ran her finger down his pecs, over his hard stomach and over the seam of his sweatpants, and down, over the shapely outline of his growing cock. Need twanged between her thighs and she rubbed them for relief.

How could she have forgotten how real this heat between them was? How could she have forgotten that they had made this child,their child, in an act of complete surrender to each other?

It had to have been that afternoon after she’d barely recovered. When she’d screamed murder at him and he’d solved her problems for her in the flicker of a second. When he’d carried her to their bed in the middle of the afternoon and coaxed her to drink her soup and then made love to her as if he’d been starved for her. With the afternoon sun warming their already damp skin, it was the first time Jia had wondered about a future with him.

How could she have even imagined for a second separating him from their child?

“Jia?”

She looked up, colored at his scrutiny and went for his lips. He grunted with surprise when she bit his lower lip, nearly drawing blood and then when he let her in, she kissed him roughly, chasing his tongue, letting him take all her breath and her beats and all of her want. All the things she wanted to say to him and couldn’t, she poured into her kiss, hoping he would understand, hoping he would see how crazy she was about him.

His fingers tightened in her hair as he took control of the kiss. And the tenor of it only intensified.

He was angry, Jia realized as he nipped at her lower lip. He gripped her jaw with tight fingers holding her just so for his assault, then dragged his teeth down her jawline and over the arch of her neck, as he came back for her lips like a drowning man reaching for land. Over and over again.

When she gasped out a rough breath, he pulled back. “You’re like glass in my hands and I’m being even more rough than usual.”

“No,” Jia said, grabbing his hand and bringing it to her cheek.

“You have never lied to me before.”

“I’m not now,” she said, heat streaking her cheeks. “You were rough. But I want rough with you, Apollo. I want whatever brings you to your knees.”

Holding his gaze, she cupped his cock and squeezed him over the sweatpants, just the way he liked. A short grunt escaped his mouth before his fingers arrested her roving hand, and tugged it up. She flattened her palm against his chest, and scraped her nails over the taut muscle there, wanting to leave deep gouges in his skin.

God, loving him was making her bloodthirsty.

“Tell me first.”

She placed her cheek next to her palm, eager to hear his heartbeat. It was a thundering whoosh against her ears. “I want to feel you move inside me. I want to...lose myself in you.”

His fingers were at the nape of her neck, crawling upward and cradling her head. “I cannot believe I’m saying this. But you can’t use sex as an escape or as manipulation. Whatever is good about it will be lost then.”

She looked up, feeling both shame and shock. “I didn’t...” She held her answer as she looked into his eyes. The pain there stole her breath. Had she hurt him? Had she been so blind that she hadn’t seen what she was doing to him? “I wasn’t using it to escape or to manipulate either of us. I just needed the reassurance that things between us can be good.”

“They won’t be if you hide from me.”

She swallowed at the soft thrust, so close to the truth, and nodded. “I’m trying, Apollo. I really am. I needed to know that there was more than just an arrangement between us. More than—”

“So what suddenly caused the good mood, then?”

She pouted at his commanding tone. “Can’t we have sex first, please? And no, I’m not using it for anything. I want to celebrate you and me and...what better way?” When he only continued to consider her with that thick-lashed gaze, she sighed. “I will even go down on you and do that thing I’ve been preparing to do for three weeks.”

“Tempting offer,agapi,” he said, running his knuckles over the gaping neckline of her top. “But no.”

“I just don’t want us to fight and then—”

---