Page 67 of Between Commitment and Betrayal
Po and Noah were next, though they were more protective. I was suddenly their little sister. “You two seriously married?” Po inquired.
“You think we’d lie?” Declan finally responded. “What’s it matter to you anyway?”
“I mean, I don’t know.” Po continued, “Evie’s a damn knockout, and she trains us the best. If this was for something in Carl’s will… I just don’t want her hurt—”
“Everly is more than capable of making her own decisions.” He cut him off. “Our marriage is our business.”
He didn’t say more or less. He didn’t say he wanted to be married to me, that we were in any sort of relationship, that this wasn’t for show.
It shouldn’t have hurt. That was the plan. But my heart wasn’t listening.Be calm. Collected. You can’t show anything else.
Declan didn’t correct him but motioned toward the door instead. “I have a few things I’d like to discuss with Everly now that the news is out.”
Noah and Po immediately walked out of the studio but Wes murmured to me, “I’d like to still see you tonight. Text me, huh?” He didn’t wait for an answer and even as Declan opened his mouth, he was already out the door.
“You’re not seeing him tonight.”
“Ishouldsee him tonight because he needs some clarification on our relationship.”
“Don’t we all?” Declan threw up a hand before he started pacing back and forth. “I think it’s best for you to come to the meeting tonight with Piper and Anastasia.”
“Nope.” I halted him right there. “You know that’s not in my best interest. I hadn’t spoken a word to Anastasia since the funeral until this morning, and Piper is her best friend. I don’t belong in this circle—”
“If I do, you do.” He strode toward me.
I chuckled and shook my head. “As much as I’d like to make this easier for everyone and agree, Declan, we both know I can’t. I might even offend them by showing up.”
“I won’t have you feeling like you’re less—”
“You won’t,” I clarified, “but they will. And that’s fine. I won’t encroach on their territory longer than our contractual twelve months anyway, which is why you all should handle it as you see fit.”
He opened his mouth to say something more.
“Without me, Declan.”
“Without you,” he muttered and then he was toe-to-toe with me, looking down at me as I looked up at him. “You realize that for the past couple days, I haven’t had a thoughtwithout youin it. My mind doesn’t work without you in it. My dreams, my nightmares, my subconscious, my conscious… none of them operate latelywithout you.”
My throat was closing, tears sprang to my eyes, and my heart felt like it wanted to leap out of my chest into Declan’s hands. I’d have to hope he’d hold it carefully, and I hated that I’d started to believe it too.
Yet, I’d be opening myself up to everyone and it wasn’t something I was willing to do.
“Is it bad that every day I’m with you, every part of me is learning that it doesn’t want to be without you either?” I took a shaky breath. “It is bad because we’ll have to be without one another soon enough, Declan. You know this. And what would you have me do?” I whispered, “Go and frustrate your PR manager so she doesn’t want to help us at all?”
A guttural sound came from deep within his throat, and I saw his turmoil as he dragged a hand over his face. “I should just fire her and get somebody new.”
“I don’t think we have time for that. Plus, you said she’s good at her job. She just has to keep the story the same. We’re married,” I said but air quoted the word married.
He narrowed his eyes. It only took him walking past me to grab a towel and press a button on his watch that dimmed the door’s window for me to remember all the things we’d done in the walls of this gym mere nights before. When he turned and grasped the back of my neck to pull me close and drag the towel across my collarbone, I bit my lip to keep from moaning. “Yes, we’re married. Completely committed to one another right?”
“Well,” I hesitated, feeling the fire in his eyes. “We’re committed to a marriage of convenience.”
He leaned in close so that I felt the scruff of his five-o’clock shadow against my cheek. “We may be committed to a certain timeline with this marriage, but I’m also committed to punching my clients in the face after they stare at you doing yoga in front of them. Should we add that in, Everly?”
No answer was needed from me as his grip tightened and he rubbed more sweat from my chest, then my cleavage. We both knew the answer, and yet my breathing became rapid, and my nipples pebbled as I stood in front of him. Hoping. Wanting. Aching for him.
A shift in his hold on the back of my neck and his hand was threading through the waves of my hair, urging me to arch into him so he could tilt my face up and descend on my lips. Declan’s kiss was possessive, animalistic, and full of control.
He wanted it all now, and I was seeing what made him a world-class athlete and thriving businessman. He dominated and plowed through all my reservations and boundaries. He obliterated my hesitation with the pleasure he delivered with how his hands held my hair tightly, his tongue roved around in my mouth, his lips owned mine.
