Page 17 of Claiming His Wife
She felt eyes on her, and when she lifted her gaze, she found Finn was staring at her intently.
"What are you looking at?"
“I see you still indulge yourself with food.”
She raised her brow.
“So?”
“I just think its super sexy how you're not afraid to eat.”
"Is that your way of saying I've put on weight?"
“No, not at all. And to show you I meant no harm, take this." He proffered the small box he had been fiddling with, and Kalilah took the proffered box with confusion. It was too small to contain the annulment papers she so desperately wanted.
“Go ahead, it won't bite, I promise," he promised softly.
She loosened the strings that were wrapped around the box. The smell hit her first and had her salivating before she saw the entirety of the package.
Damn, this is what she got for fraternizing with the enemy. No soul alive could resist a double chocolate cake from Angel Fair.
“I see that you still have a weakness for chocolate cake.” Finn gloated, but Kalilah was too busy transferring the delectable morsel onto her plate to pay him any mind.
One forkful and she was in nirvana. She barely held in the moan, but she didn’t care.
He took a sip of his steaming coffee and leaned toward her, his strong body filling her vision. His citrus scent hit her at close quarters, and her nose flared to take in the scent. Mixed with the aroma of chocolate, it was intoxicating.
“Are you enjoying the taste of it? Still good as you remember?”
“Hmmmm,” Kalilah nodded her head slowly in affirmation, all the while munching on it with her eyes closed.
“So good," she breathed, and the single word jolted her back to the incident she was determined to chalk up as a mini nightmare.
He gestured playfully at her plate with a fork and laughed when Kalilah quickly pulled the plate away from his reach. She looked at him to see upturned lips and a twinkle in his eye and tried to refocus her attention to her cake, but she couldn’t help but to look up at Finn again. They both chuckled at her actions, their gazes locked together.
She dropped the fork to the plate with a light clatter as she reached for her cup of orange juice. Finn reached across the table, and his sudden movement jarred her backward, breaking the spell that melded their eyes.
“You just have a spot of chocolate on you,” he explained.
“Where?”
He told her where it was, and she dabbed the spot.
“Look, Lilah, I want us to have a future together.” She opened her mouth to shut him down, but he cut off what she was about to say with a hand gesture. “Before you came back to Montréal, I’d already made up my mind to come find you in Seattle and bring you home. My jet was set to leave for the US next week.” He reached into the back of his pants pocket and produced the flight itinerary; it was a one-way trip with no return date.
She was shocked. She didn’t know what to think or how to respond to what he’d just said. He spoke again before she could put together a response for him.
“I am prepared to do anything so that we can get back everything that we lost. I’m not giving up on us.”
She was taken aback by how determined he sounded. Before she could think more about what he said he continued.
“I don’t think Jamie is the right man for you.”
“His name is Jonathan, and you don’t? I wonder why?” she started sarcastically. “You and my father seem preoccupied with telling me what you think is best for me. Are you the right man for me? Considering what happened years ago and how much money was involved or implied.” It was the perfect blow to land; she could see that he lost some of his cockiness by the way his eye twitched.
“I didn't take a dime from your father. I had honorable intentions, Lilah!” Finn answered, and she registered the fury in his voice.
“No, but you took his cash cow," she retorted.
