It takes all of my self-control to stay seated in the car and not jump out to grab her right away. Because she looks incredible. Every step she takes makes the blue flowing skater-dress she’s wearing flow around her calves, each swish flashing just a hint of thigh that only makes me want more.
It’s more dressed up than I’ve ever seen my jeans-and-T-shirts girl, and it makes me want to tear that dress right off of her. She climbs into the passenger seat with a smile and a wave, and before she can get a word out, I catch her around the waist and drag her toward me, kissing her cheek, her jawline, her neck.
“You look incredible,” I murmur against her skin, feathering her with kisses, dipping lower, toward the neckline of the dress, low enough to reveal just a hint of cleavage—enough to let me know I want more.
She laughs and twines her arms around me, her fingers tracing through my hair. “If I’d known this would be your reaction, I’d wear dresses more often.”
“You should,” I tell her, my hands sliding down her hips, marveling at the smoothness of her curves beneath the stretch of cottony fabric. My hands reach the hemline of the dress, touch bare skin, and start to inch higher, along her thighs.
She squirms a little and glances at the windows of the car. It’s broad daylight outside, after all, and we’re parked right in front of her house. But I don’t care.
“Maybe we should cancel,” I tell her, before I lean in to drag my teeth along the edge of her jawline, nipping her skin just roughly enough to make her gasp and arch up against me. “Go back into your apartment and forget the weekend. We’ll stay here, eat in…” I lean back to catch her eye with a feral grin. “I’ve already got plenty to devour right here.” My hands skate across her thighs, along the flat of her stomach.
She shivers beneath me, and it’s the most delicious feeling, knowing how much I affect her. How easily I can turn her on. A breathy little moan escapes her lips as my hand dips lower, grazing along the edge of her panties—I can feel the fabric of them through the dress, and I press a little harder, until her hips arch up against my hand.
But then she stops. Pulls away from me, with what looks like Herculean effort. “We can’t bail,” she says, though the hitch in her breath and the flush in her cheeks tell me she wants to be saying anything but this. “You said it’s important,” she adds. “Whatever it is.”
My stomach clenches, and my throat seals itself up. I clear it with a growl and turn back toward the road, reaching up to grip the wheel with both hands—the only way I can think of to make them stop touching her. “Bailing might be the wiser move,” I murmur under my breath.
After all, if we bail now, she’ll never need to know. She’ll never have to look at me differently—or worse, decide that this is all too much for her. I wouldn’t blame her, of course, after this. Who knows how it’s going to go? But there’s a tiny, crazy part of me that hopes she’ll stay. Even after she realizes what she’s in for.
“John?” Her hand comes to rest on my wrist, soft and delicate.
I turn my hand around to thread my fingers through hers and bring it up to my lips, kissing each finger, one by one. “Let’s go,” I say, dropping her hand, and she pulls it back to her lap, wrapping her fist around the hem of her skirt, her eyes on me, curious.
But I shake it off and put the car in drive, ignoring her stares as best I can. At least she knows better than to try to pry more details from me. I appreciate it. At this stage, I’m not sure I could stand talking about this. Showing her is better. Like leaping into the deep end of a pool. There’s no time to get cold feet or decide the water’s too unfriendly after all and climb back out. This way, once we get started, there’ll be no going back.
I floor the accelerator, and Mara changes the topic. She talks about work, about the latest project we’ve been putting together. I relax a little, settling into the more familiar, easier topic. We bat around set ideas for a particularly important scene of the play we’re staging. Mara, as usual, has brilliant ones. And better yet, whenever I pitch ideas, she questions them. Pushes me to make them clearer, smarter, better.
It’s just one of the many things I adore about her. She makes me a better version of myself.
So why am I dragging her into this mess? I shake off the doubt as we reach the exit. It’s near Palm Springs, though not quite all the way into the desert yet. I take the familiar exit, wind through the all too memory-filled town, taking smaller streets with every turn until I finally turn up one long, winding driveway, through a manicured lawn that speaks to the fact that, despite recent droughts, whoever lives here has the money to keep up appearances.
Mara’s gaze on my face sharpens. But when I glance over at her, I can practically see her biting her tongue, resisting the urge to question this.
We reach the end of the drive, and the house towers ahead of us. House is the wrong word, really. Mansion would be more appropriate.
I should know. I bought it for them.
My parents are already waiting out front, arms hooked around one another. The end of the drive is filled with cars. Extended family, friends of the family, distant relatives. My parents love doing this—hosting events, throwing parties. Showing off the property their son earned them.
It was their idea to make this a surprise. When they learned about Mara—when they learned that I finally, finally settled down, as they’ve been trying to force me to do for years—they insisted. But now, watching her reaction shift from surprise to confusion to worry, I wonder yet again if this was the right move. If I shouldn’t have told her everything, right from the beginning.
“What is this, John?” Mara murmurs as I park right in front of the drive, in the spot of honor. My dad waves, and my mom beams like she’s just won some kind of award.
In her mind, she probably has.
“My parents wanted to meet my new wife,” I tell her, shutting off the engine. “They insisted on throwing a party. It’s not huge; just some friends and family—”
“You didn’t warn me I’d be meeting your parents,” she hisses under her breath. But there’s no time for her to build up steam. The door is already sliding open, and my parents are calling their hellos.
“You must be Mara.” My mom reaches her first, before Mara even has time to fully exit the car. She wraps her in a tight bear hug, and then Dad joins in, shaking her hand like she’s a business partner, not my wife.
Well. I suppose both terms are accurate, technically.
“We’ve heard so much about you,” Mom is gushing, although that’s not strictly accurate. They didn’t even know Mara existed until I finally admitted it to them a few days ago. Less than a week.
Mara shoots me a confused look over Mom’s shoulder, but she hugs her back, and deals with my dad’s hand-pumping decently well.
“Mom.” I step over to kiss her cheek. “Give her some breathing room; you’re going to suffocate her.”
“Of course, of course.” Mom backs away, although there’s still a hungry glean in her eye as she assesses Mara. “Come in, darling, have some lunch. You must be famished. Eating for two and all.” Mom winks, and I groan under my breath.
Already?
Mara’s face flushes, and she frowns, confused. “Er… no, just eating for the one, actually,” she says, and it’s embarrassingly obvious how quickly my mother’s expression deflates with disappointment.
Still, at least she doesn’t press the issue, hooking an arm through Mara’s and leading her toward the house. I fall into step beside my father and trail after them.
“Your mother’s beside herself,” he says.
“With happiness or annoyance?” I respond archly.
Dad chuckles. “You know her. Why not both at once?” He shoots me a sideways look. “She’s pleased you’re finally settling down, of course. But she wanted a big wedding, a splashy engagement party…” Dad gestures at the house. “Hence all of this hoopla, naturally.”
“I thought you told me you could tamper her. That this would just
be a small get-together.” I side-eye the driveway, unable to stop counting. At least a dozen cars, maybe more.
“This is small,” Dad insists. “You should have seen the original guest list she wanted.”
I roll my eyes with a groan, but it’s quickly drowned by the roar of our relatives as we enter the house. My cousins swarm, followed by aunts, uncles, friends of my parents. Mara has time to catch my eye just once, panic written all over her face, before she’s swallowed in hugs and congratulations.
I watch them watching her. Some of their congratulations are heartfelt, sincere. Others are grasping, reaching. Most of my relatives are decent people, really. But they look at my bank account; they see my name in the newspapers, and they can’t help themselves. After all, decent people or not, everyone’s attitudes shift when they get close to money. Especially the kind of money I have.
The kind of money that let me buy a house like this for my parents. The kind of money that restored this family name to the prominence it once had, way back when.
I care about my family, of course. But you can’t choose your family. And mine, well… they can be more of a handful than most.
I weave through a sea of aunts to reach Mara, and loop an arm around her waist, feeling how tense every muscle in her body is. She tilts her head back to rest against my shoulder, in a move that raises a sea of awws from the surrounding family members. But when she leans in to whisper in my ear, it’s not the sort of sweet-nothing I’m sure they imagine she’s saying.
“What the hell did you just throw me into?” she whispers.
I lean down to kiss her jawline, right where it reaches the lobe of her ear. My tongue darts across her diamond earring, toying with it, making a little sigh escape her lips before I respond. “My parents wanted it to be a surprise,” I murmur, my breath ghosting across her cheek, drawing a little shiver from her. “My mother insisted that I owed her. I believe the words were ‘you robbed me of a wedding.’”
Mara tilts her head back far enough to catch my eye, steel glinting in hers. “Still. You should have at least warned me. There are so many people here—”
“They don’t matter.” I turn her to face me, cupping her face between my palms. “Nobody matters but you and me, Mara.”
Her breath catches in her throat. Her pupils dilate where they fix on mine. “John…”
“John.” My mother’s voice breaks through our conversation, as her hand comes to rest on my shoulder. “Don’t monopolize your beautiful bride,” she says, teeth flashing in a wide smile. “After all, you’ve had her to yourself for weeks. We want to get to know her.”
With an eye roll just for Mara, I shift a little, letting my mother hook an arm through Mara’s.
“Come on, dear, you haven’t even seen the gift table yet. It was tricky to figure out a good gift, of course—John here wouldn’t give us any hints about your tastes. I hope it’s all right—we decided it would be safer to just buy for the future instead…”
I trail after my mother, who’s leading Mara toward an elaborate table set up near the rear wall. There are a few gift-wrapped boxes on it, some cards, and… Oh God. My stomach sinks.
A bassinet.
Is she crazy?
“Mother,” I say, raising my voice.
Mom doesn’t stop. “We figured you’d need all of this soon,” my mother babbles, pointing at the blatant baby supplies. There are bottles, little onesies, even a car seat.
Mara tugs her arm from my mother’s with force. “Mrs. Walloway, this is all so sweet, but it’s… it’s too much.” Her face is flushed, and I can tell she’s trying not to panic.
I understand. So am I. I knew my parents wanted children, for me to carry on the lineage, but this is too far, even for them.
“Nonsense dear. It’s never too soon to start planning for the eventual future.”
“Eventual…” Mara’s face blanches now. “That’s a bit presumptuous, don’t you think?”
Over Mara’s shoulder, my mother frowns. “What could be presumptuous about carrying on the family? What could be more important than that?”
“My career, for one thing,” Mara counters.
My mother’s frown deepens. We’re attracting attention now—a couple of cousins have noticed us and are exchanging sideways smirks. It makes me want to grab Mara and pull her out of here right now. I knew this party would be leaping into the deep end, but I didn’t think it would end in us drowning. “Career is one thing, but family must come first, dear.”
“Oh really?” Mara arches an eyebrow. “Why, because I’m young and female, I must want to pop out a baby immediately?”
“Nobody said anything about immediately, but don’t be naïve. Our family needs an heir. John needs children, to carry on our name, our legacy.”
“He needs them?” Mara shoots me a glare over her shoulder. “That’s news to me. He hasn’t mentioned wanting anything of the sort.”
“Well, I would have thought that would be implied,” my mother responds, nonplussed. “After all, he keeps you well, doesn’t he? All that money and privilege doesn’t come free, dear.”
Mara’s gaze narrows where it’s fixed on mine. “Oh, so I’m being paid to be a baby incubator, is that it?” When she speaks, it’s not directed at my mother anymore, but right at me. “Forget it. The last thing I need is to be some kind of kept woman.” She shoves away from my mother, straight through the gaggle of cousins.
Away from me.
I flash one last glare at my mother, who spreads her hands wide, an innocent look on her face, like she doesn’t know what she just did. “Thank you for that,” I mutter, and then I beeline after Mara.
Forget the rest of them. They don’t matter. Only she does.
People are whispering now, pointing. Most are thankfully too distracted eating and drinking their fill. Wringing every last drop of free anything they can from this party.
Screw them all.
This was a mistake, whispers that little voice ins my head, louder now, more insistent. I try to ignore it, scanning the party for Mara. But she’s not in the living room or the dining room anymore. The gift table sits ignored, the presents unopened.
I finally find her in the backyard. There’s a big tree, one of the few that survived the droughts, with a patch of scrub grass under it. Mara’s sitting cross-legged there, facing away from the house, face buried in both hands.
I step up behind her, hesitate for a second, and then kneel next to her. “I’m sorry,” I say.
“How could you do this to me?” She looks up at me, her jaw clenched, wiping harder at the tears that keep falling.
“I didn’t know she would lay into you like that,” I murmur. “I knew my mother wanted me to have kids, but… I didn’t think she’d be this insane about it.”
Mara’s throat works with a tight swallow. “You can’t just drop shit like this on me without warning, John. Your parents honestly think I’m some kind of—”
“Fuck what they think,” I interrupt. “You and I both know why we got married. It doesn’t matter what anyone else expects from this marriage. Only what we do.”
“Yeah?” Mara lifts her face, jaw set tightly. “Well, after this, I’m starting to think I want that annulment.”
My stomach sinks. My eyebrows shoot upward. “Mara—”
“No. You keep insisting this is a real marriage, or at least that you want it to be. But no real marriage would have situations like this.” She flings a hand behind her, toward the house. “In a real marriage, you’d communicate with me. You’d have told me about your family. Hell, in a real marriage, I’d have had a few years to get used to your baby-crazy parents before I had to meet them for the first time, with them acting like I’m some gold-digger you married off the street.”
“Do not call yourself that,” I reply, the words harsher than I mean them.
She shoves to her feet. “Why not? It’s what everyone thinks, isn’t it? That, or they think you knocked me up and we got married in som
e kind of shotgun wedding.” She tugs at the ring on her left finger. “What’s everyone going to think when this gets out into the media?” She gestures at the house. “You really think every single person in there is going to keep your new marriage a secret?”
“They know better than to discuss my business with paparazzi—”
“So you think.” She shakes her head, scowling. “This was a bad idea. All of it. I should have gotten this marriage annulled the moment I woke up in Vegas. Pretending we had any other options, that was a mistake.”
“Mara, don’t just give up on this.”
“Give up on what? We’ve known each other for a couple of weeks. You’ll be over me in no time.” She sets her jaw hard.
I stand next to her, reach for her. But she pulls away. “I’m not giving up on you,” I say.
“You should,” she replies. “Clearly I’m not the right woman for you. You should marry someone who wants kids and a family, the white picket fence life.”
“Why? I don’t want that,” I reply.
“You don’t want kids?” She raises an eyebrow, doubt written all over her face.
“I do someday, but not right now, not if it will stand in the way of your career—of either of our careers.”
But she’s shaking her head, already reaching into a hidden pocket of her dress to produce her phone. “Find yourself another baby mama, John, because it’s not me.” She taps on the screen. “I’m taking an Uber home.”
“Let me drive you.” But she’s already walking away.
“Don’t follow me,” she says, as if she’s reading my mind. Because that’s exactly what I want to do. Chase her until she sees that this is the wrong move. Make her understand. We belong together.
She stops and turns to me, and I hold my breath because I think maybe she’s changed her mind. “If you value me at all, John, give me space right now,” she says.
Marry Me Now: An Arranged Marriage Collection Page 32