by Maisey Yates
His stomach tightened and he had to labor to draw his next breath.
She opened her eyes, the expression in them so trusting, so full of caring. He could feel it. Could feel her emotions radiating from her. Radiating in him. His throat felt tight and his body was screaming for release, while his heart was threatening to pound out of his chest.
He moved up to capture her lips, to settle between her thighs, testing her moist entrance with the head of his erection. Heat rushed through him, physical desire strong enough to blot out everything else.
Yes. This was what he needed. It was just sex. Nothing more.
He slid into her body and she let out a little moan of ecstasy that he captured with his lips. He kissed her, sifting her silky hair through his fingers as he thrust into her.
She moved her hands over his back, fingers skimming his buttocks. Her legs locked around his calves as she moved beneath him, perky nipples rubbing against his chest.
She was perfect. Amazing. He couldn’t stop himself from telling her. The words fell from his lips as pleasure built inside of him, as he continued to chase down the oblivion that an orgasm would bring.
Anything. Anything to dull the emotion that seemed to be building in his chest. His blood roared in his ears as he neared the peak, drowning out everything except the pleasure that was pounding through him.
A harsh groan escaped his lips as he poured himself into her and he felt her body lock tight beneath him, felt the pulsing of her internal muscles as she gave in to her own orgasm. He was glad she’d found satisfaction, because he’d been too caught up in his own to pay her as much attention as he should have.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek. He looked at her, allowed himself to really see the emotion in her eyes. The remnants of the stone wall in his chest crumbled. He was raw, exposed. He was feeling.
The intensity of it welled up in him, all of his emotions swirling together, impossible to identify, impossible to pick out one emotion and distinguish it from the rest.
“Aleks,” she whispered, stroking his neck, running her fingers through his hair. She kissed him again slowly, sweetly.
He pulled away, rolling to the side and pushing himself into a sitting position.
He turned back to face her. The way she looked at him. With so much trust. He didn’t want her to look at him that way. Didn’t want to see anything but lust in those beautiful blue eyes.
She sat too, wrapped her arms around her waist, resting her head on his shoulder. He set his jaw, remained motionless. She slid her hand over his chest, her touch arousing him again already.
He moved away from her and swung his legs over the side of the bed. “I need a shower.”
Maddy sat still in the center of the bed. She knew that she wasn’t invited to Aleksei’s shower. The sharp click of the bathroom door confirmed it.
She flopped backward, resting her head on the pillow. She contemplated getting her clothes on and going back home. That was what she would have done…yesterday. She would have run from the tension between them. It was what she had done the other day.
But she wasn’t going to do that today. Yesterday, she’d assumed her relationship with Aleksei would be temporary, had counted on it. Today, she was pretty sure it was still going to be temporary, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t try to change that.
It scared her, the thought of putting herself out there, laying her feelings bare. The thought of trying for forever. But at the very least, no matter what happened, Aleksei was a man who was worthy of her love. He was worth the risk. They both were.
Even though she wasn’t sure if there was any way the risk would work out.
When Aleksei came back from his shower he was still stark naked, droplets of water lingering on his skin. He strode to the bed and slid in beside her. Her heart ached. She loved him. She loved him so much.
He didn’t reach for her, as she longed for him to do, didn’t draw her against the warmth of his body. But he was there.
Tonight, she wouldn’t rock the boat with any declarations. Tonight she would just enjoy being with him. The man she loved. The man who had taught her how to love.
Aleksei woke late, which was unusual. He always got up at six after a night of barely sleeping. But last night he’d slept. With Maddy’s deep, even breathing, her scent, the warm weight of her body, he had slept for the first time in six years.
No nightmares. No ghosts.
He pushed aside the realization as he made his way from the bedroom into the kitchen, where he was greeted by a sight of surreal domesticity.
Maddy was moving around the kitchen, taking bread out of the toaster and putting it on a plate next to some scrambled eggs. She was wearing his shirt, the hem riding high on her thighs when she reached up into the cupboard and took out two mugs.
When she turned to face him, that same open, honest look on her face that she’d had last night, his chest seized.
“Good morning,” she said.
“You cook?”
“Well, I eat.” She walked over to the stove and took a tea kettle off of one the burners—he hadn’t even known he owned a tea kettle—and poured some hot water into the mugs. “I will forgive your lack of coffee as you’re a caffeine-less Philistine in practice.”
She picked up the plates and stood still for a moment. “You don’t have a dining room set, do you?”
“No.” There was no point. Not here. He wasn’t in Milan often, and when he was he didn’t have guests. What was the point of owning a dining table? So he could sit at it alone?
Only this morning he could have sat with Maddy. The thought wrenched the tension in his chest even tighter.
“We’ll eat in here then,” she said, her voice determinedly cheerful as she carried the plates into the living room and set them on the coffee table.
She sat down next to him and pushed her food around instead of eating it. She was upset with him. But he’d never promised her anything beyond what had happened last night in the bedroom and she knew that. If she’d forgotten it now, it wasn’t his fault.
“Oh.” She set her plate on the coffee table and stood. “I forgot I was making you tea.”
“You don’t have to make me tea, Maddy.”
She started to walk toward the kitchen. “Aleks, it’s fine.”
And there she was, calling him by a pet name, walking around in his kitchen. Making tea like she was his…
“You’re not my wife, Madeline,” he said, his voice low and even.
She froze, her body going stiff before she turned to face him. “I know that. I made you breakfast. I’m not trying to be your wife.”
“Good. Because I have no intention of ever making you my wife, of ever making any woman my wife.”
She turned away again, but not before he saw the bottomless chasm of hurt behind those blue eyes. His chest felt too full, almost painful, in response to what he witnessed there. For what he had caused.
He gritted his teeth, fought to find his control again. He was a master at controlling his emotions. He had lost his dominion over himself once and he had vowed never to do it again.
There was something about Madeline…last night he hadn’t even used a condom. That never happened to him. Protection was an essential part of sex as far as he was concerned. Who could enjoy themselves with the threat of pregnancy or health issues looming?
And yet he’d forgotten last night entirely. Hadn’t realized until halfway through his shower. He hadn’t said anything to Maddy either. He didn’t want to worry her for no reason. The odds of pregnancy were low and he was in good health.
And deep down he acknowledged he didn’t want to confess that she’d made him forget. He didn’t even want to confess it to himself, but he was forced to.
He heard a spoon clinking against the side of the mug as Maddy stirred the tea too vigorously. She spun around suddenly, her face a study in schooled composure.
“I know I’m not your wife, Aleksei.
I’m not even applying for the position because I know you just aren’t ready for that. And that’s okay. Heaven knows I’ve held on to plenty in my life. Things that weren’t as bad as what you went through. But I do care about you, and if I want to show you that I don’t think you should feel threatened by it.”
He stood from the couch, his blood pounding fiercely through his body. “I never asked you to care for me. I never asked you to make me breakfast. This was supposed to be a physical affair.”
Maddy crossed the kitchen and stepped into the living room. Now that she was closer he noticed how pale she was, what dark circles she had under her eyes. He wanted to touch her. To offer comfort. But he was the source of her pain. It would be too perverse for him to be the one to try and erase what he had caused. What he would continue to cause by not offering her more than a cold, sexual relationship.
“I know what it was supposed to be. I was the one who laid down the terms, wasn’t I? But…it’s funny, and I didn’t expect it, but you…you’ve healed me, Aleksei,” she said, her voice thick with emotion. “I carried so much anger, anger at myself mostly, for what had happened in my past. And I was stuck there, in my mind the little girl that no one loved, the guilty sinner who had an affair with a married man. That was who I was. Maybe not to anyone else, not anymore, but it was who I saw. You changed that.”
“No. I didn’t change anything, Maddy.” He was just another person in her life who had used her. Another person who would hurt her if he didn’t end things.
He opened his mouth to speak the words, to tell her to go. An intense burst of pain in his chest immobilized him, stopped him from saying anything.
So Maddy pressed on. “You did. You’re the last man on earth it makes sense for me to fall in love with, but I did. I do. I love you. You were the one who showed me that love was real. That it wasn’t just something people use against you. Because even now you won’t use it against me. I know you won’t.”
“Your trust is misplaced,” he growled. “As is your love.”
She looked down, biting her lower lip. “I know you aren’t going to get on your knee and confess your undying love, Aleksei. I don’t expect that. But that doesn’t mean we can’t still be together for now.”
“I don’t think you understand,” he said, ignoring the trickle of anguish that was spreading from his chest through his body. “I don’t need your love. I don’t want it.”
“Aleksei…” She moved to him.
“Stop. Maddy, you would take so little from someone? You would take a physical affair and nothing more? Because that’s all you’ll ever have from me. I will never give you more. I can’t. I have my mistresses long term. I find it more convenient. But it doesn’t ever really matter who they are so long as they’re biddable and available.”
He watched the light in her eyes dim, watched her entire being shrink back.
And the trickle inside of him turned into a flood. But if he didn’t do it now, if he didn’t make her leave now, he would only hurt her worse later. What did one emotionally crippled man have to offer a woman like Madeline? A woman who had her own hurts. A woman who had been so badly abused by those who should have cared for her.
He could give her nothing but his own shortcomings, his own pain. His own failings as a man.
“It’s never mattered to me who the woman was, as long as the sex was good.”
She jerked back then, as though he had slapped her. And it took everything in him to stay rooted to the spot. To not go to her. To not comfort her. Kiss her.
He had no right to do those things. Had no right to demand love from a woman like Maddy when he could offer nothing of value in return. But he wanted to. More than anything, he wanted to.
She looked up at him, blinking furiously. Maddy wouldn’t dissolve, not now. He knew that. She was too strong. Or too stubborn. Maybe both.
“You’re right, Aleksei. I…I am selling myself short. I deserve to be loved, not to just give it. I’ve given it all of my life, and the only person who ever really gave it back was my brother. Everyone else just took what I would offer and used it against me. And I always thought that meant there was something wrong with me. I never thought I deserved more. I do now.”
She sucked in a deep breath and put her hand on her stomach, as though it hurt. It probably did. His own pain was certainly real. Physical. Horrible.
“You know, the irony is I learned that from you too. You showed me that I was worth more than I thought. That I was more than my mistakes. More than my parents showed me I was. I’ll always be grateful for that. Not for this, though,” she said, turning to head back into the bedroom, probably to collect her clothes. “This hurts. And I think you’re selling both of us short. I think we could have something, and you’re too afraid to take it.”
He closed his eyes, ignoring the searing pain in his heart. “No, Maddy. There’s nothing. This was nothing.”
He’d promised her honesty. Always.
He had broken his promise.
She flinched, her shoulders hunching. But she kept walking, didn’t stop. He stood in the middle of the living room, waiting.
When she reemerged she was dressed, her purse slung over her shoulder.
“Will you still be working on the Paris exhibition, or will I need to contract someone else?”
She looked at him, blue eyes hard. “I don’t really think it’s fair for me to lose my lover and my job on the same day. Plus, I’m good at my job. The best, remember?”
“You’ll have your job, any job in my company, as long as you want, Madeline.” That he could give her.
She nodded slowly. “Quite the consolation prize. Goodbye, Aleksei.”
“Goodbye, Maddy.” Her name stuck in his throat, difficult to force it past the lump that had settled there.
She walked past him to the door, where she stopped but didn’t turn.
“You know, Aleksei, I finally realized something about myself yesterday. I’ve been living my life in fear. I let it control what I did, what I didn’t do. I let it keep me from so much as going on a date with a man for five years. I don’t have room for it anymore. There’s no room for fear anymore. Love pushed it away. I hope someday there’s a woman who can do the same for you. I know you loved your wife. I know you’ll never stop loving her, and I think that’s okay. But I hope someday you can let go so that you can move forward.”
She opened the door and slipped out into the hallway, shutting the door behind her with a final-sounding click.
Maddy was gone. He’d done what he’d had to.
He waited for the years of hard-won emotionlessness to rescue him from the pain in his body, to rescue him from the dull ache in his head and his heart. From the shattering sensation that was splintering through him.
There was no relief. There was only a sense of bitter loss, a flow of agony that he couldn’t stop.
CHAPTER TWELVE
ALEKSEI looked at the bottle of Scotch on his coffee table. He hadn’t touched the stuff in five years. Not since the very worst of his grief had passed. Not since he’d realized he wasn’t accomplishing anything by drinking his pain away.
He was considering it now. Very seriously.
He couldn’t lie to himself and pretend he felt nothing for Maddy, not when the agony of losing her was as acute as it might have been if he’d lost her to death. No, not so bad as that. At least she was still here. At least she had a chance at happiness. With a man who could truly make her happy, give her all she deserved unreservedly.
Although the thought of it made him want to strangle the other man, made rage and pain, so severe it felt beyond his control, pour through him.
Maddy was gone. Sleepless nights were back. He had barely slept at all since she’d walked out of his apartment. Out of his bed and his life.
He reached for the short length of the partially completed necklace that was sitting on the coffee table and ran his fingers over the delicate chain. It had always represented his wife’s life to him. Bea
utiful, but far too short. Incomplete.
Somehow, over the years, it had come to represent his own.
He had continued on. He had made money, found professional success. But his personal life, who he was, had ended.
He’d thought to protect Maddy by sending her away. The simple fact was he’d been protecting himself. Because he was a coward.
He had loved once. Had loved Paulina as a man should love a wife. Losing her had been devastating. It had stripped him of purpose, and he’d had to claw his way out of the pit it had left him in. Find meaning again.
And yet he suspected he hadn’t actually found it. He had found stopgaps, things to fill the void temporarily. Bandages that had concealed wounds instead of healing them. But it had been nothing more than vanity. He had more money than one man could spend, more power than most men could exhaust, more fame than he had ever wanted. And yet it was all worthless. Meaningless. He had nothing of value.
He looked at the necklace again and it was Madeline’s face he saw.
Maddy, who called up feelings in him he’d thought long buried, who called up feelings deeper than any he’d ever experienced. Maddy, who had his heart.
And if he was going to be the man for her, he had to let go of fear. He had to move on. He tightened his hold on the necklace and pushed the Scotch away.
Everything was going perfectly at the exhibition. Maddy was standing on the balcony, overlooking the ballroom, watching couples dance to the music.
She smiled wistfully, thinking of the night she’d danced with Aleksei. It seemed like a lifetime ago now. Her memories had a fuzzy edge to them, as though all of it might have been a dream.
If only her pain had the same fuzzy edges as her memories. But it didn’t. She missed him so much sometimes she could barely breathe. Over the course of the past week she’d wondered—more than once—if she’d made a mistake.
Being strong and standing on principle, taking all she deserved, was all well and good in theory. It was kind of lonely in reality.