Blood fizzed through her body and she dragged in an extra breath. Memories of the way he’d touched and kissed her just one long week ago soaked through her.
“Welcome home,” he said as he took the last stair. “My mother called and said she won’t need me for another hour. She’s still potting herbs to bring. I could’ve made it to the airport if I’d known.”
Without thinking, Ruby stepped forward, then back. Should she hug him? Kiss him on the cheek? Her stomach swooped. He was about to be her husband, for God’s sake, and she didn’t know how to react to him.
Her uncertainty was squashed as he bent down and picked up her suitcase and carry-on bag before turning to go back up the stairs again. “Good flight?” He spoke over his shoulder, and the lingering scent of soap and Christo invaded her senses.
“Fine, thanks.” She took a long, controlled breath, ignoring the unexpected disappointment at his casual response. Roommates. That’s what they were. Acquaintances who shared the same living environment. They would make this work, because it was the best thing for her baby.
“Is there someone here?” She moved to the stairs. “The car out front?”
“I bought that for you,” he said casually. “You can’t live in Auckland without a car. The keys are in the wooden bowl by the front door.”
Her hand flew to her mouth. She began to speak but he cut her off. “When my mother does arrive, I’d like to give her my full attention.”
“Of course. She’ll be looking forward to settling back in, I’m sure.”
Christo nodded. “I wanted her to move in earlier, but she said she wouldn’t be comfortable here without you.” He continued up the stairs. “You’ll be tired from the flight. Now’s a good time to show you our new sleeping arrangements.”
Ruby stopped with one foot on the bottom stair, the other still firmly planted on the floor. “Sleeping arrangements?” The shiny banister heated beneath her grip.
Christo kept climbing the stairs without looking back. “What’s in this bag?” he asked. “It’s making noises.”
“Jewelry equipment, crystals, and beads,” she said as her mouth dried. “You’ve made changes to the bedrooms? Without discussing it with me?” She climbed, one hand pressed to her chest.
“I had one of my builders renovate, but I only changed one bedroom. I’m sure you’ll like it. I employed Auckland’s finest young designer, as her taste is similar to yours.”
He’d reached the master bedroom, the room she’d stayed in when she first came back and she caught a breath as he held the door open.
“You’ve made changes to my mother’s room?” Her heart thumped as she stepped inside and her shoulder bag slid to the floor. It was completely different. Smaller somehow, but far more luxurious. She suppressed a gasp.
“Our room now. The master bedroom.” He deposited her suitcase on the king-size bed. “I’ve moved some of my things into the smaller of the two closets.” He stood relaxed, hands low on his hips. “Professional packers have catalogued and stored all your mother’s things so you can go through them at your leisure. Her jewelry is in the new safe.”
Her hand went to her mouth as she scanned the room. The whole style had changed. What had once been a plain, motherly bedroom was now a place of opulence, with everything made bigger. Double everything. Two easy chairs, two desks, two sets of drawers.
In an unguarded moment she imagined this room at night, the twin bedside lamps throwing a sultry light across the huge bed and its luxurious coverlet. Of Christo lying beside her, spent from a long night of lovemaking. Then her throat dried. He’d gone back on that part of the deal and expected to sleep with her.
“You can’t believe that I’d share a bed with you?” Heat rose quickly from her neck to her face. “We’ve had this conversation and I explained that sex is not negotiable. What is it about me that makes you think I’ll follow even one of your orders?”
He lifted his chin and gave her an easy smile. “My mother’s moving in today. I won’t have her seeing us in separate rooms. She’d worry that there were problems between us.”
She took a step backward. “We won’t share a bed. I won’t sleep with you, Christo.”
He leaned an elbow on the enormous bureau, and his mouth lifted, eyes sweeping the length of her body. “So you’ve said.”
She shook her head. “You agreed, and now you’re going back on it. You haven’t respected any of my wishes.”
“I said this was our bedroom, Ruby. I didn’t say anything about sleeping together in it.” He walked over to the bathroom door. “I’ve had this whole wall moved and built another room behind the bathroom. When my mother’s retired for the evening, I’ll be sleeping there.”
While he waited, Ruby crossed the room, her mouth dry. As he held the bathroom door open, she looked into the room beyond. It was furnished in blues and grays. A chair covered in silver fabric sat at a steel desk. This was a man’s room. Doors opened to a new balcony.
Part of her breathed easier.
“This is the only access to the smaller room. Mother will never even know it exists.”
Sharing a bathroom? An image of Christo, freshly showered, a towel slung low on his hips, caused a shiver to race across her neck, and she swallowed. How could that end in anything but trouble? “I trust there’s a lock?”
The corner of his mouth hitched. “Bit difficult, considering there’s no other entrance to the room. I wouldn’t want you to mistakenly lock me in.”
Her hands fluttered to her throat. “This—” is unbearable “—isn’t what I’d imagined. Not what I agreed to.”
“What had you imagined? That I’d live out in the servant’s quarters as I’d done before? We’ll be husband and wife, Ruby. Adults. I’m sure there are many couples the world over who pretend to be sleeping together but who have separate bedrooms.”
She crossed her arms under her breasts. “I’ll agree to this on one condition.”
He said nothing, just held her steady gaze with his.
“We have a separate entranceway built for the new room, and in the meantime I’ll take the smaller of the two.”
He blinked slowly. “You’re worried that I might walk in on you?”
Yes. “I’d be happier in the smaller room.”
He sauntered closer, more of his heat soaking through her at every step. He might be saying one thing, but more than instinct said he meant another. For one long moment he looked deep in her eyes, then nodded and left the room.
…
Hell, it was hot.
Christo threw off the sheet that had been stuck to his body and swung his legs over the side of the bed. As he scrubbed a hand through his hair, he took a quick look at his phone. 12:30 a.m. One of those Auckland nights where the darkness beat with heated air. Every breath was a hot, damp effort. Sleep was elusive.
He walked to the double doors leading onto his balcony, threw them open, and took a lung-full of subtropical night air. He’d waited a decent length of time before coming to bed so that Ruby would be settled into her new room. The only image he’d had of her since was her lying in her own bed only meters from where he stood, little more than a flimsy nightgown separating her from cool sheets.
Throat dry, he padded into his side of the bathroom and in the blue light thrown from the stained glass window, he found a water glass.
Would there be a nightgown? He turned on the tap and filled the glass. Or would she have thrown any garment off to lie naked between the linen, her hair a messy halo, a slim hand resting on the curve of her belly? As blood pounded in his veins, he turned his face to her door, and his stomach clenched. It was open.
Surely after her defensiveness this afternoon she wouldn’t have left it open intentionally. She’d made it clear she wanted to keep her distance.
He should close it. The soles of his feet stuck to the sleek tile floor as he walked across the room and placed a hand on the doorknob.
Was she okay? Maybe the new air-conditioning unit wa
sn’t working. Carefully he pushed the door open and waited while his eyes adjusted to the dim interior. What he saw made his stomach churn. Her bed was empty, sheets flung off, the curtains across her balcony doors open to the night.
Splaying his palm across the wall, he reached with searching fingers until he found the switch and flicked the light on. She wasn’t there. In three short strides he’d made it to her balcony to discover Ruby was nowhere to be seen.
She’d definitely been in here when he came to bed. There had been water on the counter top in the bathroom. A drop of sweetly scented moisturizer on a towel. To leave her room completely she must’ve come back through his room while he was sleeping.
An unbidden image of her watching him in sleep coursed through his body. He had to find her.
He threw on a cotton robe and searched the entire house. His mother was fast asleep in her quarters, all the doors were locked, and Ruby’s car was in the driveway.
The swimming pool. Of course. His mind swung back to the first day he’d seen her in that white bikini, limbs long and supple. He let himself out the side doors and was soon standing on the pool deck—the slight movement in the water and the damp footprints on the dry wood decking gave her away.
He followed the footprint trail to the summerhouse and opened the door. “Ruby?”
“Christo!”
Standing in a pool of light she was covered in nothing but a white towel, her cheeks pink, mouth open in surprise. Her hair, which had been tied up so often lately, flowed damp and free about her shoulders. A wet bikini lay in a heap on the floor. His pulse spiked.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I couldn’t find you.” He ordered his vision to move from the curve of her collarbone to the delicate fingers gripping the towel.
With one hand she pulled the towel higher toward her neck. “The heat…I couldn’t sleep.”
He took a step forward and let the door close behind him. “You’re not comfortable in the room?”
“It’s fine.” The pulse at the base of her throat was rapid. “When I have my own entrance it’ll be better.”
He stepped closer. “You must’ve been very quiet when you walked through.”
She lowered her lashes. “I didn’t want to wake you.” Taking up another towel she began drying her hair.
He took a step back toward the door. She was fine. No need to stay. But something kept his feet rooted to the floor as his gaze moved across the room. Somewhere there must be a window open, as he could smell something sweet from the garden beyond.
“I remember this place,” he said. It was where she’d made her jewelry. Where her father had found them, bodies entwined. A deep, dark ache arose as that scene came to mind in vivid detail. “Do you remember the last time we were here?”
Ruby stopped, her hair tumbling over one shoulder as she lifted her chin. Silence filled the room, and each one of his nerves pounded with the knowledge of what she’d be thinking about right now. The intensity, the power, and the perfection when they’d come together that first and last time.
“I remember the night my father found us, Christo.” She looked him directly in the eye, her cheeks flushed. “It was a defining moment in my life.”
…
Something moved across Christo’s face as his eyebrow lifted. Surprise? Curiosity? She wasn’t sure.
“A defining moment?”
“Of course.” Her heart drummed against her breastbone. She twisted the smaller towel into a turban on her head and crossed her arms, suddenly feeling that more than her body was exposed. “That was the day my world changed.”
“Because you’d lost your virginity, you’d succeeded in shocking your father, and were rid of me in one night?”
She drew her tongue across dry lips. Maybe it was time to get all of this out in the open. They would be married tomorrow, and if they had any chance of making this crazy arrangement work, the future needed to be about looking forward, not avoiding the past that had defined their relationship until now.
“That night,” she began, but had to swallow hard to make her voice clear. “That night, Christo, I lost you, and I lost the respect of my father. I was so hurt and angry at you that I wanted you to hurt, too. And it was from those events that I found out the truth about my mother. That night was the catalyst for me to move out of home and to start my career.”
He leaned on the doorframe, his gaze dark and sexy. “But you said you’d slept with me to shock your father. Were you lying then or are you lying now? It’s one of the two, or maybe both. It’s difficult to tell with you.”
Despite the cool swim earlier, a new heat rose inside her. A heat that she needed to douse before it overtook all sense and reason. She thought back to her arrival today, to how relaxed and nonchalant Christo had been. Roommates. That’s all they’d ever be. “I need to get some sleep,” she said. “I’m going back to bed.”
He pushed off the frame and for a moment, the only sound was the chorus of cicadas calling in from the dark outside. Without Christo moving a muscle, she could feel his presence dominating the room, the power of his gaze searching every part of her body. If she could leave now they’d be married tomorrow and both have what they wanted. But the pull of him was growing ever stronger.
“It wasn’t all bad, was it, Ruby? You and me?” He took a step toward her, his black eyes shining in the dim light of the lamp.
She drew in a quick breath to steady the nerves dancing in her stomach. “Some of it was very memorable,” she managed.
He was within touching distance, and she couldn’t drag her gaze from the breadth of his chest beneath the cotton robe.
“Was it this that was memorable?” He grazed a finger down her cheek and she swallowed. “Or maybe this.” He stepped forward, bent down, and brushed his lips across hers.
Slowly she shook her head, despite her body aching for him to touch her again.
“Perhaps this.” He ran his hand down her neck and stopped where her breast swelled beneath the towel. Every thought in Ruby’s head scrambled. Why was it that she had to stay out of Christo’s bed? What would happen if she succumbed to the seismic pull his body held for hers right now?
Her mind wouldn’t provide her with an answer.
“Ruby—” He breathed her name then pressed his warm lips once more against hers, cupping the base of her neck in his broad palm. Running his tongue along her bottom lip, he pulled her closer, his hand slipping to her shoulders, and her body caught alight.
“Christo.” As his mouth moved to graze her throat, her pulse spiked and the promise she’d made earlier demanded to be heard. “We agreed we wouldn’t do this.”
She felt his mouth form a smile against her skin. “You said you wouldn’t make love when we were married,” he murmured, his lips moving to her earlobe. “We’re not.”
He pulled back for an instant and his eyes, sinful as black molasses, searched hers.
“This doesn’t change that,” she whispered while one of his fingers trailed fire along the skin above her towel.
“It doesn’t.” Did his tone rise or fall? Was it a question or a statement?
When his lips covered hers again she didn’t care. When she succumbed to the promise of his kiss, her senses were invaded in one overwhelming minute by the taste, the smell, the feel of his strong, tight body under her searching fingers. She was melting. As her hand slipped under his cotton robe to find the solid wall of his chest, it was as if his essence had been so burned into her all those years ago, and her deepest memory had never forgotten.
But she wanted more of him, the whole of him. She wanted the overwhelming thrill of being wrapped in Christo’s arms. Her mind emptied and the only thing filling her body was the power of him and the burning to draw him deep inside her body.
The sash windows in the small room were open, curtains puffing in as the hot, moist air rolled in from the night. His breath, rasping and warm, made hers hitch. Her mind raced forward to the thought of
being under him, part of him.
He took both her hands so they were face to face. Slowly he inched her backward across the floor to the wall, his mouth getting closer to hers with every step as he dipped his face lower. Her feet light on the polished floor, she felt like she was floating and weightless.
Desperate to taste him again, she arched her neck but he stayed tantalizingly distant, teasing. Each of his fingers laced through one of hers, the edge of his mouth curved down as if his life depended on these next few moments.
With one last step backward, he pressed her into the wall and she waited for his lips to claim her. Mouth heavy with need, she swallowed in anticipation.
But his face stayed inches away, and slowly he lifted both arms above her head and pinned her, palm to palm, only the towel and his robe separating their skin. And then he looked deep in her eyes, and that look, that bone-melting look, sent a whisper directly to her soul. I want you now.
Christo was strong, confident, and certain of what he wanted, and it caused her limbs to weaken, her lips to open, and her breasts to ache.
He eased closer so that his chest was inches from hers, and her nipples peaked in readiness, the tucked in corners of the towel straining as she held a breath.
“Kiss me,” she half-begged. He leaned in and grazed her cheek with his stubble, the pleasure and pain of it shooting beats of desire across her skin. How had she survived so long without him? Without his touch? His warm breath played across her face, and she breathed deeper, wanting every part of him.
With his hands above her head, Christo claimed her mouth, and she searched the depths of his with her tongue. The taste of him was sweet as she played across his lips.
Moaning, he moved closer and pushed his knee between her legs, opening her to him, and she kissed him more hungrily in response. She writhed to get closer, but he held her fast.
“Stay where you are.” His voice was whisper close, and the command sent new chills across her skin. Raw desire tarnished the edge of his words, and the thought that he wanted her as much as she wanted him set her heart sprinting.
Contract for Marriage Page 11