I place her gently in the middle of my bed. Biting her lower lip, she looks away as I peel her pants and underwear off. I don’t care if she’s uncomfortable, as long as she lets me check her out.
I suck in a breath. There’s a dark reddish blossom on her left hip that looks like a lurid flower. It’s the size of an ostrich egg and is going to deepen into black and purple tomorrow.
“Damn.”
“It’s really not that bad.” Her voice is light, but shaky.
“You should’ve said something to the doctor. They would’ve given you something.”
“Ryder, no. No painkillers. Nothing that’s going to risk the baby.”
I get that, I do. Still, I’ll be lying if I said I’m okay with this.
“Don’t move.” I point a finger at the center of her chest to make sure she understands I’m serious.
She pulls her lips in, but stays put. I open the top drawer of my dresser and rummage around. There it is. A glass jar the color of jade. I pull it out with a grim smile.
“What’s that?” Paige asks, her gaze curious but wary.
“Ointment. I got it in Hong Kong when I pulled a muscle.”
“Let me guess. A stunt that you insisted on doing yourself?”
“Yup. And then they wouldn’t let me do any of the other action sequences, so we had to have a stuntman come in. But this stuff is great. Got me back to normal in no time.”
I open the jar and take out a dollop of the ointment on two fingers.
Paige wraps a hand around my wrist. “Is that stuff safe for pregnant women?”
“Yes.”
She narrows her eyes. “How do you know?”
“Because it says so on the jar.” I show her the label.
She takes her time reading it, but finally relaxes. “Okay.”
The ointment is thick and gooey, but as I spread it over her flesh, it starts to thin. I massage it into her muscles. The key is making sure that it’s fully absorbed. “I don’t know what you think about me, Paige, but I’ll never do anything to hurt you or your baby.” Even if you betray me. I learned my lesson when I abandoned Lauren in Mexico. Even though I didn’t mean for anything bad to happen, she still ended up dead because of my decision.
Paige leans forward until her forehead rests against mine. “Ryder…”
Her sweet breath fans against my skin. It tickles, but I welcome the sensation. When we’re like this, it’s like all the shit in the last forty-eight hours never happened.
I push away all the bitter memories and focus on Paige. Her eyes are closed, and she keeps dragging her teeth across her lower lip until it’s red, wet and swollen.
My fingertips touch her lower belly. “You little rascal,” I whisper. “You gave us quite a scare.”
Her lashes are wet when she opens her eyes. When she breathes out my name again, it’s like there’s an invisible rope between us, and some unseen force is pulling me to her.
I dip my head and brush my mouth against hers. A small quiver flutters all along her skin.
I move my hand gently to her injured hip, giving it a little extra warmth, and deepen the kiss. Her lips part, and she brushes her tongue against mine tentatively. I sip at her sweet mouth, tracing her every curve, memorizing the shape and texture and fleshiness of her lips. A soft moan tears from her throat, and I press harder against her, making her swallow the sound.
Fire starts in my lions and spreads throughout my body. My blood sizzles as heat tightens my skin. I want her. And it’s something beyond physical relief that I crave. I want her pleasure. I want her on her back, her legs spread, and screaming my name as I bury my cock deep inside her and pound into her over and over and over again, until she can’t remember what it’s like to be without my dick inside—
Suddenly, she lets out a sharp cry, and my eyes snap open immediately.
“That hurts.”
My hand has tightened on her injured hip without my realizing. Cursing, I snatch it away. What the hell was I thinking? Sex is the last thing she needs right now.
I stand up and shove my fingers into my hair. Having intercourse—or any kind of sex really—is probably the stupidest idea I could have had, given what happened earlier. I don’t know anything about miscarriage risks, but I’m pretty sure inducing muscular contractions isn’t on the list of recommended activities.
“Sorry,” I say. “Bad idea.”
“It’s not your fault. We both got a little bit carried away.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s okay. One of us needs to keep our cool.”
She looks at me for a long time, then nods. “You’re right. We should’ve kept our cool.” She pulls her clothes up, wincing slightly as the hip bruise is covered again. She licks her lips, and her throat works. Her gaze darts from my face to her knee and back to my face.
The best thing to do would be to just take her to her room and end the evening now. But I know it’s too late.
And then they come, those four dreaded words:
“We need to talk.”
* * *
Paige
I can tell Ryder is looking for some graceful way to close the evening. But everything has just gotten to be too much. I can’t pretend like everything is fine, head back to my room, shower and go to bed.
“Honestly, we should have talked in the morning when you first approached me,” I add.
He merely looks at me, resting his hip against the dresser. Then he finally says, “Okay. Go ahead.”
I lick my lips and voice the words I thought about during my drive back to his Beverly Hills mansion. “We should…” My throat closes up, and I can’t say the next words. His taste still lingers on my lips, and I can still feel the imprint of his hand on my left hip. If I had a super power, I would go back in time and take Shaun’s threat more seriously. But it’s too late to wish for that now.
I drag in a deep breath and try again, because this is important. “We should quit now if you don’t trust me. Given your history with Lauren, I don’t think it would be good for you to be with a woman you suspect is using you for fame and fortune.” I stop, suddenly uncertain. It sounded so much better in my head.
He’s turned rigid. “It’s only for a year.”
The quiet, flat response tells me more than yelling and screaming would have. “Ryder. The biggest reason I was okay with this fake marriage was the fact that you trusted me. I thought I was doing it for my baby, but now I realize I wasn’t.”
“How did you come to that conclusion?”
“I thought about why I said okay. I could’ve found someone else who wouldn’t have complicated my life the way you will.”
He sighs but doesn’t speak.
I forge on because this is important and he has to understand. “I can’t be with a man who doesn’t trust me. That’s my minimum requirement. I don’t expect love in an arrangement like this, but I deserve respect. And how can you have respect without trust?”
“You’re right. You can’t.” He taps the edge of the dresser with a finger. “But shouldn’t you earn that trust?”
“I think four years is plenty of time. And sometimes it’s about a choice. You can choose to trust someone or not.”