His for the Taking - By Ann Major Page 0,37
lot to everybody in Yella.”
“Other people would side with your mother, her friends, everyone in Yella, even Adam…. They’d make me feel like I used to feel. I want to forget the past—all of it.”
“We don’t have to live here. And you’re wrong about Adam. He and I don’t agree on a lot of things, but he likes you. When he told me how beautiful and classy you were, nothing could stop me from racing back to Yella.”
“Really?”
“I was irresponsible as hell to leave my oil well. I came back solely to see you.” He held her tightly. “I’m sorry about the past,” he whispered.
Very gently, he leaned down and laved the back of her ear with his tongue, causing her to flush beguilingly.
“Stop! I can’t think when you do that,” she whispered, her voice soft and breathy. “And I have to think.”
“No. You’ve been doing too much thinking. Feelings count, too, you know. I think we fell into bed last night because we both wanted each other so badly we couldn’t resist.”
“In my life, lust has been a destroyer.”
Slowly his fingers tucked her hair behind her ear. “Okay. I’ll admit to a tad of lust, but not to the destroying kind. I never got over you, Maddie Gray. Because I cared about you.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“Only because, after what you’ve been through, you’re too afraid. I don’t blame you. But if you’d only give me another chance—”
“You’re just lonely…because of Lizzie.”
“I was hellishly lonely after you left…even after I married Lizzie.”
“You haven’t had time to think this through. Don’t you see that it would never work?” She brushed at her throat with her fingertips as if suddenly she was too hot. When she tried to remove his hand, he wove his fingers through hers and brought her knuckles against his warm lips, his gentle kisses causing her to shudder.
“We’ll have to find a way to make it work,” he said.
When she glanced up at him, her beautiful eyes were aglow with fear and a wild, desperate hope.
“Let me go!” she begged.
Lowering his head so fast she couldn’t dodge his lips, he claimed the exquisite softness of her mouth. When his tongue slid inside, she rasped in a breath.
“You have to break up with Greg,” Cole muttered hoarsely. “You have to know that such a marriage wouldn’t stand a chance when it’s me you really want…in bed anyway.”
“I can’t care about that.”
“You must, if you marry him wanting me. I could tell you a thing or two about marrying for the wrong reasons. About trying to make the wrong relationship work.”
“Your argument doesn’t stand. You and I would be marrying for the wrong reasons. I had this perfect plan….”
“You don’t think I had a few plans myself? Last night blew all our plans to bits.”
“I won’t be bullied into a loveless marriage.”
“Put like that, my proposal stinks. But your assessment is inaccurate. We’d be marrying for love—for the mutual love of our son.”
“You don’t know him.”
“He’s mine. I want him to be legitimate. I’d think that would matter to you since your mother didn’t marry your father and people looked down on you for it.”
“Oh… You do play dirty.” She stared at him, aghast.
“When I have to. It’s very simple. Go back to Austin. Tell Greg about me. Say you’re confused, that you need time. In the meantime, introduce me to Noah as a good friend of yours, so we can start preparing him to accept me as your husband and his father. Then slowly we’ll sort this out…together.”
“No.”
“I want to give Noah a stable life,” he said smoothly.
“Do you think I don’t want that?”
“Good. We agree on the fundamentals. We both want what’s best for our son, and we both want each other.”
“You don’t love me.”
“You don’t love me either, but I’m not whining about it. I’m asking you to marry me.”
“You’re impossible…arrogant…entitled…”
He smiled as he waited for her to finish cataloging his many faults.
“But I want to marry you. I want to take care of you. I want to make up for six years of neglecting you and my son. Surely that makes up for two or three of my sins.”
“You don’t love me,” she repeated.
Maybe not, but no way was he letting her go again, not after last night. For better or worse, she was his. Just like Noah was his. She just didn’t know it yet.
He didn’t like it that she’d intended to keep him from ever finding out about Noah, and he didn’t like that