The Price of Inertia (The Seven Sins #4) - Lily Zante Page 0,139

talk show hosts and pretending to be at ease when I’m clearly out of my comfort zone.

I'm only truly at ease when I'm in my home, my castle, a place of comfort—with Mari by my side. Everything that was tough for me before is now bearable because of her.

The Unseen Face became an instant bestseller and from that point on everything turned crazy. The runaway success of the book was something I was unprepared for. Usually, my books hit the bestseller charts and then drop back down after a few months. This one has stayed high up in the charts and it’s still riding high even now.

James Garvey, eat your heart out.

Readers have said this book was different, that it wasn't just all horror and that it had a sense of redemption. Perhaps because The Morbid trilogy loosely mirrored my own life.

The Unseen Face was written during a time when I had finally grasped at the possibility of laying my ghosts to rest. Because Mari had given me the happier future I had never dreamed of and a sense of belonging I hadn’t ever really had.

“I'm not in the mood for writing,” I say, eyeing her side profile as she taps away at the keyboard.

“Your daily word count,” she says, in a singsong voice. “You need to meet it.”

“If you're going to parade around in a bikini all day, we might need to revise and lower my goals.”

She turns and fixes me with a serious stare. “I like to swim laps in between working, but if it's causing problems with your concentration, I can change into something else.”

Seeing my expression sour, she gets up and walks over to me.

I move my laptop to the side and let her climb onto me, straddling me.

“No need to change,” I tell her, snaking my hands around her waist. “I'll find my motivation, don't you worry.”

“That's better,” she whispers, splaying her hands on my naked chest. She's good at keeping me in check. It doesn't help that she's sitting on me, or that I'm in my swim trunks. My excitement throbs and pokes her, tellingly. She lowers her head to my chest then drops tiny kisses all over. This isn’t going to help me one bit.

“Did you want me to reach my goals for the day?” I ask her, because at this rate, it’s just not going to happen.

“Yes.” She drops a kiss on my lips, while her soft fingers skim all over my arms and chest. She loves the feel of me, of my muscles, and my tautness. My workouts and exercise are more for her, than for me. “We’ve gone through your deadlines and your timetable. You know what you have to do.” As if to confuse the heck out of me, she kisses me deeply, her sweet mouth melting into mine and giving me other, different ideas.

My arousal presses against her. I only have to pull the string of her bikini and it will begin—another hot sultry evening that lasts for hours. There will be no more words written today. “Can’t it wait, until after?”

“No,” she says, her expression schoolteacherly. “You're getting nothing until you meet your targets.”

By targets she doesn't only mean the words, but the laps I have to take in the pool, and the exercises she makes me do. The push-ups and jumping rope and some other cardio moves she lined up for me.

She's my Jamie, Trevor and Rob all rolled into one.

I can't imagine life without her, and I hope I never will. I grab her hand, the sparkling engagement ring flashes in the sunlight streaming in. I push up my thighs, poking her with the signs of my arousal.

She squirms. “Ward, you can poke me all you want, but nothing happens until you finish everything.”

My plummeting disappointment is soon replaced by new energy. Now I will be forced to get everything done super, super fast—which is probably why she’s sitting on my lap in the first place, dangling the carrot of her sexy, sensual body in front of me.

My gaze takes in her face, rounded and full now that all the worry has been vanquished. I stare at her, hoping to entice her into going easy on me today, but I know it won’t work. It never does.

There’s no danger of me slipping into an abyss with her around. Mari keeps me in check.

I don't need beautiful, exotic locations to be happy. For me, Mari is my own happy place. She makes sure I never hit