to make that up to you with the postnuptial.”
“I don’t want your money, Leon.”
“I know. But it’s important to me that I do this right this time. My opening offer is a million euros per year of marriage.”
“That’s ridiculous! No,” she insisted.
“And every time you say something like that—” he tipped his head back, speaking to the starry sky “—I’m going to double it.”
She held back a reflexive protest, hesitated, then asked, “Don’t you mean halve it?”
“No.” His head came up. “Another woman might play those games, trying to up the amount, but you won’t.”
He said it confidently, as if he knew her. That seeming approval and admiration increased all the sweet tugs and pulls in her middle and provoked her into teasing him.
“What happens if I ask you to double it?”
“Done.”
“Leon! Don’t you dare.”
“You understand that when it doubles again, we’re going from two to four?” He tilted his face to the sky again, and she thought he might be laughing at her.
“Will you please be serious?” she asked, heart pounding with genuine alarm.
“I’m completely serious. I know you don’t want my money.” His humor was gone, his voice dispassionate. “You’ve said it several times already. But I need the amount to be attractive enough that you’ll leave if things get bad. Before they get bad. I need to know that I won’t spend my entire life causing damage to another human being. That Illi won’t be caught in the cross fire. I want us both to have a clean exit if things are unbearable.”
“Would it be, though?”
He picked up his head.
“Do whatever you want with your money. I don’t care, but—” She hesitated, then spoke her greatest fear aloud. “I’m afraid that if I sleep with you, I’ll fall in love with you.” Again. She didn’t admit that last bit because she’d lost her ability to breathe. She felt as though her lungs were locked, no air getting into them.
“Have you been listening? I’m not worth your love.” His jaw was clenched, his mouth tense, his biceps like smooth, tanned rocks.
“Your father was not a good person. It doesn’t mean you aren’t.”
“I need you to stay realistic, Tanja.” He spoke softly, but it didn’t leech any of the power from his words. “I am capable of charm and consideration, but I’m not capable of love. Don’t mistake my desire to be good to you for actual goodness within me. Don’t mistake my desire for you as anything more than intense sexual attraction.”
Her heart was being stretched in all directions by his words, until it was thin and threatening to unravel completely.
“But I do want you,” he said thickly, making her heart lurch and stumble into a gallop. A tic appeared in his cheek. “Other women won’t do. I want you. I want that fire we tasted last night. I made myself forget how uniquely well suited we are, but there’s no denying it. And I can’t stand the idea of not experiencing it again.”
The backs of her eyes were hot. So was her throat. Her mind was reeling, trying to reason through all the warnings he’d just voiced that he couldn’t be entrusted with her heart.
Ironically, his stark honesty made her trust him a little. Maybe she was only rationalizing what she really wanted, though. Because she wanted the fire, too. She couldn’t imagine living her life alongside him, calling herself his wife, and not allowing their combined conflagration to engulf her.
Before she let herself think it through any further, she nodded. “Okay.”
For two heartbeats, time stopped.
Then he moved like a shark. Like a sea monster. Like Poseidon himself as he scooped her up in the same motion of standing and rising from the tub. Water sluiced off them while she clung to him in shock.
He strode without ceremony into the bedroom and set her on the bed.
“We’re wet—”
He was already coming down on top of her, naked and still dripping, body burning with heat from the water. Their skin was abraded with damp friction as he pushed a knee between hers and spread her legs so he could settle between them. His mouth came down over hers, smothering her. Ravaging her. Consuming her.
They were instantly in the center of the storm, where they’d been last night, but even deeper in the maelstrom. She jammed her fingers into his hair and angled her head so the seal of their mouths deepened. His tongue thrust in and she moaned as she greeted his intrusion.
His weight was a glorious pressure