Page 76 of Falling for Mr. Ruthless
Words I've heard before. Words that preceded abandonment, silence, absence.
Words I want—desperately and against all better judgment—to believe this time.
Night falls like a curtain, sudden and complete, Manhattan lights replacing fading sunlight without interruption. Jaden collapses into bed without protest, exhausted from hours at the park, from family dinner, from the emotional marathon of having both parents fully present for an entire weekend.
I stand in his doorway, watching his chest rise and fall in the rhythm of deep sleep, marveling at his resilience, his capacity for joy, his unquestioning acceptance of this temporary arrangement as if it's everything he's ever wanted.
Everything I've refused to admit I might still want too.
"He's out cold," Jakob's voice, close behind me, warm breath stirring the hair at my nape. "Didn't even make it through the first chapter."
"Too much excitement," I murmur, not turning, not yet ready to face the man whose scent surrounds me, whose presence alters the very air pressure in the room. "He'll sleep well tonight."
"And you?" The question low, intimate, loaded with meaning beyond its simplicity. "Will you sleep well tonight?"
Now I turn, needing to see his face. To read intention in his eyes. To gauge whether this is proposition or genuine concern—or some combination unique to the uncharted territory we've entered.
He stands closer than expected, body heat reaching me even before I complete the turn. His expression holds none of the calculation I associate with business Jakob, none of the compartmentalized distance I remember from the end of our marriage. Just open want—and something softer, more vulnerable—that makes my chest tight with reciprocal feeling.
"Depends," I say, voice steadier than the pulse that quickens beneath my skin.
"On?" His hand lifts, fingers trailing along my collarbone, the touch light enough to deny if challenged, substantial enough to send heat pooling low in my stomach.
"On whether I get any sleep at all." The words emerge bolder than intended, invitation explicit in a way I rarely allow myself to be. In a way that feels like stepping off a cliff, trusting forces I can't control to determine whether I fly or fall.
His pupils dilate, black consuming blue until only a thin ring of color remains. His hand slides from my collarbone to my nape, fingers threading into my hair with careful restraint that vibrates with the effort it costs him.
"That can be arranged," he says, voice dropping to a register that resonates in places words can't reach.
I step back from Jaden's doorway, pulling the door closed. Creating distance between parental responsibility and what happens next. Between the family moments of the day and the adult reunion the night promises.
Jakob follows my movement, maintaining proximity without crowding, giving me space to retreat if I choose. The consideration explicit, intentional, different from the entitled assumption of access I remember from our marriage.
I don't retreat. Don't move toward my guest room. Don't maintain the fiction that I'll sleep anywhere but beside him tonight.
Instead, I reach for his hand, lacing our fingers together in a gesture more intimate than it should be, given what we've already shared. Given the history written on our bodies. The knowledge we carry of each other's pleasure. The muscle memory that outlasted legal dissolution.
"Your room or mine?" I ask, the question perfunctory. We both know the answer.
"Mine." The word carries weight beyond its brevity—claiming, inviting, promising.
I nod once, letting him lead me down the hallway, past the guest room where my clothes remain but I haven't slept. Toward the master suite that was once ours, then his alone, now temporarily shared in this strange liminal space between separation and reunion.
The door closes behind us with a softclickthat sounds like decision. Like boundary. Like privacy finally achieved after hours of performing parenthood, of maintaining appropriate distances, of containing the current that's flowed between us since waking in the same bed this morning.
For a heartbeat, we stand motionless, suspended between intention and action, between thought and surrender. Then he moves toward me, eliminating distance with deliberate steps that give me time to reconsider.
I don't move. Don't step back. Don't remind myself of all the reasons this is temporary, conditional, bound to end when the threat that brought us together resolves.
Instead, I meet him halfway, hands finding his chest, feeling the steady thunder of his heart beneath my palms. The physical evidence of desire I still ignite in him, even after everything we've been to each other. Everything we've done to each other.
"Chanel."
I don't respond with words. Instead, I rise on tiptoes, mouth finding his with precision born of practice and hunger and the bone-deep knowledge of what fits, what works, what satisfies.
He responds immediately, arms circling my waist, pulling me against the hard planes of his body with an urgency that matches my own. His tongue traces the seam of my lips, seeking entrance I readily grant. The taste of him familiar and foreign simultaneously. Mint and male, andJakobthat no amount of time or distance has erased from my memory.
My hands move restlessly across his shoulders, his chest, his abdomen—relearning contours that have hardened in our time apart. I tug at his shirt with impatient fingers, needing skin contact. Needing to eliminate barriers. Needing to reclaim what was once mine by right and ritual and mutual surrender.
