Page 52 of Vengeful Seduction
“I’m yours,” I told him, panting, as soon as I could form words again. “I’m yours, David, always and forever. Until the end of time.”
Tangled up in each other, arms firmly around each other with both of us considerably more sated, we drifted off into a deep, satisfying sleep.
I would be his, forever and then some.
Chapter 15
David
A few months passed. I knew Brent was chomping at the bit. I knew he didn’t understand why it was all taking so long, but I knew it was the right thing to do. Kaye needed to settle into the new marriage—to become a little bit more complacent about it.
I kept myself a bit distant from her. Not too much. Not enough to allow her to accuse me of anything. Just enough to shake her loose from me, hopefully. Just enough so that, when the time came, she would fall right into Brent’s arms.
Because it was still the plan. I hadn’t given it up. Sometimes I slipped up and almost forgot the main point of the whole thing. Sometimes I let myself enjoy her company and her willing presence in my bed.
It was probably better that I did, though. If she found me moody and unpredictable, she would be more likely to fall for Brent, who could—in her mind—offer her stability.
It made me sick to think about her falling for Brent. He was just going to break her heart. I tried not to think about it at all, but it came back into my mind time after time.
So it was easier to mostly avoid her, to pick little fights, and to push her away. Though it would be easier still if she would fight back, but she never did.
I was avoiding her the day she came to me, her expression both nervous and determined. She opened the door to my office, where I was working, and the look on her face robbed me of the snarky comment I would probably have made.
She knew better than to bother me while I was working. Yet she was, and I found I couldn’t speak—I couldn’t tell her off. Not when she was looking at me the way she was.
“What is it?” I finally managed, and she seated herself across the desk from me, giving me the most plaintive look I’d ever seen from another human being. She inclined herself toward me, her big green eyes fixed firmly on my face.
“I want to talk to you,” she murmured, and for a moment I was actually afraid she wanted to leave me. Maybe she’d figured out what Brent and I were doing. My guilty conscience gnawed at me as I stared at her, trying to read her face.
Surely she wasn’t leaving me. She loved me. We could work this out.
“What is it?” I asked, my tongue feeling numb and my mouth dry. I tried to sound nonchalant, but wasn’t sure it came off particularly well.
If she did leave, would she be considered the party at fault? Would I get everything, without even having to do the work to make her cheat on me?
The thought was there, but was overwhelmed by a deeper, more urgent, more primal one.
Don’t leave me.
“I want to start a family, David,” Kaye murmured, and I stared at her as pieces of the argument I’d been crafting started to fall down around my ears, unneeded. Whatever I had expected, it definitely hadn’t been those words, and I looked at her, trying to make it all make sense.
“A family?” I made my shocked mouth form the words, then shook my head. I definitely hadn’t thought through a good response ahead of time to such a statement, and I stared at her a bit stupidly as she looked imploringly back at me.
“I want a baby,” she told me, and one of her hands rested on her flat stomach, stroking the starched white shirt that was neatly tucked into the waistline of a black skirt. The movement of her hand was faintly erotic to me in ways I didn’t understand.
I took a deep breath and shook my head. Better to nip this in the bud right here and now, to keep it from going any further.
“Kaye, we’ve only been married a few months,” I pointed out. “It’s far too soon. We should wait a year, or maybe two, so we’re both ready. A baby isn’t a decision to rush into.”
I thought it all sounded very reasonable, but Kaye looked stubborn. It wasn’t something she did very often—only when she really wanted something—and I knew then I was in for a rough ride. She had really dug in her heels about this.
“David, I want to see a little version of us—both of us. I want to know if our baby will have my eyes, or yours, or a mix of the two. I want to see what our child will look like, know how they act, and learn if they love to paint or if they have your head for finance. I want to know them.”
Her voice had gotten deeply passionate, and I felt my heart stirring inside of me. A little version of the two of us. Kaye and me mingled in a little person. The idea appealed to me. But it was, of course, absolutely out of the question.
There was absolutely no way I was going to bring a baby into a fake marriage. Even I wasn’t cruel enough to do something so heinous. A child would be an innocent and would be deeply hurt by the inevitable fallout between me and Kaye.
“I don’t want a baby. Not yet.” My voice was very firm, and I looked at her, keeping my eyes hard and my gaze uncompromising. “You’re going to have to wait. We’ll do it when we both think it’s right.”
