Page 123 of Handsome Devil
“I won’t touch you if you don’t want me to,” I told her.
“I know. We already established that.”
“You trust me?”
She sighed. “That’s a very blanket concept, Dane. No, I don’t trust you. But I do trust you with certain things.”
“Like what?”
“Like honoring all the ground rules of our agreement. Because you know if you don’t, I’ll leave you. And you’ll have to start over, finding someone else to marry you and help you save your precious reputation with your family in time for your birthday.”
We stared at each other for a long moment. She was right.
She also knew, though, didn’t she, that I could find someone else? It wouldn’t exactly be an impossible feat to find another woman willing to marry me. Though it might take a little time to find someone suitable who I could also trust enough to pull this off.
Someone who had as big a stake in this as I did.
She knew it as well as I did: she had a stake in this, too. Not just money or status or whatever else another woman might be seeking out of an arrangement like this. This was personal for her, which infused it with a whole other value. This fell apart, she lost any chance of ever owning that agency.
That was why she said yes in the first place.
She wanted this as much as I did.
I still had no idea, though, if she’d ever want me in her bed.
“You can trust me to honor the ground rules,” I said.
“Good. You can trust me, too.”
“I know I can, or I wouldn’t be here.”
“Great.”
“Good.”
We stared at each other.
“I’m going up,” I told her.
“Okay.”
When she clearly had nothing more to say to me, I started to head up the stairs. But then I stopped. I rubbed a hand over my face.
I turned and looked down at her, standing there so guarded, her arms crossed. She’d married me on the beach today with a smile on her face. A fake smile. And now she barely wanted to look me in the eye.
She definitely did not trust me.
I really didn’t want to sleep next to a woman who didn’t trust me enough to know she was safe. She could hate me all she wanted. Her prerogative. But I didn’t want her thinking I was planning to play her at every turn. Like manipulate her into getting everything I wanted. Including getting her to have sex with me.
That wasn’t why I married her.
If shewantedto hop onto my dick and go for a ride, I was hardly going to stop her. I’d fuck her right now, if she wanted to.
But I wasn’t going to try to manipulate her into spreading her legs for me.
Did she really think I was that kind of devil?
Maybe.
