Page 36 of Their One-Night Rio Reunion
Caio said nothing and Ana’s words hung in the air. She’d meant them flippantly but now they felt heavy as their meaning struck home.
She untucked her legs and sat up straight. ‘My God—that’s it, isn’t it? You married me out of some sense of duty. To protect me. Not because I was a suitable candidate, but because you pitied me. You saw me as a potential victim, like your mother. You couldn’t save her, so you tried to save me. When you didn’t even know me.’
Ana put down her glass in agitation as it sank in. She’d always harboured a very secret hope that somehow Caio had seen something in her that had compelled him to ask her to marry him. Fresh humiliation scored at her insides. Would she evernotfeel humiliated on some level by this man?
‘Ana, wait. It wasn’t—’
But she stood up, cutting him off, not wanting to hear some platitude. It all made sense now. And she knew, after a year of living with him, that he had an ingrained sense of integrity and decency. He might have wanted her for what she could bring to the marriage, but he’d also wanted to save her.
She went to walk out, but Caio leaned forward and caught her hand. ‘Ana, wait.’
She stopped. Even that small contact made lust surge. It was too new. Too raw. She pulled free and looked at him. He was sitting forward on the chair. His jaw was stubbled. Suddenly all her feelings for him were too jumbled to make sense of. Right now he looked like the louche playboy he’d been before they’d married, before he’d wanted to clean up his reputation.
All she’d done here tonight was allow him to scratch an itch before he went back out into the world a free man with a clear conscience—because she’dbeggedhim to make love to her, to take her virginity, and also because he’d saved her from her father.
She felt sick.
Caio stood up. ‘Ana—’
Panicked by the thought that he’d touch her and scramble her brain even more, she got out a strangled-sounding, ‘No!’ and fled from the room. Straight out into the garden.
It was lit up with solar-powered lanterns. She went blindly down towards the beach, attracted by the sound of the waves, needing to put space between her and Caio. It was clear and still, and the moonlight lit up the beach almost as brightly as if it was day. Ana sucked in a deep breath. She hated it that Caio had pitied her. She didn’t want to evoke someone’s sense of duty. She wanted to drive someone—him—mad with lust and passion.
And she thought she had.
But the truth was that it had taken a year for him to see her as a woman. To want her. And who was to say that his desire hadn’t been fuelled by sexual frustration, compounded by being stuck on an island?
The past few hours, which had felt so wondrous and revelatory, now felt cheap.
She heard a sound behind her. She couldn’t bear for Caio to see her vulnerability, so she turned around and pasted a smile on her face. ‘Sorry, I went down a rabbit hole for a moment. I’m quite tired now... I’m going to bed.’
She went to walk past Caio, who was just a couple of feet away, and tried desperately not to notice his bare chest, or the way the sweatpants hung so precariously low on his hips.
‘Ana, please. You have it all wrong—’
She put up her hand. She really didn’t want to hear an explanation. ‘It’s fine, really. Look, we both know this was just a reaction to extreme circumstances, right? I wanted to get rid of the burden of my innocence before going to Europe, and you’ve taken the edge off a year of celibacy. We both got what we wanted. We’ll be out of here in a few hours. Hopefully. I need to get some rest now.’
Caio watched Ana walk back up to the villa in her short robe. He wanted to stop her and talk to her, but something held him back. His conscience. What could he say?
He turned around and emitted a curse. He hated that she’d come to the conclusion she had, but maybe it was for the best. She was right. In a few hours they would be leaving this place. They’d be moving on with their lives. No matter how good tonight had been...it was over now. It wouldn’t help to go after her and try to articulate things he could hardly articulate to himself.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
ANHOURLATER, Ana was still tossing and turning in the bed. After a lifetime of sleeping alone, she now felt the lack of Caio’s body like a missing limb. Pathetic!
Angry with herself for allowing her emotions to control all logic, and for allowing herself to fall for someone who was so inappropriate for her, Ana got out of bed. In spite of very little sleep, she felt full of pent-up energy. And sexual frustration. Caio had awoken a need in her that she feared would never be assuaged.
The prospect of that made the sense of desperation even more acute. She needed to do something to defuse the turmoil and tension in her body. Usually she’d go for a run. Or a swim. She thought of the pool, but it was too...calm. She needed something more elemental.
Where the hell was she going?
Caio couldn’t sleep, and was standing on the small balcony outside his bedroom. He’d just been contemplating numbing the clamour in his head and the sexual frustration in his blood with more whiskey when a movement had caught his eye and he’d seen the slim shape of Ana, robe belted tightly around her waist, walking down the garden towards the beach—again.
Before he could stop himself, Caio went out to follow her.
When he got down to the beach, it took his eyes a minute to adjust. He couldn’t see her. All he could see and hear was the pounding foam of the waves. And then he saw her discarded robe and a couple of other items. He picked them up. A delicate lacy top and matching pyjama bottoms.
It made him think of that moment when he’d come out of the shower into his bedroom—they’d been in some city...he couldn’t remember which now—and he’d looked up to see Ana standing in the doorway, staring at his body as if she’d never seen a naked man before. Transfixed.
