Three Wishes(83)

He decided he didn’t want to read her thoughts in the darkened room and with effort he let her go but laced his fingers in hers. He walked to the window, dragging her with him and threw open the drapes. Then he immediately pulled her back into his arms.

“I asked, what’s funny?” she demanded.

He smiled down on her and her face changed when she saw it. He noted some of the old expression she used to wear when she looked at him shone through and the joy he was feeling intensified exponentially.

“Darling, as much as I hate the thought of you going it alone with Natasha for eight years, I hate the thought of you with anyone else more. So, I hope you’ll forgive me when I tell you I’m glad you haven’t shared your beautiful body with anyone but me.”

“Well!” she huffed, clearly at a loss for what to say and she turned her face away from him so he couldn’t see her expression.

He tilted it right back with a hand at her jaw and he saw confusion in her eyes, confusion and relief. “Now that that’s out in the open, do you agree to my condition?”

Again she looked adorably confused when he switched to an earlier subject and he noted for future reference that she was foggy after a migraine.

Then her expression cleared.

She sighed. Hugely.

“I suppose,” she gave in.

His arms tightened and his head descended.

“If we can adopt,” she interrupted his descent.

“We’ll adopt,” he said against her lips.

“Okay,” she whispered, her body melted into his and, finally, gratefully, he kissed her.

Chapter Twenty

Lily

Lily woke up alone in Nate’s colossal bed. She’d never seen a bed so huge in her entire life. It was even bigger than the bed he’d bought her and she thought that was the biggest bed she’d ever seen.

She listened for a moment to the silence in the enormous room and wondered where Nate was. She rolled languorously to her side to see if there was an alarm clock and she saw it was nearly nine thirty.

She blinked at it in surprise. She hadn’t slept that late in years. Lily didn’t even think she had the capacity to sleep later than seven o’clock.

She rolled onto her back and contemplated the ceiling and the softness of Nate’s sheets, which were other-worldly soft.

Nate, she realised, if he was anything like he used to be, must be at work.

She threw the covers back and headed to the bathroom while thinking rather contentedly about the night before and, especially, more-than-contentedly, that morning.

Surprisingly, Nate hadn’t made love to her after they agreed to get married. He’d finally kissed her (after their mortifying exchange about contraception which she did not want to remember, ever).

But that was it.

Well, not it exactly as he kissed her a great deal throughout the evening, held her from behind and nuzzled her neck as she was talking to Fazire (luckily, Fazire knew she was usually disoriented after a migraine and thus didn’t press her as to why she was, all of a sudden, at Nate’s place in London) and linked his fingers in hers while they ate the food he’d had delivered.

Later, they finally went to bed, Lily wearing one of the nightgowns Laura had bought her. Laura didn’t purchase twenty nightgowns, she’d purchased three, four sets of underwear, two outfits, three pairs of shoes and two huge bags full to the brim with toiletries and cosmetics of every size, shape and colour. Laura could shop for England in the Olympics and win the gold medal, hands down.

Once in bed, Nate had pulled her back to his front and wrapped his arm around her waist. Then he’d pressed his face in her hair, just like he used to do and in that moment Lily had given herself the momentary luxury to allow the eight years simply to melt away.

Then, she laid in bed waiting. Nothing.

“Um… Nate?” she’d whispered into the dark room.

“Mm?” The murmur sounded behind her and his arm tightened about her waist.

She didn’t know what to say. So she said, “Never mind.”

She realised she was slightly disappointed. Then she realised she was more-than-slightly disappointed. She hadn’t exactly gone there to throw herself at him just piece her family back together. But they had just agreed to pledge their troth. Certainly some sort of celebratory consummation effort was in order.

“You’re not yourself,” Nate said softly.

“What?” Lily asked.

“I’ll make love to you when you’re recovered. Right now, you’re still not yourself.”

“Oh,” she whispered.

Something about that made her heart flutter. She didn’t understand completely why but she felt it was important.

“Go to sleep, darling,” he murmured into her hair.

She decided she liked it when he called her darling. She knew she shouldn’t but that didn’t change the fact that she did.

Exhausted from the day’s events, in fact, the events of the past two weeks and in his comfortable bed with his warmth behind her, she fell into a deep sleep the like of which she had not had for years.

She woke, what seemed a year later, rested, relaxed, contented… and aroused.

“Nate?” she mumbled sleepily.

Apparently Nate had decided she was herself again for, at the sound of her voice, he took his hand away which had been up the hem of her nightgown, cupped at her breast with two fingers not-so-idly fondling her nipple. He flipped her on her back and in an instant he became her entire world. His hands, his mouth, his tongue, they were everywhere and the vague sense of relaxed, contented arousal boiled away in seconds as hot desire flooded through her.