Arranged(61)

“It’s a romper, and it’s not a torture device. It’s actually really comfortable.”

“I meant a torture device for me. It was obviously designed by someone who never thinks about having sex, let alone having sex in a hurry. It looks great, but how am I ever going to get you out of it?” My voice was grumpy, almost childish, with an intentionally whiny lilt at the end.

She threw back her head and laughed.

I was entranced. Bedazzled. My blood throbbed in my veins. She’d never laughed for me before.

She was still smiling as she took the seat across from me. I was still staring.

Our table was small enough that as she pushed her seat in I had to part my knees to let hers slip between. I locked her knees there, reaching one hand beneath to grip her thigh.

Her smile died and something else went to life on her face.

Every time I looked at her sideways she seemed to melt under my gaze. Like she wanted to lie on her back and open her legs for any scrap of attention I gave her.

She couldn’t be as caught up in this ridiculous attraction as I was, I told myself.

She just has a role to play, I told myself.

But it was getting harder and harder to lie to myself.

Harder to vilify her. To deny her charms, her sweet, innocent nature. Her magnetic, constantly trembling lips.

She’d called me a hypocrite, and the barb had stuck. She wasn’t wrong. Her motivations were no different than my own. They were more innocent, really. She was an eighteen-year-old who came from nothing and wanted a better life. Who the hell was I to look down on that? Spoiled rich boy, indeed.

When I used to picture my wife, I’d had a very clear impression of who she must have been. I’d known, thought, assumed she was cold and calculating. Unfortunately I was wrong, at least in part. There was nothing cold about her. She’d become a warm, liquid throb in my veins.

Moreover, she seduces everyone around her. Even me. Especially me.

In spite of my best intentions, a different picture was being painted for me of my wife. She was not who I had assumed. There was something very straightforward, almost undeniably honest about her. And there was no way I could deny that she was hardworking. Earnest. Just trying her best to get ahead.

Despite my highest hopes, she wasn’t the bad girl gold digger I’d given her credit for.

In fact, she wasn’t bad at all.

She was good. I knew it in my bones. It wasn’t sight or smell or anything tangible, but it was there in the air around her, another sense. A feeling. I was starting to get a lot of those where my wife was concerned. The realization made my skin feel over-warm, like I was getting a fever just under the surface. I tugged restlessly at my collar.

“You’re in an interesting mood,” she was saying to me.

I shook myself free of my thoughts. I shrugged. “I suppose.” We’d been around each other enough for her to notice a different mood of mine. It was a sobering thought. I was utterly failing to keep her at a distance, and the more contact we had together, the less I cared about that. Therein lay the problem.

We ordered drinks. She tried to order wine, and I changed it to water. “You’re too young,” I said at her look.

A silent spell fell upon us. I stared at her while she stared down at her lap. My hand was heavy on her leg.

“How have you been?” I found myself asking her. Making small talk like a civilized husband.

She sent me a brief glance, then looked down again. Something about my question put her on guard. I felt my gut dip. Had I been such a bastard that even such an innocuous inquiry made her wary?

The short answer? Yes. I hated myself for it even as I braced myself against falling further under her spell.

“Fine,” she said. That was all.

“Have you been working a lot?” I followed up with.

She shrugged, looking around at anything but me. “The usual. I keep busy. I’m supposed to fly to Paris for a YSL fragrance campaign and some other jobs in a few days.”

I felt myself tense. “How long will that last?” I remembered when the terms for it were being negotiated, but I hadn’t realized it was coming up so soon.

“I should be there for around two weeks.”

I processed that and no matter how I unpacked it, it left a bad taste in my mouth. “Is that really necessary? Two weeks seems an excessive amount of time.”

She finally looked at me directly. “I’m booked solid. You approved all of it.”

I was sure she wasn’t wrong. That didn’t mean I wasn’t bothered. Two weeks in Paris. Traveling with Chester and working with God knew who. No, I didn’t like it. “It’s not the best timing. I have a lot going on in New York for the next few weeks. Things I can’t step away from without a lot of rescheduling.”

She bent her head down, brow furrowing in confusion. “Okay,” she said carefully. “I don’t see how that could be a problem. It’s not like my travel plans could affect you.”

I felt my nostrils flare, a tick starting up in my temple. I knew what I was feeling was unreasonable. Knowing didn’t make the feelings lesson.

I didn’t want her to leave. I didn’t want her traveling without me. When it came right down to it, I didn’t want her going anywhere without me. When had this happened? Our lives were completely separate. I had insisted upon it. It was preposterous for me to feel possessive about the very wife I’d spurned. The wife I tried my hardest to stay away from.