One Night to Risk It All(33)

He looked down and took a bite of pizza, the gestures and expressions boyish now. It was strange; sometimes he seemed so young. Sometimes he seemed about a thousand years old. And she could relate, because sometimes that was exactly how she felt, too. Too young, too old and never just right.

“What did you have on the first one?”

“The pizza?”

“Yeah,” she said, her stomach tight. “I’m sure you remember.”

The left corner of his mouth quirked upward. “Yeah. Pepperoni. Black olives. It was New York style. Of course, at the time I’d only dreamed of New York. I live there now. The pizza’s much better than this.”

She laughed. “Yeah, I know. I spent at least half my childhood there. Most of my adult life. I’ve been fortunate to travel a lot from an early age.”

“I barely left the Kouklakis compound until I was fourteen.”

“What?”

“There was...nowhere else to go. And they didn’t really want anyone talking to us. Questioning us. There weren’t very many children. The ones that were there had to be careful. Careful to try and go unnoticed by anyone who might want to use us, people who came for parties and things. Careful about what we said. The wrong words could set the police down on Nikola and that would have been unforgivable. Death for certain.”


“He would have killed...children?”

“He would never have gotten his own hands that dirty. But he would have used someone else’s. I always knew that my life was in a tenuous place as long as I was there. I always knew.” He took another bite of pizza. “But I got free. I got pizza. It has a happy ending, yes?”

“Does it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s not over yet. Right now we’re just sitting here eating pizza. It’s not going to fade to black or anything.”

“True.”

“There are a lot of potential outcomes for all of this. And I’m not sure if any of them are wildly happy.”

He grunted, a short, frustrated sound seated in the back of his throat. “Because you’re looking for something I can’t give you. You could be happy if you just—”

“If I what?”

“—compromised. You were willing to do it for Ajax and you didn’t even want him. You weren’t having his baby. Well, you are having my baby, and you do want me, so I don’t see any reason that you shouldn’t want to marry me instead of him. What changed?”

She looked down. “I think I did. Or maybe I didn’t change, maybe I just became more afraid of what might happen if I kept living my life as someone else, someone safe, and less afraid of what might happen if I made an effort to find some happiness.”

“I think I made you pretty happy for extended periods of time in bed,” he said.

She coughed. “Well, there’s that.”

“I want you, Rachel.”

“What...now?” She looked around them, at the blue-tinged air slowly falling darker as the sun sank below the horizon line.

“Every moment since the first time I saw you. And that’s not me lying to keep you here, that’s me telling you the truth. That’s me confessing. Frankly, I know this isn’t going to get me anywhere with you so you have to believe that it’s honest. Because I know that it doesn’t mean anything to you that the moment I saw you, I forgot Ajax’s name, and every thought I ever had about revenge. Because all I could think about was getting you naked then and there. Not romantic, maybe. But all I know is that it didn’t matter then who you were. I mean...not in the sense of who you were to Ajax, or the media, or what your marriage had to do with him acquiring Holt. It only mattered...who you were. Which I know sounds stupid, but in my head it made sense.”

Rachel’s heart was pounding hard, echoing in her head. She leaned forward, grabbed his collar and tugged him to her, kissing him on the mouth. She didn’t know what she was doing or why. Only that she couldn’t stop.

And along with her heartbeat, his words reverberated through her. It only mattered who you were.

He cupped the back of her head and pulled her in harder, taking the kiss deeper, his tongue sliding against hers, sending a wave of lust down through her body. Nothing was settled. And she shouldn’t be kissing him. Shouldn’t be making things confusing by throwing a match on their simmering physical chemistry.

But he’d said he wanted her. And everything in her responded to that. It fought to break free, to push past the boundaries she’d placed around herself, a neat little fence that kept her safe and hidden.

Because he wanted that part of her. He didn’t want her to hide it. Didn’t want her to keep it behind a locked door. Didn’t want her to keep her passion from him. And she wanted to give him that. Wanted to give it to herself, this moment of freedom. Another chance to grab it. To try and feel something.

She’d spent so long not feeling. This was like coming to the surface of the water and breathing in air, filling her aching lungs when she hadn’t even realized what she’d been missing.

She hadn’t realized how much pain had been caused by holding herself under. Because it had been a slow-growing pain, easier to deal with than the idea of having herself exposed to the media, of being used by a man she’d thought she loved.

Still, it hurt. And she was only now seeing just how much.