Page 106 of How to Bang a Billionaire

“Then we can find somewhere—”

“Nonono, stop it.” I hid my face in my hands. “How can you like me enough to spend millions on me but not enough to have dinner with me? Don’t you understand why that does nasty things to my sense of self-worth? Why it makes me wonder if you want me at all?”

His hands closed around my wrists and I slowly looked up again. He was crouched in front of me, as calm again, but for the tightness of his lips and the furrow between his brows. And when he spoke, there was a note in his voice I wasn’t sure I’d heard before—something that almost could have been desperation. “I’ve wanted you since you were nothing but an imagined smile and a voice on a phone. And I want you still.”

“How am I supposed to believe that?”

“Perhaps you’re looking in the wrong places? I came to Oxford for you, didn’t I? I came here. I’ll beg if that’s what you need.”

“You know what I need.”

He gazed up at me and I could have cried over how completely fucking miserable he looked. “But that’s a phantasm. If you would abandon these ridiculous, romantic notions, we could have something real. Something attainable and sustainable.”

“That sounds like a renewable energy source, not a relationship.”

“Do you like me, Arden? Do you like the time we spend together? Do you like the way I touch you? Do you like the things I can give to you and do for you?”

“Yes, but—”

“Then why can’t that be enough for you?” His voice had gone rough with urgency. “If you would let me, I would do everything within my power to make you happy.”

“Except be honest with me about who you are.”

“I would ruin you. And I…I could not bear it.”

He still had my hands but my fingers curled with my restirring temper. “You can’t know that.”

“I’ve seen it happen. I bring nothing but pain to the people I love.”

“You mean…Nathaniel?” You didn’t exactly have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that.

“And you’ve met Eleanor. My own sister despises me.”

“You did, um, say you were going to drag her to therapy by her hair.”

A touch of telltale color had risen to his cheeks. “That was not well done of me, I admit. But she thinks too little of me to be coaxed, so threats are all I have left. And Machiavelli does say it’s better to be feared than loved, if one cannot be both.”

“Yeah, I think he was talking about medieval Italian politics. Not sibling relations.” Fuck. We’d gone way off track. “And anyway,” I went on quickly, “I’m not Ellery. Or Nathaniel.”

“But I’m the same. I’ve done what I’ve done. Made the choices I’ve made. And my nature is…what it is.”

I broke free of his hold. Reached out, took his face in my hands. He shuddered, but then stilled. It was like leashing a wild thing. Or cradling a butterfly on my palm. “I told you in London. I’m not scared of who you are or what you’ve done. I want you, and that means all of you. And if it also happens to involve some pretty kinky sex”—I managed a grin, though it was frail and slightly crooked—“then that’s okay with me.”

“You shouldn’t have to—”

“There’s no have to about it. For God’s sake, Caspian. Can’t you see I’m desperate for you to let go and dominate the fuck out of me? I like it rough. I like it filthy. And, most of all, I like it with you. When it is you. Not just the paper-thin façade of the man you think I want you to be.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Isn’t it? It’s just sex. And I’m a fully consenting grown-up. No matter how rubbish I am at the grown-up part.”

“Those impulses in me aren’t…that is, they don’t come from a good place.”

“Well, neither do mushrooms, but they’re delicious in garlic.”

Caspian made a sound that could have been a laugh. “I have no idea what you’re trying to say.”

“Just that maybe it doesn’t matter where your desires come from? Only that they’re there and I…um…I welcome them.”