Page 45 of Modern Romance July 2025 #4-8

CHAPTER ELEVEN

S LEEP WAS NOT an easy thing for Theo these days. He was not used to these struggles here on his island, in his sanctuary. He didn’t let worry touch him here .

Though he supposed it wasn’t worry that kept him awake. Nothing as simple as that. It wasn’t even that when he did find sleep, he often had dreams of Rebecca that had him waking hard and panting.

It was the dreams that did not end in desire thwarted that bothered him, stuck with him, made sleep more appalling than lying here staring at the ceiling.

It was dreams of her holding a child that haunted him.

Their child. With dark hair and blue eyes.

And even that, he thought he could have withstood.

It was their future, more or less. One he’d accepted.

It was the dreams where they both disappeared—in varying impossible ways, like a puff of smoke, over a cliff, into the sea—that made sleep feel less and less safe.

He could delve into the psychology behind these dreams if he wanted to. He did not want to.

So he lay in bed, trying not to think about dreams. Or that confounded discussion over dinner.

He had seen pity, clear as day, on her face.

Pity. As if he was something to be pitied when he’d handled everything life had thrown at him.

He would not call his childhood a happy one, but it was hardly traumatic.

So he hadn’t had a mother involved? This was true for many people.

So his father had been careless? He hadn’t been cruel .

Yes, stability had eluded Theo, and that had been challenging at times, but it had built him into a man who had accomplished everything he set out to do.

He had reached all his professional dreams. He had everything a man could desire. And he would give his child the things he had not had, tying up a loose end with finality.

Theo should pity her , but he knew that wasn’t what he’d felt when she’d talked of her childhood in glowing, happy terms. The way she’d spoken about her parents with love .

It settled in him like claws trying to rip their way out, because it added something else to his long list of requirements for the future, for his role as a father.

In the years to come, he wanted his child to sit at someone’s table and speak of him and Rebecca with that same sweet reverence. That was the measure of good parenting, and he would be a good parent. His child would have the best.

He was terrified that this was the kind of thing he wanted that no matter how he tried, worked, demanded, he might not be able to ensure it happened by sheer force of will.

Except by keeping her here. Except by marrying her. Perhaps he could not replicate what Rebecca’s parents had given her, but he could try. And these were imperative steps to that trying.

Because he was a man who set goals. Who met them, no matter the challenges stacked against him.

That was a settling-enough thought that he finally drifted off, into a hazy dream that made little sense.

He kept chasing after Rebecca. Around the island.

Athens. The Desmond Estate in Ireland. She’d be within reach.

Then disappear. And with each disappearance, the desolation and desperation inside his chest grew.

And even that was better than the end. Where he finally reached her. And she collapsed in a pale heap. Eyes open and lifeless.

He woke with a heaving start, pushing up on his mattress, struggling to breathe. He nearly yelped at the figure at the end of his bed but managed to bite it back in time.

“Good morning,” Rebecca sang cheerfully.

It had to be a dream. Just another part of the series of horrible dreams. But he sat in the middle of his bed, his breath heaving in and out, as she stood there, a bright smile on her face looking just fine. Just fine.

“What is the meaning of this?” he growled. Because he might have welcomed an unannounced appearance if she’d been wearing something that suggested that she was going to crawl into bed with him. Anything that might allow him to believe she would come exorcise the memory of that dream out of him.

But she was wearing some kind of running clothes, down to the tennis shoes on her feet. Her hair was pulled back in a bouncy tail, and she had a pair of headphones hooked around her neck.

“I have decided that the best thing for both of us is an early morning run every morning,” she announced.

“You should drink water when you wake up, not coffee. For your health.” She moved forward and he realized she had a water bottle in her hand.

She slapped it down on his nightstand with a loud bang .

He looked at the bottle. Then her. Perhaps his mind was still half-asleep, but he could not fathom what she was talking about. “What are you doing?”

“It’s just what I’ve decided, Theo, and since it is the right thing to do, you should get up and get dressed for running.” She smiled at him, but the sunny cheer was an act. There was something icy sharp in her eyes.

And he wasn’t a dullard, even if his brain hadn’t kicked into full gear yet. On a heavy sigh, he leaned back against the headboard. “I see what you are doing.”

“Do you?”

“It is not appreciated.”

“But these are all the right things.” She said this with wide eyes and a kind of wonder to her voice. Excellent acting, all in all. “Parents need to be healthy and take care of themselves. No doubt a habit we need to solidify before the newborn stage wreaks havoc with our schedules.”

“Your point has been made, Rebecca.” Though irritation was the predominant feeling, there was the flutter of something underneath. Something he really didn’t want to label as amusement , but his lips twitched, wanting to curve upward all the same.

It was quite inspired, really. A little farce to make her point. It impressed him, he could admit, but it didn’t change his mind.

He didn’t need her to like his proclamations. He didn’t need her to see his way of thinking. He knew he was right. And whether she liked it, or he did, what needed to be done would be done.

It would cost him nothing to play along right now. To go on the run. Pretend to be cowed by her point. But it would also cost him nothing to distract her from her little bit of theater. And might in fact be quite enjoyable.

“In fact, you are quite right,” he offered, trying to match her sunny tone.

She eyed him suspiciously, as she should. “I know.”

He tossed his sheets aside. “Let’s go.”

“A-absolutely.” But she didn’t move. She stood there, staring at him as he stood.

Completely naked. Her tongue darted out, pressed to the corner of her mouth, but her eyes were glued to where he was growing hard and ready, just for her.

“Y-you will need to get dressed,” she said, her voice a kind of squeak at the end.

He took his time glancing down at his own naked body. Then he looked back up at her, noting her eyes had taken the same tour. “Will I?”

She sucked in a breath, and he watched as she mustered enough control to bring her gaze up to his. She opened her mouth, but said nothing, as though she’d forgotten whatever it was she’d meant to say.

He nearly grinned, but he tried to keep his expression fairly serious.

Even as he took a step toward her. “Exercise is important, of course. Even in your condition, I’ve read that it’s important to move every day.

But I think there is a better way to exercise one’s cardiovascular system aside from running. ”

Her eyes were wide and so blue, even in the dim light of this ridiculously early morning. Her cheeks had turned the prettiest shade of pink and her chest rose and fell with quickening breath. She swallowed. Then cleared her throat.

She came up with no words. No grand proclamations or arguments. She wanted him. As much, as obsessively and ridiculously as he wanted her.

He leaned close, his mouth at her ear enjoying the sharp intake of her breath and the way she didn’t back away, didn’t try to find her voice or deny what sparked between them. He spoke low, right there. “And I have come to an interesting conclusion.”

She blinked, confused. “Huh?”

“I think, perhaps you came in here not because you wanted to prove some rather weak point, but because…” He trailed off, leaning closer.

So she could feel his breath. So he could hear hers struggle.

So warmth encased them both. “I think you haven’t quite come to grips with one very clear conclusion.

Maybe you like being told what to do, Rebecca. ”

The noise she made was like an erotic punch. A kind of sigh mixed with a gasp, all delicious sexual want.

She didn’t move away. She stood there, swaying ever so slightly toward him. And still she tried to deny that which was clearly true. “No, I…”

“Yes, I think you do.” He lifted his hand, trailed a finger down the elegant curve of her neck with a feather-light touch. “You like me telling you what I want.” He let his finger trace down over her shoulder, across her breast where her nipple had already pebbled. “What I demand.”

She made a squeaking kind of groan then. “Yes,” he murmured, continuing the path of his finger down, across the firm swell of stomach, to the apex of her thighs, where he rubbed lightly. “You want to be told what to do, don’t you? Sweet Becca, you love it.”

She made needy noises in the back of her throat that nearly sent him over a wild edge. “You want this. You want me. Here. Now.”

“I…”

She did. She damn well did. And the edge of need cut through him with such force, he wanted it to cut deeper, to cleave them both in two. So he gave more orders. “Get on your knees.”

He felt her shudder. Yes, the order thrilled her, but he still wasn’t sure she’d take it. Until slowly, so damn slowly, she began to kneel. She balanced her palms on his thighs as she reached her knees, and then she looked up at him as she reached out with one hand and took him in a fist.