Page 148 of Morally Black Betrothal

“Well? Can we do that?”

“Do what?” I blinked. “I’m sorry, I’m a little thrown.”

He swore softly. “I’m not being clear, am I?”

“I’m just not sure…”

“You don’t have to decide now. I know I’m springing all this on you, and it’s not what you signed up for, but don’t worry. I’m not trying to back out of our deal. You’ll still get all the money, regardless of what happens between us privately.”

His mention of payment was just another blow. If we were going to be—what, dating? Sleeping together?—wouldn’t that make me some version of the prostitute I was trying not to be?

I sat there, half numbed by the question, until Brendan swore again, then stood and pulled me up with him.

“Angel.” He took my hands and shook them lightly like he was trying to shake away my doubts. “Simone. Look at me.”

Like a fool, I did. And saw in those green eyes all the hope and want and confusion that I knew must have been swirling right back at him.

“Can’t we just be whatever we want in private while continuing our arrangement where to the rest of the world, we’re engaged?” he asked.

He gathered my hands and held them against his chest, his thumb playing over the ridges of the diamond on my ring finger. The feel of his broad, warm fingers closed over mine soothed my nerves and my thoughts, as though his body could calm me in a way his words hadn’t quite figured out yet. And his expression was so earnest, so hopeful, so different from his typically stern demeanor, that I couldn’t help but smile.

Maybe these words weren’t the ones my overactive brain wanted now. But that didn’t mean they might not come one day.

Brendan was only asking me to live in the moment.

I could do that.

“Okay.” My voice was small.

One dark brow arched. “Okay?”

He was being perfectly reasonable. Brendan Black, a gorgeous billionaire, wanted to date me. For real. I should have been jumping for joy.

Instead, I settled for giving him a quick peck. “Yes, okay. We can try.”

Brendan frowned. “I think we can do better than that.”

“Huh?”

His lips found mine again, full of the kind of unbridled enthusiasm I’d just been hoping for from his words.

What Brendan Black couldn’t put into words, he apparently put into action.

“Brendan!” I shouted as he bent low and tossed me over his shoulder just long enough to carry me back into the bedroom, our breakfast forgotten.

All doubts fled, replaced instead with that fire he’d set alight last night. It had never been extinguished, I realized. Just left to embers until we wanted to blow its flames alive again.

As I found myself pressed back into the bed again with more kisses that made me forget my name, I had a feeling it would always be like that with him.

Which meant there was no world in which I’d ever walk away from Brendan Black, even if the ending he offered couldn’t be happy in the end.

34

THE THING ABOUT SISTERS

Brendan

Icouldn’t stop touching her now that I’d started. Now that I was allowed to do it whenever I wanted for as long as I wanted.