She laughs, but there's no humor in it. "Okay. Sure. Whatever you want to say."
"It's the truth."
"Is it?" She turns to face me fully, and her eyes are damp with tears, glittering with anger. "Because you've done nothing but push me away since the moment we met. You made it very clear last night that you don't want me. That touching me is so repulsive you'd rather cut yourself open than?—"
"That's not why I did that."
"Then why?" She moves closer, and I can smell her powdery, floral perfume.Fuck. She smells sweet and warm and feminine, and despite everything, I feel my cock twitch, swelling against my fly. "Why did you leave? Why do you look at me like... like..."
"Like what?" I growl, and my voice drops an octave. She freezes, her eyes widening, and something primal in me responds, my cock hardening until it’s straining painfully against the front of my jeans.
Fuck.
The space between us shrinks. I don't know if she stepped closer or I did, but suddenly there's barely a foot separating us.I can see the exact color of her blue eyes, the flush on her pale cheeks, the rapid rise and fall of her chest.
“I cut myself because I couldn’t fuck a woman who was shaking and crying at the thought of me touching her,” I bite out. “And I left because I couldn’t stop wanting you even though it made me feel like shit.”
Her breath catches. "I don’t understand?—”
"You're eighteen years old. A virgin. You just lost your entire family. And I'm..." I force myself to stop moving closer. "I'm not good for you, Maeve. I'm not good for anyone."
She swallows hard. “I know what you were told to do,” she whispers. “So you should have done it.”
“I couldn’t.” My voice is flat, rough. “I still can’t. Not unless you want me.”
She stares up at me, her eyes impossibly wide. “I don’t even know what that means.”
“I know.”
A heartbeat passes, and every cell of my body is screaming at me to back her against the garden wall, to turn her around and tug her jeans down, spread her slender thighs, and sheath myself in her tight, virgin cunt. She's my wife. I have every right. Right now, in this moment, I could almost convince myself that she wants me.
Her eyes are wide. Her chest heaving. Her cheeks flushed. She feels this thing—this pull—between us, but she just admitted she has no fucking idea what it is. She’s so innocent she can’t recognize desire even if she feels it.
I could solve several of our problems right now. I could strip her down, sit on that bench, and pull her into my lap, onto my cock. I could give myself what I so desperately need and seal this bond between us that will protect her.
But I can’t fucking do it.
I’ll feel like a monster if I do. Even if it would be so fucking easy?—
No. Fuck, no.
I step back, breaking the spell.
"We should go inside," I say, my voice harder than I intend. "I have work to do."
The hurt that flashes across her face is like a knife to the gut. "Of course you do." Her voice is cold now, all that fire extinguished. "Heaven forbid you actually have a conversation with your wife."
She pushes past me, heading back toward the house. I watch her go, my hands clenched into fists, everything in me wanting to follow her and apologize again, just in case it might be different this time. To pull her back and finish what we almost started.
But I don't.
Because if I go after her now, if I touch her even once, I won't be able to stop.
And she deserves better than being fucked against a garden wall by a man who doesn't know how to be gentle.
—
I'm backin the study, staring at documents without really reading anything, when Mrs. Brady appears in the doorway again.
