With anyone else, such words might sound alarming. But I understand the language of Roman Wolfe now. His love has always been expressed through possession and control, through the dismantling of boundaries between us. For him to admit that I've changed him is the highest form of devotion he knows.
I reach up to touch his face, and he turns to press a kiss into my palm. "I've noticed changes in you," I whisper.
"You've barely begun to see them," he promises, and there's something in his tone that sends a delicious shiver through me.
The next morning, I discover exactly what he means. Roman has always been protective—possessive to a degree that would send most relationship counselors into conniptions—but the news of my pregnancy has transformed his usual controlling tendencies into something almost religious in its fervor.
I swing my legs out of bed, intending to head to the bathroom, only to find myself suddenly airborne.
"What are you doing?" I gasp as Roman lifts me effortlessly into his arms.
"Carrying you," he says simply, as if this is the most natural thing in the world.
"Roman, I can walk ten feet to the bathroom."
His expression doesn't change. "You're carrying my child. You won't walk anywhere you don't absolutely have to."
"That's ridiculous," I protest, even as a warm flutter of pleasure moves through me at his intensity. "Pregnant women walk all the time. It's healthy."
"Other women, perhaps." His arms tighten around me. "Not you. Not my wife. Not the mother of my child."
It should feel suffocating. It should set off alarm bells. Instead, I find myself melting against his chest, my resistance fading under the onslaught of his complete devotion. This is Roman's love—absolute, unyielding, and entirely consuming.
The pattern continues throughout the day. I'm not allowed to retrieve my own water—he's there before my thirst even registers. When I reach for a book on a high shelf in his library, his body is suddenly behind mine, his much longer arm easily grabbing what I need while his other hand settles protectively over my stomach.
"I'm only a few weeks along," I remind him as he insists on carrying me down the stairs for lunch. "The baby is the size of a poppy seed."
"My poppy seed," he corrects, his lips brushing my forehead. "In my woman. Both equally precious and irreplaceable."
By evening, I'm equal parts amused and overwhelmed by his attention. When I emerge from the shower, I find that he's laid out my clothes—the softest items I own, nothing with restrictive waistbands. The sight makes me laugh.
"Are you going to dress me too?" I tease.
The look he gives me is utterly serious. "If necessary."
"Roman." I wrap my arms around his waist, resting my cheek against his chest. "You can't treat me like I'm made of glass for the next eight months."
His heartbeat is steady under my ear. "I can. I will."
"You'll drive yourself crazy. You'll drive me crazy."
His hand slides into my damp hair, cradling my head. "There are worse fates than being cared for too well, Delilah."
I look up at him, at the iron determination in his eyes, and realize this is a battle I won't win. More importantly, it's one I'm not sure I want to win. Because beneath the exasperation, I'm discovering something unexpected—I like this. I like being the center of his universe, the precious vessel carrying the next generation of his legacy.
"Fine," I concede. "But you have to let me walk sometimes. For my sanity."
"When I'm not there to carry you," he agrees, which isn't really an agreement at all.
That night, his obsession manifests in new ways. When he carries me to bed—of course he does—his touch is different. Always before, sex between us has been a claiming, an assertion of his dominance and my surrender. Tonight, as he lays me against the sheets, there's a reverence in his movements that takes my breath away.
"My beautiful wife," he murmurs, his fingers tracing patterns on my skin as if mapping territories he already knows by heart. "My perfect, fertile wife."
The words shouldn't affect me the way they do, sending heat rushing between my thighs. Roman notices—Roman always notices—and his smile turns knowing.
"You like that," he observes, fingers drifting lower, finding the evidence of my arousal. "You like knowing you're carrying my child."
"Yes," I admit, because lying to Roman is pointless. He reads my body better than I do.
