He looked so earnest Amaryllis didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It was probably the sweetest thing any man had ever said to her and she would never have imagined Reese, whom she’d always thought of as practically a demi-god, would be so desperate for her approval as to consider such an ‘improvement’ necessary.
To her horror, tears filled her eyes.
Reese’s reaction was far more violent. He released her hand as if he’d suddenly discovered he was holding fire and leapt to his feet. “You are not pleased.”
It was a statement, not a question. Amaryllis didn’t trust herself to speak. She shook her head.
His face hardened. After a moment, he nodded sharply, turned and strode toward the door.
Amaryllis leapt to her feet. “Wait! Don’t go!”
He halted and turned to look at her questioningly.
Moving toward him, she placed her palm on one of his hard cheeks, stroking it. “You don’t need to do that. Not for me.”
He nodded. “I understand. It would not make a difference.”
All the doubts and fears Amaryllis had been harboring shattered. One thought emerged crystal clear. She couldn’t just allow Reese to leave thinking that she cared less than nothing about him. It hurt her to see him trying to preserve an emotionless front when everything about him told her he felt pain.
Shaking her head, Amaryllis caught his hand and tugged on it until he reluctantly followed her back to the couch, then pushed on his chest until he sat down. When he’d settled, she placed a knee on either side of his hips and sat on his lap, facing him. “Itwouldmake a difference. It would change you and … and I love you just the way you are,” she finished, leaning toward him and brushing a light kiss across his hard mouth.
She felt a jolt of surprise go through him, either at her words, or the kiss, or perhaps both. When she leaned back once more to study him, his expression was a mixture of desire and disbelief and confusion. She could see that he was reviewing every exchange between them, trying to understand how it might have happened that she would fall in love with him, but it wasn’t something that could be analyzed. The first time she’d set eyes on him it had knocked the breath right out of her, as if she’d been body slammed by his pheromones. It would probably be more accurate to say that nothing he’d done or said since had knocked the sense into her, not even when she’d learned that he’d been sent to infiltrate them. She smiled faintly. “You’ll never figure it out,” she murmured, rubbing the tip of her nose against his.
He swallowed audibly. His hands were shaking slightly when he captured her face between them. “Amy,” he said gustily, leaning forward to brush his lips lightly against hers.
Her lips tingled at his touch and she flicked her tongue out, tracing the shape of his lips. His breath left him in a rush. He hesitated and then covered her mouth with his own, thrusting his tongue into her mouth to caress the sensitive inner flesh.
The warm intoxication of desire flowed through her as his essence flooded her senses, bringing a flush of heightened sensation to her skin. It took an effort to lift her eyelids when he withdrew to study her once more. “Will you make contract with me?” he asked, his voice raw with his own needs.
A knot of misery gathered in her throat at his insistent question. She found she couldn’t meet the look in his eyes. Instead, she studied the musculature of his broad chest, tracing the bulges and dips that defined each muscle mass with the tip of one finger.
She did love him. She didn’t care what he was supposed to be, only what he was. She would’ve liked nothing better if she could’ve just closed her mind to all her doubts and jumped at the chance he offered her.
But she loved him. She might be carrying his baby, and she might not. She might be carrying some horrible deformed thing. She might never be able to bear a normal child and she knew that was what he wanted. A family. Not just her. A family.
It wouldn’t be right and it wasn’t something one did to a person they loved. She couldn’t lie about something as important as the possibility that her genes were as defective as her body, not even a lie of omission. And she couldn’t bring herself to tell him. Horror filled her even at the thought of doing so.
He might want her anyway.
Or he might look at her like everyone else had always looked at her. Even after she’d had all the surgeries that made her look normal, all they’d been able to see was what she’d been before.
She didn’t think she could bear that look from him.
Instead of answering his question, she leaned down and followed the path her finger had traced with the tip of her tongue. He tensed, released a pent up breath that was like a groan.
“Amy,” he said hoarsely.
She lifted her head to look at him.
He stroked her cheek. “I want to do this correctly.”
Amaryllis frowned in confusion.
Frustration flickered in his eyes. “By your customs. But—I have need.”
Relief flooded Amaryllis. She slipped her arms around his neck, sliding forward on his lap so that his engorged cock was nestled along her cleft and sending delicious tremors through her. “To hell with the customs. We’ll make new ones,” she muttered, grinding her cleft along the hard ridge of his cock. “I have needs, too.”
Leaning forward, she caught the lobe of his ear between her teeth, sucking it. “I’m wet for you,” she whispered. “I want to feel you inside of me. It felt so good when you were inside of me before.”
