Marion Lennox - Forbidden Desires - A Debt Paid in Passion / An Exception to His Rule / Waves of Temptation

He was pleased to recall the demand she’d thrown at him weeks ago. It justified taking her into his home. He didn’t need a volatile mix of leftover attraction and betrayal confronting him with his eggs every morning, but Lucy’s needs trumped his.

Sirena heard the logic, but couldn’t bring herself to acknowledge it. His dispassionate reasoning was exactly that: lacking in feeling, practical. Cold.

It was also a perfect out, allowing her to accept a crazy arrangement for sensible reasons, but she feared she was only giving in to temptation. She knew why, too. Deep down, a grossly foolish part of herself believed that if she could just have his attention long enough, she could explain and earn his forgiveness.

The loss of his good opinion crushed her, not abating despite the months that had passed since the lawsuit. Experience with her stepmother told her that imagining she could earn Raoul’s admiration was pure self-delusion, but that didn’t alter the fact that she desperately wanted him to stop hating her.

While he wanted unfettered access to his daughter. That’s all that motivated him and he was trying to make it happen with his typical brook-no-arguments leadership and infinite resources, standing there casually impeccable and vaguely bored, certain he had the entire thing sewn up.

“Did I ever tell you how annoyingly bigheaded you can be when you think you’ve had the last word?” she muttered while casting for a suitable reason to refuse.

“I don’t think I’ve had it, I know it. The doctor won’t release you unless you have a care plan in place. I’m it.”

“You’re my get-out-of-jail card? When you put it like that...”

Every muscle in his body seemed to harden. “Be careful, Sirena. I’m taking into account you’re still only half-alive. Once you’re back to full strength, I won’t be nearly so charitable. I’ve forgotten nothing.”

A futile yearning swelled in her chest and burned in the back of her throat. He had every right to be angry, but to have her arrested when she’d been like an appendage for him for two years, then had given herself to him without hesitation...?

“You know I can’t have sex for another five weeks, right?” she threw at him. “If you’re thinking to have a convenient outlet on hand, it won’t happen.”

He swept her with one pithy glance that reminded her she was far beneath her best. She hated both of them in that second. Why did she care whether he was attracted to her or ever had been? He hadn’t. He’d been horny and she’d been handy. He’d told her so. Apparently having her underfoot wouldn’t be handy enough to tempt him again. That should be a comfort, not a knife in the heart.

“Just until the doctor clears me to live alone,” she muttered, bolstering her humiliated blush with a level glance into his implacable face. “I’m only staying until I’m back to full strength. Then Lucy comes to my flat with me.”

“We’ll burn that bridge when we get to it.”

* * *

Despite the welcome of blooming gardens at the house in Ascot, Sirena was icy cold as they drove past the gates where she’d stood waiting for Raoul in the rain, begging him over the intercom to speak to her.

Finding him here that day had been a matter of calling in a favor with an out-of-the-know workmate. After that she’d been shut out completely, her personal items from her desk returned and her keys, company ID, equipment and expense cards taken back.

Unable to look at him, she set a light hand on the warm shape of the baby between them and rocked numbly with the car when the chauffeur halted under the portico. As she reached to unclip the child seat, Raoul’s adept fingers brushed hers away.

“I’ll bring her.” He relayed the diaper bag to his chauffeur and lifted Lucy out the opposite door, coming around to meet Sirena where the chauffeur had opened her door.

She tried to climb from the low-slung car and was more resentful than grateful when Raoul reached to help, offering his arm so she could cling to it with a shaky grip. Her muscles burned at the strain of pulling up and steadying herself on her weak legs. Pain sliced across her middle where her incision was healing.

As they went up the steps, he slipped his arm around her and half carried her.

She made a noise of protest, but couldn’t help leaning into his support, both bolstered and weakened by his lean hardness. She finally gave in to the pull of attraction and let her head loll into his shoulder for just a second before he spoke, his tone flatly shoving her back to reality.

“You shouldn’t have been discharged.”

“I don’t want to be this feeble,” she grumbled, pulling away as they crossed the threshold. The loss of his touch made her feel weak and sorry for herself. “Even that time in Peru I managed to keep going. I’ll get better. I have to.” She sank down on the velvet-upholstered bench in the foyer and cupped her swimming head in her hands.

“When were you sick in Peru? That time half the conference came down with food poisoning? You didn’t get it.”

“I did! But someone had to take charge, extend the arrangements with the hotel and rebook the flights. I didn’t hear you volunteering.”

He grew an inch in height and his mouth opened, but she waved a hand against whatever scathing response he was on the verge of making.

“It was my job. I’m not complaining, just saying that’s the most wretched and useless I’ve ever felt, but this is worse. I hate being like this.”

“You should have told me. This time and then.”

“It was my job,” she repeated, ignoring his admonition in favor of reminding him her work ethic had been rock solid. She looked up at him and he met her gaze with an inscrutable frown and a tic in his cheek.

“I expect you to tell me what your needs are, Sirena. I’m not a mind reader. We’ll go to your room now so you can rest. Can you manage these stairs with me or shall I have a room prepared down here?”

“Upstairs is fine, but Lucy will need a feed before I lie down.” She deliberately kept her gaze on the baby and not on these beloved surroundings. Silly, naive fool that she was, she used to host fantasies about one day being mistress here. She loved everything about its eclectic style.

The lounge where she moved to nurse was one of her favorite rooms, with its Mediterranean colors, contemporary furniture and view to the English garden. Raoul had a lot of worldly influences in his life, from his Spanish mother’s ancestry of warmth and sensuality to his father’s Swiss precision. He had been educated in America, so he brought those modern, pop-culture elements into his world with contemporary art and futuristic electronics. All of his homes were classy, comfortable and convenient.

And all contained the one ingredient to which she was drawn inexorably: him.

He stood in profile to her, lean and pantherish, thumb sweeping across the screen of his mobile as he dealt with all the things she used to do for him. Her heart panged. She had loved working for him, loved the job that challenged her. Transcribing had put her through business school and kept her fed these last months, so she couldn’t knock it, but it didn’t take her off her steno chair, let alone around the world.

“Are you going in to the office this afternoon?” she asked, of two minds whether she wanted him to leave. Being on guard against him drained her, but another secret part of her drank up his nearness like a cactus in a rare rain.

“They’re asking the same. Things are in disarray. When you delivered, I had only starting to put things in place for an absence I thought would happen next month.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, feeling the habitual words leave her lips and thinking, Why are you apologizing? It’s not your fault!