Livia Reasoner - Dark Nights - Mistress of the Underground / The Vampire Affair

He turned toward her. “You’re going to kill me, you know. Brilliant cardiologist suffers heart attack while making love….”

“I don’t know about that,” she mused.

His body tensed for a moment, as if he thought she didn’t consider what they did making love. Only sex.

So she lifted a brow and teased, “You consider yourself brilliant? Really?”

He reared up and leaned over her, nipping at her sensitive nipple with his teeth, as he pushed his thumb inside her, strumming her clit as he might a guitar. Except that Ben wasn’t musical. Just brilliant at making her come.

She tensed, then broke apart, coming again. She bit his shoulder, hard, in protest at how easily he controlled her body. His teeth closed over her nipple, nipping.

She rose up, coming again. “Oh, Ben!”

“You can’t deny my brilliance now,” he teased her.

She knew he was kidding because Ben had never had an ego, just a hard work ethic. And a hard dick, which pulsed at her hip. She closed her hand around him, holding his hot, pulsing flesh. He groaned again but pulled her hand away.

“We have to discuss something.”

She hated how this was straying into a serious conversation she’d rather avoid. She sat up and swung her legs over the edge of the mattress.

“I’m worried about you, Paige,” he said, “about this crazy stalker.” His hands closed over her shoulders, turning her to face him. “I think I should move in here.”

Her heart knocked against her ribs. “What?”

“Or you can move in with me,” he offered, his dark eyes earnest.

“Ben!”

He sighed. “It would only have to be until the stalker is caught, Paige. You’re not safe here alone.”

“I’m not alone,” she pointed out. “Sebastian lives here, too.”

“Casanova?” he scoffed. “How much time does he really spend here?”

“Not much,” she admitted. “But I’m fine alone. You don’t need to worry about me.”

“But I do.” His throat moved as he swallowed hard. “Even before you picked up a stalker, I worried about you.”

“Ben, I take care of myself,” she reminded him, resenting that she had to. “I always have.”

“I know.” His brown eyes grew soft and wistful. “But I wish…”

“What?”

“I wish I had taken care of you when we were married,” he admitted.

She laughed at his thought of chivalry. “I didn’t let you.” If only she’d taken his advice…

“But I should have tried,” he insisted, his fingers clenching her shoulders. “I should have been there for you more.”

She shook her head, suddenly weary from more than making love. “That’s all in the past, Ben, and it doesn’t matter. We’re not married anymore.”

His eyes darkened with emotion. “What are we, Paige?”

She tried to pull out of his arms, but he held her tight, his fingers biting into her skin. “I don’t know, Ben.”

She didn’t have an answer for him or herself.

“We’re not married,” he agreed. “We’re not really dating. We don’t go out to dinner or a movie.”

“Who does that?” she asked. “We never went out to dinner or a movie.” They’d always been too tired from working such long, hard hours. Or he hadn’t been around. He’d been around for so little of their marriage.

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Maybe we should have….”

She smiled, amused that he would think they could have. Neither of them was much made for leisure activities…except making love. “We were never those people, Ben, not when we first started going out or when we were married.”

“What people?”

“You know the ones, the couple who hold hands while they walk around the mall, the ones who stare into each other’s eyes over a candlelit dinner.”

His eyes softened with regret, as if he wished they had been. “Paige…”

They both carried too much regret. None of it could change what had happened between them, what had gone wrong.

“It’s okay,” she assured him. “We never had time to be those people. I was busy, too.” Not as busy as he’d been, but she’d submerged herself in her work, too.

At first, because she’d been determined to be exactly the opposite of her mother. But then she’d fallen for Ben. And she’d still worked too much, so that she wouldn’t notice how little he’d been there.

“We should have made time,” Ben said.

“It’s too late now,” she said again.

He shook his head, obviously unwilling to accept the finality. “It’s never too late.”

“We can’t change the past,” Paige insisted.

“No, we can’t,” he agreed. “But I can be here for you now. I can protect you, Paige.”

“You might be able to protect me from my stalker,” she said, “if I have one. But who will protect me from you?”

A muscle twitched in his cheek. But he didn’t profess his undying love or the fact that he’d never hurt her. They both knew he couldn’t promise her those things.

“We can’t change the past,” she said as she drew in a shaky breath. “And we can’t change the fact that we have no future.”

He’d already accepted that they had no future. If only he’d realized it sooner and let her go…then maybe she wouldn’t be in danger now.

“We don’t have a future together,” he agreed, but hated himself for the pain that darkened her usually bright eyes. “But we need to make sure you have a future. I need to move in here, so that I can protect you from physical harm.” As she’d already pointed out, he was the last one who could protect her from emotional harm. “And you need to stop going to the club. It’s not safe for you there.”

Her eyes crinkled at the corners as the sadness left them, and she laughed.

“I’m serious, Paige.”

“You’re deluded,” she retorted. “I may let you tell me what to do there—” she pointed to the rumpled bed “—but only there. You’re not my husband anymore. You can’t tell me how to live my life.”

Frustration had his temper snapping and he bitterly remarked, “We both know I’ve never been able to tell you what to do.”

As the hurt and guilt flashed in her eyes, he wished the words back. It wasn’t her fault. It was his. He was the medical expert—the friggin’ world-renowned and otherworld renowned cardiologist. He should have known.

Pride and anger replaced the hurt in her narrowed eyes. “No, you’d actually have to be around in order to tell me what to do,” she said, the smile leaving her face as bitterness sharpened her voice. “And you weren’t around for much of our marriage.”

He couldn’t argue with her, nor could he apologize—not without offering an explanation that would put her in more danger than she already was.

“Why are you around now, Ben?” she asked.

Guilt. Fear. Love. He could have named any of them and been speaking the truth. But then he’d have to explain something that defied explanation. The damn secret society.

“I’m worried about you,” he said. “You’re in danger.”

She shook her head. “You don’t know that….”

“The flowers, the car…”

“That all could have been a mistake,” she insisted stubbornly.

How had he forgotten how stubborn Paige could be? It was one of the things he loved about her. “You can’t take that chance. And neither can I,” he said. “Let me move in here. Let me take care of you.”

She laughed again, but this time tears sparkled in her eyes. “Oh, Ben, that would only set us both up for disappointment.”

“What do you mean?” If she was worried about him falling for her again, it was already too late. He had never fallen out of love with her, and he worried that he never would—no matter that they had no future.