think it’s silly?” He moved toward her with a lazy confidence, as if he knew he had all the time in the world. As if he owned this night. As if he owned her, which, in a way, he did.
“Why silly? Are you trying to tell me you’ve really been in the shower all this time?”
She’d never been a good liar. The only person she’d ever needed to lie to had been her grandfather, and her pride had forced her to battle it out with him, toe-to-toe, instead. So now she hesitated just a moment too long.
Trent reached her just as she was opening her mouth to say yes, yes, of course I’ve been in the shower.
One eyebrow rose in that classic, mocking arch as he shook his head slowly. He laid his finger against her lips.
“No,” he said. “Don’t bother to fib. If you’d been under water all this time, you’d be as wrinkled as a raisin.”
Instinctively, she folded her hands into fists. He glanced down at them, and his grin deepened. “Shall we look?”
Damn him…he was so cool, so amused by her discomfort. When he touched her hand, she had to resist the urge to slap him. He hadn’t bought the right to mock her.
But he had bought the right to touch her. He’d been very clear about that. No way in hell was he going to sign on for a year of chastity. “I’m no saint,” he had said, with that maddening smile that made it impossible to tell how he really felt. “So you’d better decide whether you can deal with sharing my bed for a whole year.”
He took one of her hands, gently pried open the fingers and held it up for inspection. Her fingers were warm and damp, but smooth. No wrinkles. She’d been in the shower a total of maybe five minutes, just long enough to scrub off her makeup.
“So what were you doing in there?” His gaze flicked across her wet hair and bare face, then skimmed the lumpy contours of her overwashed nightgown. “Not primping, apparently. Although…it might have taken a while to dig up anything as unflattering as this rag.”
“If I’d had enough money to buy a trousseau, Trent, I wouldn’t have needed a husband in the first place.”
He chuckled. Could this really be funny to him? Surely he, too, remembered how often they had dreamed of their wedding night. That fairy-tale dream had sparkled with magic, with lace and music and romance and roses. The reality was going to be so different.…
But perhaps the fairy dust had been her dream, not his. Though they’d been close, she hadn’t ever completely understood him, with his cryptic smiles and his elegant indifference. Perhaps, for him, it had just been about the sex.
“What exactly are you trying to accomplish with all this, Susannah?”
“All what?”
He tugged at the sleeve of her nightgown. The neckline was shot, so even that light pressure caused it to slip over her shoulder. She felt suddenly half-naked.
“This plain-Jane costume. Were you hoping it would turn me off? Did you think you could make yourself so ugly I’d run screaming from the marriage bed?”
“No.”
“Good. Because that really would be silly.” He set her hand free and put his forefinger under her chin. “The chemistry between us has nothing to do with packaging. It never has.”
She couldn’t deny it. Back when they were little more than kids, this fire between them had erupted like one of her grandfather’s oil drills hitting a pocket of natural gas. Nothing had been strong enough to put it out. It had overpowered pimples and puberty, flus and hangovers, bad moods and bad hair, and even the day the skunk sprayed her right in the face.
It had even outlived love.
She still felt it, arcing between them now. A primal force. Blind and fierce and involuntary.
And dangerous. At least to her.
“Susannah.” His voice was a whisper. He moved her wet hair from her shoulder and bent his head toward her bare skin. She made a small, trapped sound, knowing he was going to kiss her.
She couldn’t let it happen. Her heart tripped on itself merely at the sound of his voice. The touch of his lips would cause it to explode.
Mumbling something meaningless, she jerked away from him, toward her nightstand. She couldn’t breathe, but somehow she kept moving. That piece of paper was her last hope. Like the cyanide pill issued to soldiers, in case of capture.
She flicked on the bedside lamp. Then, her hands shaking only a little, she slid open the top drawer and felt around the stacks of papers inside. It should be on top. She’d written it hastily, only this afternoon.
“I have something.…”
She glanced at him, hoping she didn’t sound as nervous as she felt. To her surprise, he was smiling. Not a genuine, warm smile, of course—those were rare—but his one-dimple teasing grin was pretty dazzling, too.
“Ah.” He glanced at the drawer. “The practical princess strikes again.”
“What?” He and Chase had always called her that, back when they were teenagers, and she’d been one inch less reckless than the two boys. But why now? Could he possibly guess what she’d written on that paper?
His dimple deepened. “I think I brought plenty, thanks, though it’s nice to know you’ve got extra. Just in case.”
“Extra what?” Then she realized what he meant. Condoms. Her breath came shallowly as she tried not to imagine the tumbled bed, the discarded silver wrappers littering the floor, their sweaty bodies braided together in the moonlight. “No. It’s not that. I have something I want to show you.”
Finally her fingers closed around the long white envelope. She pulled it out and extended it toward him. “It’s something I’d like you to read. Something I’d like you to sign.”
He didn’t look at the envelope. The smile stayed in place, but it lost any hint of humor. Above it, his gaze held hers, cool and unblinking blue inside a thick fringe of black lashes. Oh, even when he was angry, he was lethally attractive.
“Sign?”
The word was even colder than his eyes.
“Yes,” she said, too quickly. “I got to thinking about things, today after the wedding, and I realized we hadn’t really considered…everything.”
“No? It seemed to me the prenup your lawyer drew up was pretty damn thorough. He made it quite clear that I’ll be shot if I’m caught crossing the Everly threshold with so much as one pillowcase from your mother’s needlepoint collection.” He lifted an eyebrow. “Which wasn’t very likely in the first place, was it?”
“No. It was silly, but Richard’s careful. He wanted to protect me—”
“Was the medical certificate his idea, too?”
She felt heat crawling up her throat toward her cheeks. The medical certificate had almost scotched the whole deal. But when Trent had insisted on a physical relationship, she had insisted that he prove he was healthy.
