Whenever Maggie got that look on her face—an expression that said she had something to say he wasn’t going to like—Justice knew trouble was coming.
But then, he’d been halfway prepared for that since this “lost” weekend had begun. Nothing had changed. He and Maggie, despite the obvious chemistry they shared, were still miles apart in the things that mattered, and great sex wasn’t going to alter that any.
Her red-gold hair spilled across her pillow like hot silk. She held the dark blue sheet to her breasts even as she slid one creamy white leg free of the covers. She made a picture that engraved itself in Justice’s mind, and he knew that no matter how long he lived, he would always see her as she was right at this moment.
He also knew that this last image of her would torment him forever.
“Justice,” she said, “we have to talk.”
“Why?” He stood up, crossed to the chair where he’d tossed his jeans and tugged them on. A man needed his pants on when he had a conversation with Maggie King.
“Don’t.”
He glanced at her. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t shut me out. Not this time. Not now.”
“I’m not doing anything, Maggie.”
“That’s my point.” She sat up, the mattress beneath her shifting a little with her movements.
Justice turned his head to look at her, and everything in him roared at him to stalk to her side, grab her and hold her so damn tight she wouldn’t have the breath to start another argument neither of them could win.
Her hair tumbled around her shoulders, and she lifted one hand to impatiently push the mass behind her shoulders. “You’re not going to ask me to stay, are you?”
He shouldn’t have to, Justice told himself. She was his damn wife. Why should he have to ask her to be with him? She was the one who’d left.
He didn’t say any of that, though, just shook his head and buttoned the fly of his jeans. He didn’t speak again until his bare feet were braced wide apart. A man could lose his balance all too easily when talking to Maggie. “What good would it do to ask you to stay? Eventually, you’d leave again.”
“I wouldn’t have to if you’d bend a little.”
“I won’t bend on this,” he assured her, though it cost him as he noted the flash of pain in her eyes that was there and then gone in a blink.
“Why not?” She pushed out of the bed, dropping the sheet and facing him, naked and proud.
His body hardened instantly, despite just how many times they’d made love over the past few hours. Seemed his dick was always ready when it came to Maggie.
“We are who we are,” he told her, folding his arms across his chest. “You want kids. I don’t. End of story.”
Her mouth worked and he knew she was struggling not to shout and rail at him. But then, Maggie’s hot Irish temper was one of the things that had first drawn him to her. She blazed like a sun during an argument—standing her ground no matter who stood against her. He admired that trait even though it made him a little crazy sometimes.
“Damn it, Justice!” She stalked to the chair where she’d left her clothes and grabbed her bra and panties. Slipping them on, she shook her head and kept talking. “You’re willing to give up what we have because you don’t want a child?”
Irritation raced through him; he couldn’t stop it. But he wasn’t going to get into this argument again.
“I told you how I felt before we got married, Maggie,” he reminded her, in a calm, patient tone he knew would drive her to distraction.
As expected, she whipped her hair back out of her eyes, glared at him fiercely, then picked up her pale pink blouse and put it on. While her fingers did up the buttons, she snapped, “Yes, but I just thought you didn’t want kids that instant. I never thought you meant ever.”
“Your mistake,” he said softly.
“But one you didn’t bother to clear up,” she countered.
“Maggie,” he said tightly, “do we really have to do this again?”
“Why the hell not?” she demanded. Then pointing to the bed, she snapped, “We just spent an incredible weekend together, Justice. And you’re telling me you feel nothing?”
He’d be a liar if he tried. But admitting what he was feeling still wouldn’t change a thing. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to,” she told him. “The very fact that you’re willing to let me walk…again…tells me everything I need to know.”
His back teeth ground together until he wouldn’t have been surprised to find them nothing more than gritty powder in his mouth. She thought she knew him, thought she knew what he was doing and why, but she didn’t have a clue. And never would, he reminded himself.
“Hell, Justice, you wouldn’t back down even if you did change your mind, would you? Oh, no. Not Justice King. His pride motivates his every action—”
He inhaled deeply and folded his arms across his bare chest. “Maggie…”
She held up one hand to cut off whatever else he might say, and though he felt a kick to his own temper, he shut up and let her have her say.
“You know what? I’m sick to death of your pride, Justice. The great Justice King. Master of his Universe.” She slapped both hands to her hips and lifted her chin. “You’re so busy arranging the world to your specifications that there is absolutely no compromise in you.”
“Why the hell should there be?” Justice took a half step toward her and stopped. Only because he knew if he got close enough to inhale her scent, he’d be lost again. He’d toss her back into the bed, bury himself inside her—and what would that solve? Not a thing. Sooner or later, they’d end up right here. Back at the fight that had finally finished their marriage.
“Because there were two of us in our marriage, Justice. Not just you.”
“Right,” he said with a brief, hard nod. He didn’t like arguments. Didn’t think they solved anything. If two people were far enough apart on an issue, then shouting at each other over it wasn’t going to help any. But there was only just so much he was willing to take. “You want compromise? We each give a little? So how would you manage that here, Maggie? Have half a child?”
“Not funny at all, Justice.” Maggie huffed out a breath. “You knew what family meant to me. What it still means to me.”
“And you knew how I felt, too.” Keeping his gaze steady and cool on hers, he said, “There’s no compromise here, Maggie, and you know it. I can’t give you what you want, and you can’t be happy without it.”
As if all the air had left her body, she slumped, the flash of temper gone only to be replaced by a well of defeat that glimmered in her eyes. And that tore at him. He hated seeing Maggie’s spirit shattered. Hated even more that he was the one who’d caused it.
