of her, amusement still twinkling in his eyes. Yet, underneath the levity lurked something else—a seriousness that terrified her.
“Are you saying you expect me to…you expect us to…that you want…”
She couldn’t force herself to finish that sentence.
“I want you to marry me.”
“Marry you?” She sank into the chair she had vacated earlier.
“What did you think I meant?” He studied her distraught face carefully. “Alesha, you didn’t think I wanted us to live together in sin, did you?”
“Why do you want to marry me?” She needed a cold compress for her head.
“Because I need a wife.” He reclined against his desk.
“You need a wife?” She paused before continuing. “Why?”
“According to my campaign manager, it would be good for me to be seen as a family man, and having a wife would equip me with a full-time hostess and date.”
He took no pleasure in reiterating Cam’s earlier words. Although seeing the woman who had single-handedly ruined his life two years ago in acute distress was very gratifying, indeed.
“How romantic.”
Her dry tones made his eyebrow rise slightly—he had no clue how she managed to be sarcastic at a time like this.
“You once made it clear that you didn’t want romance from me. Has that changed?”
“Do you always do what others tell you?” She deliberately sidestepped his previous question.
“Never.” He firmly shook his head.
“Then why start now?”
She couldn’t marry him—or anyone else—under these circumstances. The very idea was absurd!
“I’ve already answered that question.” His face was unreadable.
“Have you?”
Of course, he didn’t tell her that until she had walked through his office door, he had no intention of agreeing to Cam’s suggestion. Even having put the proposal on the table, he couldn’t believe he had done so. Yet, there had always been something about her—something that sparked a chord inside him. He was dismayed to learn his reaction to her hadn’t dissipated with the time they had spent apart—time she had forced them to spend apart, he angrily went over in his mind. Despite his better judgment, he still wanted her, and this time he was determined to have her—all of her.
“You don’t even like me.”
She waited for him to respond but he remained silent. Slowly, he smiled without humor and neither denied nor confirmed her observation. Lord, she wished she had never come here today! She had thought, prayed, that time would have healed old wounds. However, it was painfully apparent it had not. He obviously wanted nothing to do with her, but if that was true, why was he suggesting that they get married?
“‘Like’ is irrelevant, Alesha.”
“How can you say that? How can you suggest that we get married?”
“I told you why already.”
He sighed, his tone implying he had no desire to explain his reasons to her again or to justify them to himself.
She lowered her aching head into her hands and willed herself to wake up from this nightmare. However, when she raised her head again, the man in front of her had not vanished, as she had hoped. Rather, his presence was undeniable as he watched her closely.
“You’re serious.”
“I am.” He nodded affirmatively.
“Is this about revenge?” She articulated the only possibility that made any sense to her.
“It’s about fate, Alesha.”
“Fate?”
Her disdainful, soft echoing of his single prophetic word caused a slight clinching of his jaw—or did she imagine that?
“Yes.”
There was uncomfortable silence as each tried to guess what the other was thinking. Each one of them would have been surprised to realize their feelings were more in sync than not. Since parting, they had been destined to come to this point and now they were here. Where their lives ended up from here was a mystery to them both.
“If I agree to your proposal, what do you expect?”
She couldn’t believe she was actually contemplating his unorthodox proposition. However, she didn’t have a viable alternative—not if she wanted to save her brother.
“Model behavior, public affection. There’ll be a great deal of publicity and we will have to appear happily married and very much in love.”
Intense dread spread throughout her entire soul as he rattled off his requirements for a wife as if he were reading from a shopping list. He seemed so hard—had she done that to him? Somehow she knew she had and that hurt more than anything.
“And privately?” She stared into those cool gray eyes of his.
“You’ll have to be more specific.”
His mocking smile showed that he knew exactly what she referred to. He was getting immense pleasure in needling her.
Taking a deep breath and releasing it on a sigh she elaborated, “This will be a marriage in name only?”
“No, it will not.”
She stood up at that, her chest heaving rapidly. “You can’t expect me to…for us to…” Her voice trailed off, unable to finish that sentence.
“I can, and I do.” His eyes swept appreciatively over her slender, shapely body.
“This is ridiculous, and I’m a fool for even considering your absurd proposition!” She turned and walked rapidly toward the door.
She had a right to be angry at his suggestion. He would have been disappointed if she weren’t. He could have picked up the phone and had ten women in his office within a matter of minutes, willing to do whatever he wanted. But he didn’t want any other woman. He wanted Alesha. Damn her, he always had. He didn’t want to desire her, but he couldn’t help it any more than he could help breathing. She intrigued him and he wanted the chance she had denied them both two years ago—to get to know each other better, intellectually and intimately. And, God help him, he didn’t care that he was literally blackmailing her to get that opportunity.
He knew he was treading on dangerous ground—he also knew there was absolutely nothing he could do to stop himself. He craved Alesha, and this time he was going to do whatever it took to get her and to make her admit that she wanted him, as well. He wouldn’t allow himself to dwell on why her desiring him was of the utmost importance to him.
