Married for Amari's Heir Read online

  And she wasn’t just confessing to him, but to herself.

  Suddenly, she felt drained. Dirty. Desolate.

  Acquiring a moral compass was overrated.

  “Do you suppose there’s a place in life where you become past the point of redemption?” she asked.

  “I’ve never considered it.” He sat down on the edge of the bed. “But then, that could be because I never imagined I had the option of redemption.”

  “I probably don’t either then.”

  “Is it so important? What’s the purpose, anyway? Is it that you want to be considered good?” he asked.

  “I...I never really thought very much about whether or not I was good or bad. I remember asking my father one time why we were afraid of the good guys. The police. Because, even I knew from watching TV that they were supposed to be good. And people who ran from them were bad. So, I asked him if we were bad. He said it isn’t that simple. He said sometimes good people do bad things, and bad people do good things. He said that not everyone in a uniform is good. But I just wanted to know if we were good. Maybe I still do.”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Doesn’t it? I don’t know that anybody aspires to be one of the bad guys. And...I want to teach our child to be good so...I should be, too.”

  “I suppose you can only really be a good or bad guy in your own life, at least, in my experience. There are a great many people who would characterize me as a villain, though I have never broken the law. However, I have accomplished what I set out to accomplish. I have created the life for myself that I always wanted. What does being good have to do with any of that?”

  Charity frowned. “I don’t know. But I’m not sure I really know who I am. How can I know if I’m good or bad if I don’t know the answer to such a simple question?”

  “Do you suppose if we get a nanny she can help us with these sorts of questions?”

  Charity laughed, in spite of herself. “You mean, do you suppose she would mind helping a couple of emotionally stunted adults?”

  “I suppose you and I don’t make the most functional pair.”

  “Are we a pair?”

  “Only in the sense that there are two of us, and we will be raising this child. Though, in what capacity I’m still not certain.”

  She wanted to ask him about last night. Wanted to ask him if he had slept with someone else. But it seemed strange, and not her business. Since she had made a grand declaration about the fact that she would not be sleeping with him again.

  Though, right now she felt less resolute in that. Possibly because she felt less resolute about everything. Because as soon as she had spoken the words about not knowing who she was, she realized that they were true. She knew how to put on masks, how to play parts. Even when she had decided to step away from her father, from the con games, all she had done was put on the mask of waitress, woman in her early twenties. She hadn’t made real connections with anyone, hadn’t made friends. Had not assigned any kind of depth to the persona she had been playing for the past couple of years.

  For a moment, she was worried that was all there was. That she had played too many parts on too shallow a level to ever find anything beneath them. What kind of mother would that make her? What did that mean for the rest of her life?

  No wonder it had been so easy for her mother to leave her. No wonder it had been so easy for her father to detach from her in the end. There was no substance in her to hold on to.

  That can’t be true.

  At least, she wouldn’t let it continue to be true. And she’d...she’d felt the implications of what she’d done. She still did. That had to mean something.

  She needed dreams. She hadn’t let herself have any, not since the last con. Because, she was afraid that her dreams would outstrip her means, and that she would fall back into the same behavior she’d been raised in. But she couldn’t live like that. For the sake of her child, she had to be more.

  Of course, she had no idea what her future held, because it seemed as though Rocco was currently clutching it in his palm. For those brief moments outside of his office, back in New York, she had imagined a life blissfully raising her child, alone. That had seemed satisfactory. But once again everything had been uprooted. Her fantasies proving impossible.

  “Don’t worry about whether or not you are good or bad,” he said, finally. “What you really need to focus on is making it to a day where you don’t vomit in the morning.”

  “Oh, Rocco. You do fill a girl with hope and butterflies.”

  He frowned. “I am trying to help.”

  “But you aren’t being nice,” she said, a small smile curving her lips. “According to you.”

  He shook his head. “No, I am being practical. My mother used to bring me tea.”

  Charity’s chest tightened. Imagining Rocco as a little boy, a little boy she knew had ended up alone. It made her ache for him. And it made her feel swollen with emotion. Because, this one bit of tenderness he seemed to know, he had chosen to pass on to her. Whether he called it practicality or kindness, it didn’t change the fact that he was giving some to her.

  “Well, I appreciate it. I really do.” She cleared her throat and picked up one of the pieces of toast, neglecting the jam, because she wasn’t certain her stomach could handle it yet. “Though, you don’t need to come and hold my hair when I’m... It’s gross.”

  “I find nothing gross about it. You are sick. You are sick because of my baby. It seems only fair that I should take care of you.”

  “Is that what this is? You’re going to take care of me?”

  “I confess, I hadn’t really thought it through.”

  “Somehow, I feel like that’s the story of every single interaction you and I have had, indirectly or directly,” she said.

  “Probably. Had one of us been thinking more clearly at any stage of this, things could’ve turned out quite differently.”

  “Yes, we should begin that soon.”

  “I’m thinking quite clearly now.”

  Charity opened the small jar of jam and began to spread a little bit onto the piece of toast, feeling slightly more emboldened as she had taken three or four bites and not felt her stomach turn once. She lifted the toast to her lips, a little bit of bread crumb getting on her thumb, sticking to where some jam had made contact with her skin.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” she said.

  Silence settled between them and she looked up at him, meeting his eyes. He was watching her, a strange softness in his expression. At least, if it had been any other man she might have thought it was softness. With Rocco, it never was.

  “What?” she asked.

  “I’m thinking,” he said.

  “About?”

  “The fact that I will probably try and seduce you.”

  She sputtered, putting her toast back down on the plate, crumbs still sticking to her fingers. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “I’m going to seduce you,” he said, his tone decisive. “I will succeed. We both know that.”

  She spread her hands wide. “I just threw up in front of you, and I’m now lying in bed covered in jam. How could you possibly be thinking about seduction? And you really think I’ll agree to...be seduced?”

  “Yes,” he said, turning away and walking toward the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I thought I would wait to seduce you until you felt better. Do you require anything else?”

  She felt as if she’d been hit over the head with something very heavy. “No.”

  “You seem confused.”

  “How did we get from tea and toast to...seduction?”

  “I want you,” he said. “I have, from the first moment I saw you. I am...used to having what I want.”

  “But I’m a woman and not
a Ferrari. So you can’t just come down to the lot and plunk down cash. I have a say.”

  “I know,” he said. “And I want you to say yes. I value the yes, Charity. It means nothing if you don’t want me, too. Which is why I plan to seduce you, not simply take you. We will talk later.” Then he stood and walked out, leaving her with a promised seduction, tea and toast.

  * * *

  Seduction really was the most logical course of action. Because he had not been able to force himself to get excited about any of the women he had encountered last night. And he needed to prove to himself that he could take control of whatever this thing was that seemed to take him over whenever he was around Charity.

  And when he’d been sitting there, looking down at her he had felt...a strange warmth in his chest. And it had pulled at him. Called to him. And she had asked “what.” What he was thinking, he assumed, and his mind had been blank.

  He hadn’t been thinking. He’d been feeling.

  Then for some reason seduction was the first thing that came out of his mouth.

  But really, it made sense.

  That day in the hotel she had challenged everything he had ever known about himself. He did not lose control, and yet, with her he had. So he could continue to avoid her, which would keep her in possession of his control, or he could stoke the fire of the things that burned between them, bring them under his command.

  Yes, that was definitely the better idea.

  The only other option was allowing his beautiful little thief to claim total control over his libido and that was not acceptable.

  He strode through the villa, wearing a different suit to the one he had been wearing last night, feeling reinvigorated. He had not slept at all since coming home, but in lieu of sleep, his new plan would do just as well.

  He moved through the living area and onto the terrace, taking in the grounds. He had not encountered Charity in the house, and he wondered if she was still sick in bed. Her feeling sick would be an impediment to his plan.

  His plan had begun to seem very important, as he doubted he would find another means to get his interactions with her on track. Not as long as he was distracted by his desire for her body.

  He could nearly taste her again. Those sweet, dusky-rose lips and the honey between her thighs. He was hard just thinking about it. How long had it been since he’d wanted one woman specifically? Had he ever?

  He wanted sex, women in a general sense, but never specifically. Art, cars, things, he craved with a ferocious specificity, but never women. He craved beauty so that he could collect it, keep it.

  He craved things because the more he owned, the more there was of him. The more evidence there was of his power. Never had he felt more helpless than as a boy with nothing. And so, he had become a man with everything.

  It was why he had built a house into a carved mountainside that gazed out at the sea, owning a piece of what was wild. Taming it.

  He wanted to tame her. Keep her. Make her his.

  The epiphany was utterly disturbing, and yet he realized, standing there scanning all that he owned, it was her he was searching for. And no amount of awareness about the nature of his attraction would stop him searching for her.

  She had him. And he had to reverse that ownership.

  He saw a faint splash coming from the courtyard, from the large infinity pool that overlooked the sea. His gut tightened. It was her. He knew it was her.

  He moved away from the terrace and back into the living room, striding out the double doors that led to the walled-in garden. There was an outdoor living area, with a bed and gauzy curtains, perfect for those times when he simply couldn’t wait to get a lover indoors. The pool and its glass wall faced the sea and a completely private beach, if he enjoyed the feeling of putting on a show without actually having an audience.

  And Rocco had to confess, without any shame, that he did.

  He looked at the pool and saw barely a ripple. Then, her sleek, dark head resurfaced. She had her back to him, her black curls tamed by the water. She pushed her hands back over her hair, droplets sluicing down over her hair, her arms.

  “The view from here is very nice,” he said.

  She whirled around quickly, her eyes wide, her mouth open. His eyes fell to the low cut of the bathing suit she was wearing—one that must have been provided by his staff, as he had requested sometime last night that they see to it that his guest had clothes. It was a one-piece suit. Out of deference to her pregnancy, he imagined. And yet it was still incredibly sexy.

  He couldn’t tear his eyes away from her breasts. They were average size, he supposed, but incredible. Perfectly round with lovely, caramel nipples that had set his body on fire. He was obsessed with tasting her again. Everywhere.

  “I thought so,” she said, offering him a strained smile. “You picked a great location for the pool.”

  “I wasn’t talking about the ocean.”

  Her cheeks darkened. “Oh.”

  He moved closer to the pool, closer to her. He couldn’t help himself.

  With her, he could never seem to help himself. “You are beautiful, cara mia, surely you know that.”

  She lifted a shoulder, a water droplet rolling down her skin. “I don’t think about it often.”

  “Not at all?”

  She shrugged again and began to walk toward the steps of the pool. Slowly she rose from the water, revealing her body inch by delectable inch. He could not yet see any changes from the pregnancy, though she was nearly at the three-month mark by now. She was still slim, the rounded curves of her body pure perfection. He could remember clearly what it had been like to run his hands over all that bare skin...

  “It doesn’t mean anything to me. In my position in life either you use your beauty to manipulate, or you don’t. Until I met you, I’d never used my body. Not even for a con.”

  “I am curious,” he said, and he found he was, “when did you stop helping your father? And why did you go back?”

  She let out a heavy sigh and walked over to the chair that had a white towel folded and placed in the center. She picked it up and started to dry herself, wrapping it tightly around her hips. “When I was about seventeen I told him I didn’t want to play the game anymore. He wasn’t happy, but I was basically taking care of myself anyway. A lot of what I did was facilitating corporate scams and charity frauds.” She lowered her eyes. “It was bad. But I’d always done it and...I just didn’t think much about it. He used to say that there was no amount of hard work that could ever get regular people like us to the top. He said if people weren’t smart enough they didn’t deserve to keep their cash. ‘A fool and his money are soon parted’ was always one of his favorite phrases. Of course, it never applied to him and how fast he went through whatever he got.”

  “Naturally not,” Rocco said, keeping his voice neutral.

  “But there was a point when I realized it was...not something I wanted to do. So I stopped. And he left town about six months later. I got a job waitressing. I’d been doing that for about three years when he came back. I hadn’t heard from him at all for the last year. And I was struggling and it sounded so easy. More than that...my dad was back. I’ve never been able to say no to him because I just want to be...I want us to be a family. He’s all I have. And it was just one more job—hit AmariCorp, get them to invest in us, roll out with the money. I swear I didn’t know it would be so much. And...look, it was wrong,” she said, dark eyes blazing, “I know it was. Old habits and stuff. I got tempted to cut corners and I didn’t hold up to the temptation. I did it because I knew that I wouldn’t make that much in a year of work and I was tired of struggling. And then he took off, and I felt like crap and I just...well, I never saw any of the money we took from you. It took us a couple months to organize the scam, another one for me to realize my dad left me in the lurch and another three fo
r you to find me. And you made me pay, Rocco. You made me pay enough that I know I’ll remember the cost if I’m ever tempted again. Nothing is free.”

  Her words sat uncomfortably in his gut. “I made you pay. With sex?”

  “Among other things. I don’t know if I ever truly understood how wrong it all was until I met you and it...it hurts.”

  “I feel I have asked too much of you,” he said, moving to close the distance between them. “I am...I regret the way things passed between us.”

  “You’re sorry?” she asked, tilting her head to the side.

  He frowned. “I would not go that far.”

  “I feel all warm inside, Rocco. I really do.”

  He moved to her, wrapped his arm around her waist and tugged her up against his body. His heart was raging, his hands shaking and he didn’t have any idea why.

  “I am not sorry,” he said, his voice rough, “because I cannot regret wanting you. I cannot regret having you. Even though I should.”

  He raised his hand to her cheek and slid his thumb over her lip, slicking up a drop of water that remained there. She was the epitome of beauty, a living embodiment of all the things he surrounded himself with. All the things he tried to collect. All of the things he wanted to own. And she didn’t want him.

  It enraged him, that she was so close to him, and yet so far from him in so many ways.

  No, it was unacceptable. He would not endure it.

  “I’m cold,” she said, shivering.

  “I could make you warm,” he said, his voice rough.

  “Why?” she asked, her eyes searching his.

  “Because I want you,” he said, tracing the perfectly shaped line of her upper lip before sliding his fingertips over her sculpted cheekbones. Learning her face. Taking possession of it.

  “But I don’t understand why you want me. You’ve given me every indication that you hate me. You humiliated me in New York. You used me. And whether you want to talk about it or not, you paid for my body. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “None of this makes sense. When you walked into that hotel in New York I had every intention of humiliating you. I wanted to leave you in that hotel room aching and begging for me. I didn’t think I would want you. How could I want a thief?” He gripped her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t think you understand, Charity. Nobody steals from me. What I have earned is precious to me in ways very few people comprehend. I despised you before I laid eyes on you. I was not supposed to want you.”