The Scandal You Started, page 32
“Ha!” Benedict slapped his knife down and rotated to face her. “Explain to me how you were going to notice something you refuse to believe exists.”
She scowled, and he smirked triumphantly.
As he straightened, he flapped his hands around and spoke in a high-pitched voice. “Love is so stupid. I’ll never fall in love. Men suck. Marriage is a waste of time. I want to be single forever.”
Rayna frowned between them as George snickered and removed the pan from the flame. “I don’t fucking sound like that, you piece of shit,” she grumbled and thrust the bowl of tomatoes towards Benedict.
He chuckled, taking the bowl. “Yeah, but you say stuff like that.”
She shot straight. “Yeah, and I always meant it too.”
They both stilled and glanced at each other, then turned their creepy grins on her.
“What?” she muttered, wanting to squirm away.
“You said ‘meant,’” Benedict said. “As in past tense.”
“Does that mean you don’t mean it anymore?” George asked.
Her lips parted on a soundless syllable before she paused and replayed her sentence in her head. Her blood ignited in embarrassment, and she clapped her lips together, quickly shaking her head. “No. No. I don’t believe in love, and marriage is a waste of time.”
“But?” George encouraged softly.
She opened her mouth, and closed it. And opened it again. And closed it with a frustrated sound.
“I don’t…” She sighed. “I don’t understand how this happened. Why does he make me feel…” She paused before realising that was the end of her sentence. “He makes me feel, and I don’t get it. I don’t understand why I got attached. I don’t get why he seems…different.”
“Maybe because he is different,” Benedict said, like it was obvious. “He’s not just different from the guys you normally go for, but he’s different from you too. He challenges what you always thought you wanted in life, the way no man ever has.”
“I hate it,” she sulked.
“No, you don’t,” George said with a chuckle. “You just never expected to meet someone who might actually succeed in proving you wrong.”
Rayna glared with puffed cheeks as if the fault lay with both of them and not the man on the other side of the window. “Why aren’t you telling me it’s impossible?”
Benedict didn’t seem to have an answer, so his blue eyes went to George who shrugged his thick shoulders. “Because if anyone can find a way to make it work, it’s you and Dominic. You’re both stubborn enough to tear down the whole POTeM project if it comes to it.”
“He wants to stay,” she emphasised quietly.
“Yeah, we got that much,” said Benedict, and she wondered if it was about time she threw something at his head.
“What do you want, though?” George asked earnestly.
What did she want?
In the two days since it felt like she’d had a small epiphany at the lab, she’d asked herself the same question every time she’d looked at Dominic.
And no matter what path her thoughts took…the end answer was always the same.
Outside, around the barbecue
Victor’s gaze drifted between the back of Rayna’s head through the window to Dominic, slowly cutting a punnet of strawberries at the garden table, while Winnie chopped up a watermelon.
He shuffled around the barbecue, so his back was to them as Declan rotated skewers of marinated chicken. “Has he said anything more to you?” he asked just above a whisper.
Victor didn’t need to elaborate. Declan knew who his younger cousin was talking about. “Other than that he told her he loves her, no. Nothing more.” Declan met his cousin’s gaze. “What about her?”
Victor gave a slight shake of his head. “I’m worried she doesn’t trust me enough to.”
Declan grunted, his barrel chest giving a slight shake. “That’s absolute bull, Vic, and you know it. She trusts you, but she’s probably scared she’s going to break that trust.”
Discomfort clawed at Victor’s chest, creating a deep crevice between his brows. “I should speak to her. I should tell her it’s okay to tell me, but I don’t know with certainty she actually wants to stay with him.”
“She’s taking her time to decide. Understandably. This is Rayna we’re talking about after all, and Dominic’s asking a lot from her after such a short amount of time. But she’ll come to you when she’s ready to. Trust that she will.”
“I know. I know.” Victor pinched his glasses off and scrubbed a hand over his face. “I just hope I get the chance to tell her the truth about what happened when it actually might benefit her and Dominic, rather than when it’s too late.”
Chapter 38
Rayna
Just after midnight that night, Rayna had washed off the day’s perspiration from her skin, her belly finally didn’t feel so full, and her limbs subtly ached with a pleasant tiredness.
Benedict had had a night shift at the hospital, so he’d ended up leaving a few hours before the sun set in the August sky, while Winnie and Declan had headed home much later with plans to celebrate the rest of the holiday with their other two children and grandchild. Which left Rayna, George, and Victor to disperse to their own rooms, with Dominic making himself comfortable in the spare bedroom across from Victor’s.
It left Rayna in a bit of a predicament. She wanted to sneak into Dominic’s room and spend some time alone with him. But that meant risking Victor seeing her, so she was waiting until that side of the upstairs landing seemed a little quieter. Because once Victor’s head hit the pillow, he’d be out like a light within five minutes.
But as she plodded around her childhood room in nothing but a loose T-shirt and boxer shorts, scrolling on social media to kill time, the door clicked open behind her. The sound was so quiet, she might not have heard it if she hadn’t turned the AC off a minute prior.
She glanced over her shoulder, and her brows rose as she caught Dominic sneaking his wide frame through a small gap. He shut the door behind him as quietly as he’d opened it.
Then he stood there, his khaki T-shirt pulled taut across his bullish shoulders, a late-night shadow on his square jaw, that dent in his chin so damn sexy, his hair streaked with the lines his fingers had made at some point, and a little, crooked smile on his mouth.
So damn gorgeous. Effortlessly. Painfully. Perfectly so.
“Good evening, my lady,” he said, smoothly bowing over one bronzed arm.
There was no fighting the big grin that blossomed on Rayna’s face as she rotated to him, the soft cream carpet tickling her bare toes.
“I think you have the wrong room, Lord Norland,” she played along, blindly dropping her phone on the wooden bedside cabinet by the double bed tucked in the corner.
He strode confidently towards her. “Oh? But I was told this was the bedroom of the woman who has slept in my arms for nigh two months now.” He bent over her, all arrogant, delicious rake. “And darling, you appear to look just like her.”
“Maybe I am her,” she purred, curling her hands into the neckline of his top.
She tugged at him, but he resisted. “Uh, uh, uh, love. I cannot kiss you if I do not know for certain you are her.”
“Yet here you are calling me ‘love’ and ‘darling’ anyway.” She quirked a brow. “You go around calling every woman that?”
“I wouldn’t dare,” he just about got out before he cupped the back of her head and plastered his mouth over hers.
Her senses erupted, robbing her of any tiredness. She kissed him back, long and slow and deep, taking and giving all the kisses they hadn’t been able to share throughout the day.
“How did you sneak over here?” she rasped.
“I avoided the squeaky floorboards.”
“How did you know which ones were squeaky?”
“I tested both sets of stairs between the landing each time I came up to the bathroom.”
She stared, lips parted, in laughing disbelief. “You’re unbelievable.”
“Well, it is unreasonable to think I could accept being distanced from you for three whole nights, on top of not being able to touch you during the day either.” He nudged his nose across hers. “It is agony, and I am suffering to no end, my love.”
He was so bloody dramatic. And it was so fucking cute.
She let her lashes slip low and seductive over her eyes. “You can touch me wherever you want in here.”
His jaw locked tight. “Do not taunt me, little witch.”
He said that, but his hands skimmed down her body to wrap around her waist and under her arse so he could hoist her up. She clasped his prickly cheeks and kissed him as he walked them to her bed. He was so careful as he laid her on her back on the pillow closest to the wall. She wanted to wrap her limbs around him to keep him over her, but he climbed off the bed.
Once he found the button of the bedside lamp, he swaggered back towards the door and switched the ceiling light off. Then he made himself comfortable on the pillow next to her.
Rayna turned her head, smiling as her chest rose but never quite fell in the same way it seemed so full. Dominic smiled back, glittering hearts throbbing in his eyes in the lamplight.
It was still terrifying. Knowing that the look he’d given her lying beside her that first week had only deepened and intensified. She carried the weight of it, and she still wasn’t sure she had it in her not to drop it in a panic.
But she couldn’t imagine him looking at her in any other way. Didn’t want to imagine it.
Wordlessly, she rolled over to face him, tucking her hands under her pillow. He didn’t say anything either. He simply massaged a hand up and down her hip.
“Did you have fun today?” she mumbled.
“I did. Very much so. Did you?”
“Hmm, I did. Uncle Declan always makes the best burgers, and Harvest Holidays are probably the only times we can convince V to play video games with us.”
Dominic’s teeth peeked out in one corner. “I must admit, I quite enjoyed beating him in the racing game. Though I do not think it won me his favour.”
Rayna giggled tiredly. “I think he was just shocked to realise he really is that bad at playing.”
For two hours, she exchanged quiet laughs with Dominic as they reminisced the antics of the day before they drifted off on random tangents and shared old memories. His hand moved between her hip and thigh and arms while her fingers twisted the hem of his T-shirt and traced the veins over his hands, but neither of them tried to close the space between them.
Yet everything about the conversation was intimate. Pleasant and gratifying even in the moments the words faded into silence. She could’ve kept at it all night.
But at some point, Dominic whispered, “I ought to leave.”
“Why?” She didn’t mean to sound so disappointed, but that was how it came out.
He flashed a grin as he brushed the back of his fingers across her cheek. “It would not serve us well if we fell asleep and Victor caught us in each other’s embrace come morning. He would never scold you, but I do not believe it would be the same in my case.”
Rayna didn’t want Victor finding out like that either, but Dominic wasn’t right about the reason.
“He likes you, you know,” she assured him. “He’s just being a grouchy dad who doesn’t want to show it.”
“Even so, my love, I would rather he did not find us in a compromising position.” He pinched her chin between his finger and thumb as he pushed himself up onto an elbow. “Though it kills me to leave you so.”
He placed a series of firm, lingering pecks on her lips. She sighed heavily between the last two, not wanting to take her hand off his nape, but he edged out of her hold with a smile.
“Good night, Rayna.”
The pounding of her heart punched through her pulse as she stared at him, unable to say it back, suddenly tongue-tied.
He began heading for the door. She lifted herself up on her palms.
Rayna? Hello?
He’s leaving, dammit! What the fuck are you doing? Say something!
But her damned mouth wasn’t cooperating. It’d completely forgotten how to shape any words, and no matter how much she willed herself to speak, the sounds weren’t coming together.
Just as he reached for the handle—
“Dominic.”
He paused and rotated halfway. “Yes, sweetheart?”
Oh, thank Neves!
She was relieved she’d managed to stop him. But it was daunting realising she actually had to say something now. Worse yet, she actually had to face her feelings.
Exhaling a deep breath, she anchored her fingers into the thin blanket under her. “Stay.”
Maybe it was a trick of the dim lighting, but she thought she saw his body flinch.
The long seconds that followed wound a blush up her face, and she fought hard not to take back what she’d said.
“For tonight, you mean?” he finally croaked.
It took a moment, but she shook her head. “Not just tonight but…with me. After the project. Here and in the past. Some balance that might…make it possible to stay together.”
Silence.
Dominic didn’t move. His expression didn’t change. She was convinced he hadn’t heard her.
Then with a quick flicker of his shadow, he was stalking towards her, unforgiving purpose and possession and determination burning in his amber-ringed stare.
Her heart skedaddled like a frightened cat on ice, and Rayna scrambled on the bed.
“Wait. Wait, wait, wait.” Her back hit the cold, painted wall, and she held her hands up. “Dominic, wait.”
He stopped short of the side of the fabric-framed bed, and she panted, her pitched shoulders dropping as if she’d only just narrowly escaped the jaws of a predator.
Her fingers trembled before her eyes, and she buried them in the blanket again. Embarrassment taunted her pride, poking and pinching her skin like a school bully. Gosh, was it frustrating, but she could do nothing to stop it.
The only option was to conquer it, because running wasn’t a choice anymore.
She gulped. “I’ve…I’ve never done this before.”
Fucking Neves, she hated how pathetic she sounded. It almost made her stop entirely, but Dominic’s presence remained steady and without judgement, so she carried on.
“I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m not even sure I know what I actually want. But every time I think about you leaving…I hate the way it feels. I don’t—I don’t think I could do it. Just watch you leave. Not without trying at least. Maybe not even then.”
She pushed even further back against the wall as the bed dipped under the weight of his palms and one knee, bringing him eye-level. “Rayna—”
“I still don’t believe in love,” she said with a rapid shake of her head. “I don’t know how to trust that it lasts or that it’s real. I’m still not sure about marriage either. I can’t just change how I’ve always felt about them overnight.”
“Darling, that is not what I want from you,” he assured her with an almost pained smile. “I love you as you are. With all your repulsed opinions of love and marriage. You do not have to change that.” His smile angled a little more playfully. “And if I may be so honest, it is a relief to know I likely will not have to worry about another man convincing you that being married to him would be better than being married to me.”
She might have rolled her eyes if baring her raw self wasn’t making her feel so strung up. She wasn’t regretting it, per se. But no one had ever warned her it’d be this unnerving.
He crawled closer until he was kneeling beside her. And damn him, because in a moment of vulnerability where she was already feeling small, he looked bigger than he ever had before.
“But you do not have to trust either if you cannot bring yourself to.” He took her hands in a secure grip. “All I ask is that you trust me. Trust that I love you dearly. Allow me to prove to you I can be trusted with your heart and happiness and wellbeing too. That is all.”
She stared at her fingers encased in his paws before raising her lashes. “You say ‘that’s all’ like you’re not asking me to hand over my entire life to you.”
He huffed a mirth-filled sound. “I do not want you to hand it over. I merely wish to share it with you. To enjoy it with you. Grow old with you.” Wispy tendrils caressed her skin as his gaze intensified. “I wish to take my last breath looking at you, knowing there was no one I could have ever loved more than I love you.”
Her heart was thumping hard, each rapid beat causing a mini earthquake in her chest. It was difficult to think over the racket, but the deeper she fell into the warm pools of his irises, the softer her erratic pulse became. Comprehension hugged her tightly.
He was right. She didn’t have to trust the concepts of love and marriage. She just had to trust him, herself, and this thing between them. She was halfway there already.
“I do trust you,” she uttered.
For the first time in a while, there wasn’t an ounce of doubt in her voice.
Dominic collapsed towards her on a shaky sigh of relief. A glassy shimmer slipped over his eyes that cracked her heart and fixed it in the same breath.
“Truly?” he said thickly.
Pulling away from the wall, she nodded. “I always have.”
It was the one thing that had remained the same since the beginning. Even when they were in each other’s faces, arguing. Maybe even when he’d had his hands wrapped around her throat, she’d trusted that he’d let her go. He had. He’d always shown her he was trustworthy.
He guided her hands to his shoulders, and like they’d done it a thousand times before, she knew exactly what he wanted from her. He drew her up and closer with the support of a solid arm, allowing her to manoeuvre herself until she was straddling his folded legs.
She encircled his neck. He did the same to her waist. Tighter. Holding her flush to him.
It was only then that she realised this big, arrogant, roguish, self-possessed oaf of a man who’d thrown her entire world upside down with his determined, ever-present existence and declarations of love was trembling.
