But I clench my jaw and look away from Natalia clinging to Kent’s arm, knowing that we’ve made a decision about how to play this. And that I’ve got to stick to it.
“Let her,” Kent said to me a few weeks ago as we laid tangled in the sheets of his dark room. “Let her think that I’m considering her as my wife, Fay.”
“Are you?” I asked, hoping that my voice didn’t betray my terror at the idea. That I could lose him to that horrible woman –
“No,” he had insisted, taking my chin in his broad hand and making me look at him. “No, Fay, I don’t want her. But…until this settles, until we come up with a solution that makes the business secure without the Bianci’s insisting on a second marriage pact to solidify it? Let her burn herself out spinning her wheels. Let her think she’s getting somewhere with me. Let her try.”
I tore my chin from his hand, then, turning my face away and scowling down at the bed. “But what if she succeeds?” I grumbled, a little alarmed at the level of jealousy I’m feeling at the idea of it. “What if she wiles you away with her stupid Italian charms –“
Kent just laughed and slid his hand from my shoulder all the way down my back to land on my ass, which he gripped tight in his palm. “How could she do that,” he murmured, dipping his head to lick a long stroke between my breasts, “when I’ve got you here, hogging my bed –“
“What!” I shrieked, slapping at his back and laughing. “I do not hog the bed –“
“You do,” he murmured. “You spread out like a starfish – it’s horrible –“
But then I wiggled down on the mattress so that his body was leveled above me, his weight pressing me down, just the way I like it. I made him look at me, right in the eyes, not letting him get away with distracting me. “Promise me, Kent,” I whispered, trying desperately not to wear my entire heart on my sleeve. “Promise me you won’t leave me for her.”
And he did.
Kent whispered his promise against my lips, and then a dozen more times as he worked his way down my body, pressing a kiss against my skin after each one.
“Really?” Daniel asks, looking up at her interestedly, his face warm and fond. I watch him, a little jealous at his ability to play nice so easily.
“Yes,” she says, tapping his nose with a motherly finger. “I have made a little party for you two! You will be meeting some others of the young ones from good families,” she says, smiling at both of us. “And your Ivan will be there,” she adds, nodding to me and giving me a little wink. “I know how much you like him.”
My mouth falls open a little at this, at her nerve. Ivan – I haven’t spoken to him in weeks, not since the party. He texted a lot at the start – but now we’ve gone silent.
“Oh,” Daniel says, glancing between us. “Thank you, Natalia, but I’m not sure we should –“
“Ohhhh,” she says, leaning down and wrapping an arm around his shoulders in a little hug. “You’ll go! You’ll have fun! You two – spending all day wrapped up in that room, reading books after Fay goes and plays with animals all morning!” She stands sharply up and rolls her eyes at us. “You need a little life – have some fun. You leave it to me. I arranged it all.”
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