I froze. “You mean, marry Robert?”
He swept my hair back from my face, running his thumbs along my cheekbones. My jaw. My lips. “I mean . . .” He raised his hips in an aching thrust. “Tell them all to fuck off.”
I closed my eyes, imagining how freeing it would be to waltz into my betrothal ball tomorrow night and give the whole bloody lot of them two fingers.
“You can live here.” He moved again, harder, deeper. “And I could . . . come to you . . . whenever . . . you want.”
Live here? In his townhouse?
I wouldn’t have to die.
My father and Keelynn could come as well.
The sale of the estate would surely provide enough funds to pay my father’s debts and save us from destitution.
My mind spun with possibilities. I couldn’t think straight with him moving . . . like . . .that.
Dammit.
None of those things addressed the real reason I had bargained with him in the first place.
Keelynn loved Robert.
One year.
That’s all it would cost me to fix every single problem in one fell swoop.
I pressed a hand against the tensed muscles of his abdomen, and he stilled. “I can’t.”
Brow furrowing, he stared up at me through clear blue eyes. “You can. But you’re choosing not to.”
He wanted to argue oversemanticsright now? “That’s right. I’mchoosingnot to.” I was making a choice for myself—and for Keelynn. I wouldn’t let some man swoop in and tell me what I should do. “This isn’t about me—or about you, for that matter. This is about my sister.”
His eyes shuttered before he looked away. “Right. My apologies for misreading the situation.” He gestured toward our connected bodies. “I thought perhaps it may be alittleabout me.”
Why did men have to be so bloody selfish?
“So, what? You just want me to live in this townhouse for as long as you’re interested? What sort of life would that be for me?”
“Forget I said anything.”
How the hell did he expect me to do that when it was all I could think about?
I shoved him back and climbed off his lap, needing to get away, to clear my head. My damp thighs shook as I searched for something to wear that hadn’t been shredded. Brilliant. My undergarments were ruined. Where the hell was my shift?
“You’re overreacting,” he said.
“Am I? Because I’m fairly certain you just asked me to be your whore.” He hadn’t professed his undying love or offered me marriage.
He had offered me a house and sex.
By the time I’d situated myself, Rían was fully dressed. He handed me a beautiful blue dressing gown he’d shifted from heaven knows where.
I tore the gown from his grasp and threw it in the fire where it belonged.
Rían’s expression turned as dark as the black smoke twisting up the chimney. “Aveen, I’m sorry I said—”
“No. No more talking.” I couldn’t handle him saying something else and making me feel worse than I already did. I collected my cloak and threw it around my shoulders. “Take me home.”