Accidentally Married to the Billionaire 1(34)

“I don’t know why I can’t seem to tell you no,” she said, her voice softening, “Maybe it’s because I want to be married to you even if it’s just for show. We could have fun, couldn’t we?”

“We could try. I don’t consider my life to be a great deal of fun, but I think you could make it a lot more pleasant. Indiscreet or not, I have to say that last night was incredible. You’re a woman who knows what she wants.”

“Which is fine as long as I don’t decide I really want you,” she said.

“That would be more than fine with me, Marjorie,” he said.

Brandon wasn’t sure anymore if he was trying to charm her or if what he said was true. The lines were blurring. She was shocked that he’d really settle enough money on her for subsistence after their parting? How badly had she been treated, to learn to expect so little from people—from men?

Brandon leaned in and kissed the top of her head, her auburn hair silky against his lips.

“I don’t want to fall for you. I’m afraid,” she said huskily.

“Then just lean back and watch the fire. Give yourself a minute to breathe.”

Marj shifted, snuggling against him, her head on his shoulder.

“This is nice,” she said, “I could handle six months of this, easy.”

“I wish I could promise you that. It’s not likely to be much like this. There isn’t a great deal of stillness in my life. I have meetings and charity events and sometimes I think I’m on a plane as much as I’m on solid ground.”

“Wouldn’t it be good to have someone with you then? Less lonely?”

“It would be grand, but—and I’m optimistic that you even asked that, I’m not trying to talk you out of it. I only want you to know that lounging by the fire after supper isn’t something that happens very often. A late dinner meeting followed by a Skype conference, some emails and then a few hours’ sleep, workout, then back to work.”

“Tell me again why you want this job so bad if that’s all your life is?”

“It’s—a connection to my dad, I guess. It’s what he raised me to do, what he sent me to school for. I can’t stand the thought of Lena squandering all of his life’s work, of wrecking it...”

“This company isn’t his legacy, Cates. You are. You’re what he left behind. And he probably raised you because you were his son and he loved you, not because he needed a placeholder,” she said, stalwart.

“You didn’t know my father,” he said, his voice a bit hollow.

“You’re right. I didn’t. If he married someone like the Wicked Queen, he probably wasn’t my kind of people. No offense, but I doubt we would’ve been besties. As for what you do now, your dad doesn’t get a vote. You do. So what do you really want? Not what you think you’re supposed to do, but what you want.”

Brandon shifted uncomfortably, not liking the solemn tenor of the conversation or the inconvenient fact that the woman beside him, his two days’ bride, was the first person to ever ask him what he wanted out of life. The question was disturbing. The answer was worse.

“I think I want you,” he said.

“Good answer, Cates,” Marj said with a sly smile.





Chapter 14


Marj had promised herself when she put on that slinky dress that hugged her figure in all the right places that she wasn’t going to let him take it off of her. That she would make a decision cold sober and without the persuasion of his mad skills in the sack. But when she asked him what he wanted, and all he said was that he wanted her, she had seen him, really seen him. Not the corporate titan, the cover boy for Fortune. The man, who had lost his father and was trying his damnedest to hold on to the only thing he had left of his family—a business. And she wanted to help him. Her heart went out to him, more than she cared to admit.

Marj felt the urge to comfort him, to hold and kiss him, as an entirely separate impulse from the clench she felt low in her belly every time his hand brushed her wrist or he kissed her hair. And what was with that? The hair kissing. He’d done it twice, and the heat of his mouth, his warm breath on her hair made her feel tingly from her scalp to her toes.

She’d held herself together pretty well, except for setting that one little fire and that was purely an accident. Just like the fact that she was currently nuzzling him was totally involuntary. It was an automatic result of the crackling fire in the fireplace, the luxurious suite, the luscious food and the proximity of an undeniably hot man who had so far said some pretty amazing things to her and shown himself to be caring, to have an affectionate heart, even if he was defensive.