He sucked in his pride and tried. “We’re married.”
“Much to my regret,” she spat back.
“We’re married and we’re going to stay married.”
“Not if I can help it.”
His patience slipped, his temper flared. “We’ve discussed this before. I thought I was quite clear.”
“Clearly threatening.” She gazed at him with disgust. “Which is something you’re good at.”
“I’m good at other things. As you know.”
All he got for that try at a tease was a snort. So he opted for bare-boned truth again. “As long as your mother is alive and our child is also, then we’re staying married.”
She narrowed her eyes until they were like shiny points of crystal. “I’ll find a way out.”
“There is no way out for either of us,” he argued. “So why not enjoy what’s between us like civilized adults?”
“Because you are not and never have been a civilized adult and the last thing I want to do is have sex with you again.”
His temper steamed, sizzled. “I could take you right now.”
“Ha!”
Vico leaned down, almost touching his forehead to hers, his lips to hers.
Her blue eyes turned a brilliant, startling aqua before she jerked and stepped back.
He laughed. Watched as she glared and blushed.
“One more kiss,” he said. “One more kiss and you’d be mine.”
“Not a chance.” His wife threw him a haughty look, even though her blush deepened. “You’re dreaming if you ever think I’ll go to bed with you.”
The jab cut. She was right. Only in his dreams had he conquered her, had her over and over. Only in the endless dreams during these past months since he’d tasted her, touched her, and took her had he found a release from his endless need.
The Princesse, in one moment of ecstatic insanity, had ruined him for other women.
The male in him rebelled at the thought, though the past months where he’d had no interest in other women were evidence of this new reality. Frustration twisted around his temper. “Merda.”
“What?” Those eyes of hers were now sleety with icy disgust.
“Have you dreamed of me too?” He tried one last time to reach her because the thought of losing this battle, the only one he’d ever lose with her, was too much to contemplate. “Have you spent your nights remembering how it was between us?”
“No.” Her elegant fingers fisted in her hands. “I don’t think of you at all, much less dream of you.”
“If you say so.”
“Why would I dream of a man who tricked me into his bed?”
The old charge burned into his temper, making it leap into full flame. “Are you still lying to yourself?”
“Why would I dream of a man who has been out with a dozen women and no doubt slept with every one of them since that terrible night?”
The truth was so exactly reverse to her supposition it was laughable. Still, the fact she’d tracked him through the tabloids brought an odd thrill to his gut. “Jealous?”
“Quite the opposite.” Her smile was pure putdown. “Here’s the answer to your dilemma.”
“What?” Vico stared at her.
“Obviously, your libido is out of control. However, it’s nothing to do with me.” She waved a dismissive hand. “I give you permission to go find as many other women as you need to keep yourself satisfied.”
“Permission?” Outrage at her words, her thoughts, her morals pulsed through him, pouring gasoline on the fire of his temper. “We are married.”
“So?” She folded her arms in front of her and shrugged.
“That means we have sex with each other, not with someone else.”
“Oh, please.” She gaped at him with incredulity. “You think you can convince me that a man like you has morals about marriage? Don’t make me laugh.”
“Marriage is not a laughing matter,” he gritted the words between his teeth. “I did not take those vows lightly.”
“Right.” Her one word crackled with skepticism. “I’m supposed to believe that a man who would trick a woman into his bed suddenly finds a moral conscience.”
“I did not trick you.”
“You’re not ever tricking me into your bed again and certainly never tricking me into sex.”
He ignored the claim, keeping himself on track by the merest thread of control. “Do you really think you’ll want to go through your life with no sex?”
“No sex with you doesn’t mean I won’t have sex.”
The taunt was too much. Without thinking, his hands rose to snatch her arms in a firm, tight grip. She gasped and tried to push away, but he slammed her against his hot, needy body. A body on fire for her and on fire with hate for her. “You will never,” he snarled, “cheat on me. You’d be well advised to make sure that never, ever happens.”