She straightened, stunned by him for the second time that day. "Thank you" she heard often enough for work on a committee or a donation to one cause or another. But praise? Compliments? Only at the youth center, where they appreciated her, valued her. Almost never anywhere else, including home, where her efforts were her duty, expected.
"I-" She shook her head. "You're welcome."
"Would you like me to do that for you?" When she frowned, he nodded at her foot.
"N-no," she stammered. Touch her? God, no. "I'm okay. Earlier, I saw you leave with Dad," she said, hurriedly changing the subject from his hands on any part of her body. "Is everything okay? What did he want to talk with you about?"
The corner of his mouth hitched in a small smirk. "He doesn't trust me."
She laughed, the sound brittle and sharp. "Yes, well, after my mother pulled me aside for a heart-to-heart during the reception, I figured out pretty quick why they decided to make an appearance today." And it had been an appearance. A cameo. A show.
"Why?" Lucas straightened from his sprawl against the wall, the movement languorous, his eyes hooded, dangerous.
"Why did they come, or why did she pull me aside?"
"Both. Either."
"They attended to show our family solidarity. Still, she wanted to make sure I fully comprehended the damage my immature and impetuous decision-her words-caused them. How I'd humiliated both of them and harmed not just Dad's professional relationship with the Reinholds but their personal one, as well. She didn't understand how she could've raised such a selfish daughter and not realized it."
Pain radiated from inside her, eclipsing the numbness she'd enveloped her feelings in for the duration of the gathering. Burying the hurt and disappointment had been the only way she could return to the party and smile, chat, and laugh as if she were the happiest of brides. But now, repeating the accusations, they cut into her heart like dozens of tiny slices.
"Selfish?" Lucas rumbled. "Bullshit. What did you say to her?"
"What could I say, Lucas? ‘Mom, I broke off my engagement to a man I dated for over a year to marry a man I barely know so Dad doesn't go to jail.'" She splayed her hands wide, palms up. "‘I hope you understand.'" Again, she chuckled, and it was as bitter and hard as its predecessor. "I don't know what you want from me. Tonight, at the gala last week. What do you want?"
"You to tell them all to go to hell," he growled. Leaning down, he extended his hand, palm out. After a long hesitation, she placed hers in his, and he pulled her to her feet. He tugged her across the room to a gilt-framed mirror hanging on the wall. Drawing her in front of him, he cupped her chin and made her stare at their reflection. "Impetuous? Immature?" His soft tone belied the anger in the blue-green stare blazing back at her from the glass. "This woman is the most conscientious, selfless, considerate person I've met. And I've known her for weeks. How do they not recognize it? And why does she let them get away with not acknowledging it? With not respecting her gifts, her heart, her feelings?"
Because she owes them! Sydney almost cried out. Her teeth sank into her bottom lip, trapping the admission.
"No." He touched his thumb to her lip and gently but firmly tugged it free. "I told you not to do that."
He rubbed her flesh, and she helplessly stared at the sensual picture they created. His big body covered her back and shoulders. His dark head bent over hers. His thumb soothing her mouth as his other hand splayed wide over her abdomen. Her muscles contracted hard, the erotic ache echoing in the deepest, emptiest part of her.
"Lucas," she breathed, reaching up and circling his wrist. "I can't."
"Can't what?"
His eyes refused to free her as his hand rode higher on her torso, his thumb coming to rest between her breasts. The caress on her mouth emboldened, pressed instead of brushed. The more insistent touch sensitized her breasts, tingled in her nipples, resonated and throbbed in her sex.
She tightened her grip on his wrist.
"This," she rasped. "What you expect of me. Tonight. I just-can't."
He stilled behind her, tension nearly vibrating against her skin, humming in the air around them.
"Why?" he finally asked. "Are you going to say you don't want it?" As if daring her to utter the untruth, he dragged the pad of his thumb over the tip of her breast. The flesh pebbled, begging for another stroke. A harder one.
"No." She briefly lowered her lashes, fumbled for any reason other than the truth. In spite of the special vows he'd uttered, the ceremony had been a lie. Her new last name was a lie. And now her wedding night would be one. When she stood here so emotionally raw, stripping her body bare before him, too, on a night that should have commemorated something beautiful and special seemed the biggest lie of all. He would find her sentiment foolish and misplaced, since her body cried out for his in a way that would make a banshee mute. But after sacrificing so much today, this one thing, this one night was the only thing she had control of. And she couldn't hand over one more piece of herself.
Not tonight.
"No," she repeated softly. "I'm not going to lie about my … attraction toward you. But not two weeks ago I was engaged to another man. I'm not breaking our contract, I'm just asking for time."
A taut, heavy silence as stifling and leaden as an ominous bank of clouds hung in the room. The weight of it-the threat of the imminent crash of the storm behind it-weighed on her skin.
"Are you still in love with him?"
"No." She'd never been in love with him.
Lucas's hands fell away from her. He shifted back, and the space relieved and distressed her. Jesus, she needed to get a grip.
His brooding gaze met hers in the mirror, the stark outline of his scar lending his lean, sharp features even more of a menacing appearance.
She waited, breath trapped in her lungs, for his objection. For his demand she honor her part in this agreement.
"Sleep well, Sydney," he murmured, then turned and exited the room.
Leaving her more confused and lonely than ever.
Chapter Thirteen
Lucas thrust open the door to Sydney's room, not bothering with a warning knock. After a sleepless night, civility and manners had gone the way of sinners and that annoying Bieber kid's career: to hell. Besides, she'd asked him not to touch. She hadn't issued a stipulation about looking. Clenching his jaw, he shut the door on that train of thought and padlocked it for good measure. Just contemplating why she'd pushed him away last night … and for whom …
Yeah. Letting it go.
Early morning sunlight streamed in through the bay windows, gliding over the chaise lounge under the windowsill, across the hardwood floor, and onto the bed and rumpled blankets.
Where Sydney slept like some Disney princess under a curse.
He snorted. Why shouldn't she sleep soundly? She didn't have balls to turn so blue all they needed were white hats to look like fucking Smurfs.
Feeling like a Peeping Tom but unable to scrounge up a regret, he neared the bed. The pale yellow blankets twisted around her hips, and one of the long pillows had fallen to the floor. Satisfaction rolled through him with the subtlety of a freight train. Good. Maybe her night hadn't been as restful as he believed. Bending down, he picked up the pillow and propped it against the headboard. This close to her, that damn honeysuckle scent wrapped around him like chains. He'd bet the sheets smelled like her.
Hell, he wanted to smell like her.
Cursing, he reached for her shoulder and noticed the gray T-shirt with a red B and U blazoned across her breasts. His eyebrows jacked high. Sydney had always struck him as the forties-silky-nightgown type, not worn-old-college-shirt-and-boxers type. If she wore boxers. Great. Now exactly what lay under the blankets would bug him until he found out.
Muttering beneath his breath, he reached for her once more-and once more drew up short. He frowned. There was something different …
Her lashes fluttered, opened. Hazel eyes clouded with sleep peered up at him, soft and dreamy. Frozen, he stared, spying the almost smile as it touched her lips. Then noting the moment realization entered that lovely gaze and the curve inverted. Comprehension swept away the drowsiness, and she went rigid before scrabbling to a sitting position. The covers dropped farther down her hips, and he glimpsed red-and-black plaid. Again amusement trickled through confusion. Because he still couldn't figure out what had struck him as so odd …
"What are you doing in here?" she blurted, shoving her dark gold and brown curls out of her face.
Curls. Jesus. The wild tumble of long, dense spirals brushed her shoulders, forming a sexy halo around her beautiful features. The straight, perfectly styled strands belonged to the socialite. But these vibrant, untamed, free curls belonged to the woman.