Wren had said that he wasn’t lovey-dovey. On Rox’s first day, Melanie had said that Cash wasn’t mushy and didn’t lie about what was going on.
Rox closed her eyes and just felt his strong arms around her.
God, she wanted so much to believe him.
An echo of his words jumped around inside her, a vibration straining to get out, but her throat was constricted so tightly that she could only sip air. She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t think.
“And I don’t say that to all the other girls,” Cash said. “I haven’t said that to anyone except you. I’ve been in love with you for years, torn between wanting you to divorce Grant and yet not wanting you to suffer through a divorce.”
This didn’t compute. This was contrary to all the laws of the state and nature. Cash Amsberg didn’t fall in love with anyone. He just fucked his way through the office contact list and client roster.
Rox carefully, slowly, slipped her arms around his waist, trying to tell him with her body because her throat would not open.
“I’ve wanted to tell you this for so long, that I love you. I’ve wanted you in my arms, in my bed, in my life this way, not just at work. I won’t ghost on you. I’ve been waiting for you for so long.”
Rox turned in his arms and buried her face against his chest, holding him as hard as she could.
Even with his splenectomy scar right under her arm, he wasn’t in any danger of being hurt by her squeezing him. She wasn’t strong enough to hurt him.
She was too weak, far too weak where he was concerned. She wanted to believe him so much.
“I love you, too,” she whispered. “Don’t ghost on me. No matter what. I couldn’t bear it now.”
His arms tightened around her, and his fingers wove into her hair. He curled around her, protecting her, holding her in his arms and with his whole body. “I won’t ghost on you. I won’t leave you, ever.”
“Don’t get creepy,” she said, her voice choked because she didn’t want to cry but she couldn’t quite laugh.
He chuckled. “I won’t get creepy, but I love you and I won’t leave you, lieveke.”
They sat that way for a few more moments until it seemed prudent to lie down before they fell over, and they slept in each others’ arms in the morning sunlight for another hour.
PRINCE MONSTER
Rox wandered out of Cash’s bedroom to go to the kitchen to rustle up some breakfast.
Cash had left his bedroom a few minutes before her, kissing her on the forehead and then ducking to kiss her on the lips before he went out to make sure that Arthur and Maxence had found food and coffee.
As Rox closed the bedroom door behind her to walk down the hallway, Maxence turned the corner from some guest bedroom in the deeper part of the house and smiled at her.
She lifted her chin and refused to be shamed by the wannabe priest catching her leaving a man’s bedroom in the morning. Hey, Maxence had definitely followed that black leather-clad woman out of the office at The Devilhouse, and from what Arthur had said, he wasn’t as pure as Irish butter before that, either.
He was following her down the hallway, however. She should probably wait and walk with him to be polite. She leaned against the wall, crossing her arms over her chest.
Maxence was wearing another tailored black suit, bringing to mind priests, morticians, and ravens. It fit his broad shoulders and tapered to his athletic waist and long legs too well to have been bought off the rack, and the discreet stylishness of it caught even Rox’s attention.
Talk about mixed messages.
While she leaned against the wall, waiting, Maxence was inspecting the art hanging on the long hallway’s walls as he strolled, his hands clasped behind his back. He hadn’t seen that she was hanging out, waiting for him.
A lot of art hung on the walls of Cash’s house.
Rox stared at the painting across from her of a still life of fruit, glowing scarlets and oranges. She drifted over to look at a landscape painting of a Spanish fort on a hillside. Another painting farther down the hall was of an archway, draped with ivy and flowering vines.
None of the paintings were portraits of people.
Cash didn’t have any mirrors in his bedroom or the common areas, either.
Or pictures of his sister or other family.
No faces, at all.
Her heart broke a little more for him.
Maxence was close enough to talk to without yelling down the hallway.
She said, “I need to talk to you.”
Maxence walked to meet her in the hallway. “All right.”
“So you’re His Holiness Pope Fuckitall.”
He folded his hands behind his back and smiled, looking down at his feet. “That’s a rather recent nickname. As a child, I was the Emperor Maximum. I grew to my adult height about six months before everyone started to grow in eighth standard.”