His Ring Is Not Enough

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“No, Ajax, you wouldn’t have been. You would have been fine, but not perfect. Because she’s not perfect. You certainly aren’t.”

“But it made sense,” he said. “In my head...in my head she made everything fall into place.”

“She’s not a business venture, and she’s not an ideal, either.”

He rubbed his temples with his fingertips. “I know that.”

“Well, you don’t seem to. You talk like marriage to her was your end goal and then...and then what? It would just be perfect? Your life would suddenly be perfect?”

“I can’t... It’s hard to... I’ve been working, Leah, so hard, all of my life. I came to your family’s home, and your parents treated me more like a son than an employee. They took me in, gave me focus and purpose. Your father set me on this path. He taught me things, taught me how to be a man, to be strong. He gave me goals. He sent me to school. I have been walking that path he set me on, tirelessly, never looking away from the goal, from the end.”

“To where you would make Holt continue on for him. Where you would be part of our family.”

“I’ve been walking for a long time,” he said.

“And then you reach the end and you rest?”

“And then maybe I don’t have to work so hard to stay in control all the damn time because I’ll have arrived at a more stable point,” he bit out. “My...everything would be in place.”

Because things weren’t now. He’d made money, obtained power and connections. He’d used all of the resources at his disposal to bring down his father’s drug and human trafficking ring. And he still couldn’t rest. He still didn’t feel he could stop working. Stop trying to distance himself from his past.

From all he had done.

“Why do you need to hang on to control so tightly, Ajax?” she asked, her eyes filled with...sympathy. Pity. If she knew who she was talking to, if she knew the beast that lived inside him, she wouldn’t look at him like that.

He stood and started to pace the room. “It’s nothing. This is nothing. It can still be fixed.”

Leah studied him, noticed the tension in his jaw, in the lines of his body. He was uncomfortable, and thrown off. And she had to take into account that he could very well be heartbroken.

He said he loved Rachel. But for the first time she wondered. Wondered if he’d ever known her really, or if she’d just been symbolic for him.

“I have a plan, Leah,” he said.

She crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “Oh, good. Let’s hear it.”

He stopped moving, his hands locked behind his back. “First, we must show a united front. I am taking over a massive corporation here, changing the layout in some respects. We need to show solidarity—I will not appear weak.”

“No, you wouldn’t.” She couldn’t imagine him appearing weak anyway.

“And I will not be seen as a man forced into this situation.”

“Pride is a beautiful thing. At least I think it is. I don’t know that I have any left.”

“I find myself in short supply, as well.” His expression turned fierce. “And I will turn my focus to helping mass produce Leah’s Lollies products, as soon as time allows.”

She ignored the leap her heart took and looked down at her fingernails. “Payment for services rendered?”

He looked stricken for a moment, and his face paled. Then, as soon as the reaction occurred, he covered it again. “This is not that sort of arrangement. You are my wife. Not a woman I have purchased.”

“And how long will I be your wife?” That was the one bit left undiscussed. Undecided. Would she be his wife on paper, or in reality.

“I made vows,” he said. “I intend to honor them. Do you?”

“In what regard?”

“In all regards. What’s the sense in divorce when this union could serve us both?”

“We’re missing the love bit.”

“You don’t strike me as the kind of woman who’s overly romantic.”

He was right. Now. It hadn’t always been true. But over time...over time all that sunny optimism had bled from her, an open vein that had truly begun the hemorrhage the moment she’d first seen Rachel standing by Ajax. The perfect couple, so beautiful, so poised. The embodiment of her heartbreak.

“I’m not especially. But what do I get out of this, Ajax? Beyond a husband who is bitter toward me and will think of other women if we ever make love?”

He looked her over, slowly, and something changed in his eyes, heat sparking in their dark depths. Heat that lit an answering fire in her stomach. Heat that reminded her just how strong a pull Ajax had over body.

“What do I get?” she repeated, her voice a whisper.

“What do you want?”

As they’d both pointed out, their pride was all but destroyed. So why cling to it now? She wasn’t going to sit around, angry over not getting what she wanted because she hadn’t asked for it. She was going to make her own demands. If he wanted a marriage, she would give him a marriage.

She had her armor now—she didn’t need love. She didn’t want it. Didn’t want emotion. But a business partnership, cemented by marriage, that she could handle. And sex with Ajax? Well, she was attracted to him. And frankly, she was over being a virgin. This was a convenient way to deal with both her attraction to him and the virginity. A win-win situation, really.

And yeah, kissing him had knocked her defenses a bit, but it wouldn’t happen again. Not when she was the one making demands. Not when it was expected.

She would make this a marriage that would work for her, not just for him. To hell with his plans, she had plans of her own. If he said no, maybe he’d release her.

But if he said yes...

“If we’re going to stay married, then I want a marriage. I want you, in my bed, every night, and never with another woman. I want you to support me personally and professionally. I won’t live a half life forever because of a rash decision I made.”

“Naturally,” he said, “I want children, as I said already. It has always been a part of my plan. And you?”

She hadn’t given it a lot of thought, because marriage had seemed a far-off event. But part of her had always taken for granted that she would be a mother someday.

“I want them,” she said, trying not to think too deeply about it.

“And as you are my wife, sleeping with you seems only logical. What is the point of seeking physical release elsewhere?”

“I’m relieved you feel that way.” Though not overly flattered. “Better for our health, wellness and media image, I imagine.”

“However, I stand by my original statement. You and I may figure out the finer points of our relationship after this whole thing has been smoothed over in the public arena. While we’re attending events as blissful newlyweds, it would be best if our personal relationship was kept as simple as possible. I don’t want Christofides thinking there might be a weakness he can exploit. I don’t want him to get desperate and decide he should come and seduce you.”

“Me?”

“He may very well if he sees that Rachel is a dead end to destroying my goals.”

“Oh, seduced for revenge from my marriage that’s for business only. I am such a lucky girl.”

“It’s the reality, Leah. I don’t say it to insult.”

“Of course not.”

“Also in favor of waiting, you need time to adjust.”

“Time to adjust? What do you... What?”

“Yesterday you were to be my sister-in-law—today, you’re my wife, I doubt you’re prepared for the change. In spite of what I said about you not being a prisoner, and while I know you entered into the arrangement of your own free will, it was an emotionally heightened moment, and there were a lot of reasons why our marriage made sense in terms of business. But just because all of that made sense, does not mean you and I make sense as a couple. Naturally, you will need time before you’re ready to consummate.”

She blinked, unable to wrap her mind around what he’d just said. “Need...time?”

“Naturally.”

She felt raw. Her ego wounded and scrubbed with salt. And now he was telling her what she wanted. To hell with that. “You have no idea what I’m ready for, what I want. Don’t you dare think you can tell me. I’m quite okay with sex, the idea of us having sex sits very well with me. I didn’t agree to marry you thoughtlessly, I know what being married means.”

“You’re young, Leah, naive. I will not take advantage of that. A little time for everyone to adjust to the situation is necessary.”

She felt defiant now, her pride, that pride she’d decided only a moment ago she didn’t care much about. “I don’t need time, Ajax. You could have me on this table right now if you want. Think of my sister. Hell, think of England, I don’t care. I know what I want. I said exactly what I wanted. I want you.”

The words hung, heavy in the silence of the room. She’d admitted it. That she wanted him. That she wanted to sleep with him. Something about the admission made her feel stronger. Made her feel like her armor was back in place.

“The thing is,” he said, his voice a growl, “I don’t want you. You are a child to me. I look at you and I see a girl. I do not see a woman.”

His words didn’t hurt as badly as they might have, not with her armor on. Not when she could see, so easily, that he was lashing out because of pain in him. Not because of her. “I’m twenty-three. I am not a child.”

The anger in his eyes dissipated, and he just looked tired. “I...I have not had time to adjust to the new plan.”

Just then she found it hard to be mad at him, in spite of the cutting edge to his words. “And the plan is everything, right?” A new thing she’d learned about him in the past twenty-four hours.

“Yes, Leah, the plan is damn well everything,” he said, each syllable rough and hard. “How do you navigate life without one?”

“Follow your heart. Your passions...”

“Passion,” he spat, as though the word tasted terrible on his tongue, “is the single most destructive element in life I can think of.”

“You don’t feel passion?”

“I deny it.”

“Not even for Rachel?”

He shook his head, dark eyes blank. “For nothing. For no one.”

“I thought you loved her.”

“What does that have to do with passion?” he asked.

“Everything.”

He shook his head. “That’s where you’re wrong, Leah. Passion is all about self. All about pleasing yourself. And that path...that path can get very dark.”

And then Ajax turned and walked out of the room, and the last bit of fantasy and mist that had hung before her eyes evaporated.

There was nothing more than cold reality and the realization that the man she’d thought she’d known for most of her life was nothing more than a stranger.

CHAPTER FOUR