Billionaire's Contract Engagement / Money Man's Fiancée Negotiation (37 page)

He pulled back again then rocked forward. Once, twice. Slooowly. Watching her face. This was just like the shower video, only better because she was actually feeling it. And it was everything she expected and more.

Faster,
she wanted to say.
Harder.
But the words were getting lost somewhere between her brain and her lips. She felt paralyzed, poised on a precipice, and as he moved inside her, each thrust pushed her a little closer to the edge. Ash must have been able to tell that she was close. He picked up speed.

Her body began to tremble, then quake, then the pleasure took hold almost violently. It felt as though her body was turning in on itself. Toes curling, fingers clenching. She was still in its grip when Ash groaned and shuddered.
She was just starting to come around, to come back to herself, when he dropped his head on her shoulder. He was breathing hard, and she was having a tough time catching her breath, too.

Ash kissed her one last time then rolled over onto the mattress, drawing her against his side.

“Don't take this the wrong way,” he said. “But that was without question the quietest sex we have ever had.”

She knew from the videos that she had the tendency to be … vocal, during sex, but she just assumed she was saucing it up for the camera. She didn't realize she
always
acted that way. “I can try to be louder next time.”

“Oh, no,” he said quickly. “Quiet is good. I've stopped getting those I-know-what
-you
-did-last-night looks in the elevator.”

She rose up on her elbow to look at him. “You're not serious,” she said, but she could see by his expression that he was. Her cheeks flushed just thinking about it. He once said that she had voyeuristic tendencies, but come on. “I still have a hard time believing some of the things I did. And you know, I just assumed that when I got my memories back, I would go back to being the person I was before. But the truth is, I don't think I want to. I think I like myself better the way I am now.”

“You know, I think I do, too.”

She hoped he really meant that. That he wasn't secretly disappointed. “You don't miss the makeup and the perfect hair and the clingy clothes?”

“To be honest, I hadn't given it much thought. The clothes you wear look fine to me, and your hair is cute this way.” He reached up and tucked a strand behind her ear. “As for the makeup, I never thought you needed it anyway.”

“I think I was insecure as a child.”

His brow furrowed. “You remember?”

“Not exactly. It's hard to explain. It's just a feeling I have. I look at the way I was and it's just so not me, so not who I am now. It makes me feel as though I was playing a role. Trying to be something that I wasn't. Which means I couldn't have liked myself very much, could I?”

“I guess not.”

“Would it be okay with you if I bought some new clothes? Those lace push-up bras are like medieval torture devices. I'd honestly rather have smaller-looking boobs than suffer another day in one of those things.”

He grinned. “You can buy whatever you need.”

“I'll probably need you to take me, though. Since I'm not thrilled with the idea of taking the bus. In fact, I may never get on one again. You could just drop me off, and I could call when I'm finished.”

“How would you feel about driving yourself?”

She thought about that and realized there was really no reason why she couldn't drive herself. She was off the pain meds and she wasn't getting dizzy any longer. “I guess I could. As long as you don't mind loaning me your car.”

He got this adorable, mischievous grin. “I was going to wait until Monday when it got here to tell you.”

“When what got here?”

“I wanted it to be a surprise, but I suppose I could tell you now.”

“Tell me what?”

He jumped up, looking a bit like an excited little boy, and reached for his pants on the floor. He pulled his cell phone from the pocket, then flopped down on his stomach beside her. He tapped at the touch screen, but when she sat up and tried to see over his shoulder what he was doing, he rolled onto his back. “Just hold on.”

He had such a sweet, goofy grin on his face, she was
dying
to see what he was up to. When he finally handed her the phone there was photo of a car on the screen. A luxury mini-SUV in a rich shade of blue. “I thought your car was new,” she said.

“It is.”

“So why buy another one?”

He laughed. “For you. That's your car. Well, not that exact one, but one just like it.”

“You bought me a car?”

“You need one, right?”

“Oh, my God.” She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him. “Thank you!”

He laughed and hugged her back. “It's not that big of a deal.”

“Maybe not to you, but it is to me.”

“If you scroll left you can see what it looks at from other angles.”

She sat back against the pillows, scrolling through the other shots he'd taken.

“It's so cute! I love it.”

“It also has an excellent safety record. And I got the extended option package. It has everything.”

She scrolled to the next page, but it wasn't of the car. It took her a second to figure out exactly what it was she was seeing, and when she did, her head began to spin.

One second Mel was all smiles, then her face went slack and all the color leeched from her skin. She lifted a hand to her mouth, as if she might be sick.

He sat up. “Mel, what's wrong?”

She shook her head and said, “I should be dead.”

He looked down at his phone and realized she was no longer looking at her new car. She was looking at the photos he'd taken at the impound lot in Texas, of what was
left of her old car. He had completely forgotten they were there.

“Crap!” He snatched the phone away, but it was obviously too late. He should have erased the damned things, or at least transferred them to his work computer. “I didn't mean for you to see those. I'm sorry.”

She looked up at him, eyes as wide as saucers. “How did I survive that?”

“You were really lucky.”

“Everyone kept saying that. But they always say that when someone has an accident and doesn't die. Right?”

He shrugged. “I guess sometimes they really mean it.”

“Was it just the one picture, or are there more?”

“Half a dozen maybe. I'll erase them.”

She held out her hand. “I want to see.”

“Mel—”

“Ash, I
need
to see them.”

“It'll just upset you.”

“It will upset me more if I don't.
Please.”

He reluctantly handed it back to her, and watched as she scrolled through the photos. When she got to the last one she scrolled back the other way. She did that a few times, then she closed her eyes tight, as though she was trying to block the image from her mind.

Letting her look had been a bad idea. He should have told her no and erased them. “Mel, why don't you give me—”

“I rolled,” she said, eyes still closed.

“That's right. Into a ditch. Then you hit a tree. The doctor told you that, remember?”

Her brow wrinkled in concentration. “The interior was black, the instrument panel had red. Red lights. And the gearshift.” She reached out with her right hand, as if she
was touching it. “It was red, too.” She opened her eyes and looked up at him. “There was an air freshener hanging from the mirror. It smelled like coconuts.”

There was no way she could have seen that kind of detail in the photo on his phone. She was remembering. “What else?”

“I remember rolling.” She looked up at him. “I remember being scared, and hurting, and thinking I was going to die. It was.
awful.
But I do remember.”

He wondered how long it would take before she remembered what else had happened,
why
she rolled into the ditch. Had she been conscious enough to know that she was miscarrying?

He put his hand on her shoulder. “It's over, and you're safe now.”

She looked up at him. “There's something else.”

He held his breath.

She stared at him for what felt like an eternity, then she shook her head. “I don't know. I know there's something there. Something I should know. It just won't come.”

“It will,” he assured her, hoping it never did, wishing she could just be content to let it stay buried.

M
el had a bad dream that night.

After a dinner of takeout Chinese that they both picked at, and a movie neither seemed to be paying much attention to, Ash walked Mel to bed.

He was going to tuck her in then go to his office and work for a while, but she took his hand and said, “Please stay.” He couldn't tell her no. They undressed and climbed into bed together. He kissed her goodnight, intending it to be a quick brush of the lips, because he was sure that sex was the last thing on her mind. But her arms went around his neck and she pulled him to her, whispering, “Make love to me again.”

He kept waiting for her demanding aggressive side to break through, but she seemed perfectly content lying there, kissing and touching, letting him take the lead. And he realized just how much he preferred this to the hot and heavy stuff.

Afterward she cuddled up against him, warm and soft and limp, and they fell asleep that way. It was a few hours later when she shot up in bed, breath coming in ragged bursts, eyes wild with fear.

He sat up beside her, touched her shoulder, and found that she was drenched in sweat. He felt the sheet and it was drenched, too. For a second he was afraid she'd developed a fever, but her skin was cool.

“I was rolling,” she said, her voice rusty from sleep. “I was rolling and rolling and I couldn't stop.”

“It was a dream. You're okay.” He had no doubt this was a direct result of her seeing those photos and he blamed himself.

“It hurts,” she said, cradling her head in her hands. “My head hurts.”

He wasn't sure if it hurt now, or she was having a flashback to the accident. She seemed trapped somewhere between dream and sleep. “Do you want a pain pill?”

She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. “I'm cold.”

Well, lying between wet sheets wasn't going to warm her.

“Come on,” he said, climbing out of bed and coaxing her to follow him.

“Where?” she asked in a sleepy voice, dutifully letting him lead her into the hall.

“My room. Where it's dry.”

He got her tucked in, then laid there for a long time, listening to her slow even breaths, until he finally drifted off.

She apparently didn't remember the dream, or waking up, because she shook him awake the next morning and asked, “Ash, why are we in your bedroom?”

“You had a nightmare,” he mumbled, too sleepy to even open his eyes.

“I did?”

“The sheets were sweaty so I moved us in here.” He thought she may have said something else after that but he had already drifted back to sleep. When he woke again it was after eight, far later than he usually got up. Even on a Sunday. He would have to skip the gym and go straight to work.

He showered and dressed in slacks and a polo since it was Sunday and it was doubtful anyone else would be around the office, then went out to the kitchen. Mel was sitting on the couch wearing jeans and a T-shirt, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, knees pulled up with her feet propped on the cushion in front of her. If he didn't know better, he would say she wasn't a day over eighteen.

When she saw him she looked up and smiled. “Good morning.”

He walked to the back of the couch and leaned over, intending to kiss her cheek, but she turned her head and caught his lips instead. They tasted like coffee, and a hint of something sweet—a pastry maybe—and she smelled like the soap they had used in the shower last night. He was damned tempted to lift her up off the couch, toss her over his shoulder and take her back to bed.

Maybe later.

When he broke the kiss she was still smiling up at him.

“Good morning,” he said.

“There's coffee.”

“How long have you been up?” he asked as he walked to the kitchen. She'd already set a cup out for him.

“Six-thirty.” She followed him into the kitchen, taking
a seat on one of the bar stools at the island. “It was a little disorienting waking up in a bed I didn't fall asleep in.”

“You still don't remember it?”

She shook her head. “I do remember something else though. The book I've been reading, I've read it before. I mean, I figured I had, since it was on the shelf. But I picked it up this morning after already reading almost half of it, and bam, suddenly I remember how it ended. So I went to the bookshelf and looked at a few others, and after I read the back blurb, and skimmed the first few pages, I remembered those, too.”

This was bound to happen. He just hadn't expected it to be this soon. “Sounds like you've been busy.”

“Yeah. I was sitting there reading those books, thinking how stupid it was that I could remember something so immaterial, and I couldn't even remember my own mother. Then it hit me. The picture.”

“What picture?”

“The one of me and my mom, when I was thirteen.”

He recalled seeing it in her room before, but not since they had been back. He didn't recall seeing it in her place in Texas either. “I remember you having one, but I don't know where it is.”

“That's okay. I remembered. It just popped into my head. I knew it was in the front pouch of my suitcase. And it was.”

Ash could swear his heart stopped, then picked up triple time. She remembered packing? “Your suitcase?”

“I figured I must have taken it with me on my trip.”

“Right … you must have.” Hadn't he checked her suitcases? So there would be nothing to jolt her memory? It was possible that he only patted the front pouches, assuming they were empty.