Was he closer? He seemed closer. “Tell me something.”
“Anything.” The heat of his hand burned through the fabric of her leggings.
“I wish you meant that, but I won’t push it.” The temptation to lean into him was huge and growing. She fought it, trying to stay focused on what needed saying. “I just need confirmation of something.”
“Yes?”
“Would you ever walk away from your child as your father and your mother’s lover did with you?”
“No.” The word fell with the weight of a boulder between them, every ounce of lust in his expression transforming to determination.
No doubt he meant it.
It made her doubt his willingness to walk away from her as well. He thought he could and most likely would, but she wasn’t so sure. Especially if they decided to have children together.
If he didn’t let himself love her, he wasn’t going to fall for someone else, either. And no other power but love was going to make this man rip the fabric of his family.
No matter what he told himself, or her, for that matter.
“You are just a mass of contradictions, aren’t you?”
“Not at all,” he said with a different kind of force and obvious horror at the very idea.
She laid down her own line in the sand. “I’m not agreeing to anything today.” She waited for him to take that in.
If his first reaction was to try to obliterate it, they were done here. No matter what extra aces he’d slipped into his hand, she wasn’t playing.
“Today?” he asked with emphasis on the single word.
“Today.”
“This is not an indefinite offer.”
“Oh, I know, but you’re smart enough to realize that little box isn’t getting opened this afternoon.” She flicked her head toward the dining table and the Tiffany box still sitting unopened near her now empty plate.
Max’s head tilted, a predatory light growing in his eyes. “I thought it was.”
“Well, I guess even Corporate Tsars can be wrong sometimes.”
“Perhaps.” Nothing in his expression or relaxed posture indicated that bothered him.
He seemed…well, turned on. And that wasn’t what she was expecting in reaction to her statement. Though it certainly didn’t hurt in regard to how she wanted to spend the rest of their afternoon.
“Tonight, today…whatever, we go with my plan.”
“That entails…?” he asked with the air of a man who already knew.
Maybe he did. Or maybe, he was just so good at exuding confidence, it came naturally—even when he was in the dark.
“You and I test out our sexual compatibility in a bed and with complete follow-through.” He had to know what that meant because she wasn’t spelling it out. “I talk to my dad when he calls. Tomorrow, I talk to Jeremy Archer. Depending on that conversation, I decide whether I need to interrupt my SBC’s honeymoon.”
“You will not.” Max sounded so sure of that fact.
But then, as Romi had already acknowledged, he always did. Uncertainty wasn’t in Max’s repertoire any more than love was. Since calling Maddie was on the very bottom of the list of things Romi wanted to do right now, she wasn’t going to argue regardless.
“Tomorrow night, I eat dinner alone. I think about what you are offering and what you are threatening and if I can reconcile the two.”
Or if she could live with the consequences of not doing so. Romi was pretty sure that didn’t need saying.
Apparently Max agreed with her, because he merely nodded. “We will have lunch again the day after.”
“You can bring your little blue box. It will either get opened, or not.”
He shifted so he was very much in her personal space, his body surrounding hers as one arm slid around her waist and the one on the back of the couch moved to rest behind her head. “You show very little curiosity regarding a piece of jewelry you will be wearing for some time to come.”
“Jewelry isn’t going to sway me.” But his nearness might.
“No more than the salvation of your father’s company.”
“Right.” But the salvation of her father?
That was something else entirely. It was everything. And Max had set it in motion, no matter what his supposed motivations for doing so were.
“You’re taking this delay really well,” she breathed, his face almost close enough to kiss. Realization came over her slowly. “You knew I would ask for time.”
“I had hoped you would make a quick decision, but I was prepared to give a week.” However, he had expected her to open the ring box.
He would learn that for all the trappings of wealth that surrounded her, Romi wasn’t all that interested in them.
“And I only asked for three days.”
“A decent compromise.”
She almost laughed at the idea of Maxwell Black compromising with anyone, but the truth was that he considered the entire marriage idea a compromise. And he had allowed a counteroffer.
For time at least.
Max hadn’t said no about the sex. From the way he was sitting and the alpha male pheromones saturating the air around them, she didn’t think he was going to, either.
Romi wasn’t sure why that was so important, but it was. She needed to link with him intimately before making a decision.
At this point, she wasn’t looking for logic or reason. Romi’s instincts were telling her she needed the physical connection and she wasn’t going to ignore them.
* * *
Maxwell did not need convincing when it came to giving in to Romi’s desire to give herself to him fully.
No, she clearly did not see it that way, but she had never allowed another man the same level of intimacy.
Maxwell could not figure out why she was offering the gift to him now, without things settled between them. But then, that was no new situation for him with her. Her mind worked in ways his did not.
Perhaps it was as simple as her needing a sense of some control over the situation.
He wasn’t averse to giving her that.
Was in fact ridiculously eager to do so. It was just that she had looked so damn vulnerable when she’d found out about her father’s rehab.
Maxwell had not cared for the feeling that he was doing something wrong. He knew he was not.
Maxwell had not put Madison’s shares up for grabs as a bargaining tool. His willingness to use that situation did not make him a villain. It made him smart.
And he had not led Harry Grayson down the path of functioning alcoholism. Maxwell had in fact convinced the older man to go somewhere he could get help with his addiction.
Was he willing to follow through on his threat to back out of the deal? Yes.
Had Maxwell ever considered, even for a moment, it would come to that? No.
He wasn’t the monster Romi seemed to think him.
No matter what she might thin
k, Maxwell wanted her to accept the terms of his deal, not simply give in to them.
If his successful years in business had taught him one thing, it was that voluntary partners worked harder to make the venture work. It wasn’t always a luxury he could afford himself, but when possible, Maxwell maneuvered his rivals into wanting the mergers he chose to pursue.
Something niggled at considering his marriage proposal just another business merger, but that was essentially exactly what it was. Right?
Pushing aside the uncomfortable thoughts, he considered his next move. No question it involved making love to Romi, but did he start here and take her to the bedroom?
Considering his hair trigger where she was concerned, if they began here—even with the most basic of kisses—chances were, this is where Romi would gift him her virginity.
She deserved more ceremony than that.
He would take her to his bed, not the guest room where he conducted most of his sexual trysts. His wrought-iron bed, imported from the ironmasters in Russia, had never been occupied by anyone but him.
Using more control than he realized would be necessary, he pulled away from the allure of her body and stood. Maxwell put his hand out to Romi. “Come, we will have your sexual taste test.”
She burst out laughing, all traces of the overly emotional, dangerously vulnerable woman drowning under her sweet humor. “That is not what I said.”
“But it is what you meant?”
“Maybe I’m just ready to lose my virginity.”
“Maybe there is something going on here neither of us understands.” He liked that idea much better than him being the only one in the dark.
“Oooh, the Corporate Tsar doesn’t know everything. How disconcerting that must be for you.”
“I am used to that unfortunate turn of events around you.”
“I confuse you?” she asked, sounding really far too happy about the possibility.
“Do you doubt it? Have we not established that we are very different people?”
“You’re nothing like Jeremy Archer, or my dad for that matter, but you understand them. Don’t try to pretend you don’t.”
“You, Romi, are an enigma.”
She preened. “Well, that’s nice to know.”
He shook his head. “Like right now. I do not understand why this is so satisfying and amusing to you.”