“You’re so beautiful.” The kiss he bent to steal was as reverent and sweet as it was hard and possessive.
Her lips clung to his as he drew away.
“Don’t get ideas,” he chided, breaking contact from her look of invitation. “We’re cut off until you deliver.”
“That’s you being overcautious. Karen didn’t say we couldn’t.” She was still aggravated that they’d shared a bed last night but hadn’t made love. She was nervous about doing anything to jeopardize her pregnancy, but they’d been making love without consequence until now.
“Karen doesn’t know how insatiable we are once we get started. Just do me a favor and don’t make this harder than it is.”
“Pun intended?” She drifted her gaze down his front to the bulge behind his fly.
“This is going to be a very long pregnancy.” He gritted his teeth, making her laugh as he guided her inside for an early dinner before driving home.
CHAPTER TEN
AFTER YEARS OF being the one who micromanaged to ensure everything met her father’s impossible standards, Adara was forced to let go and trust others to pull off top-notch work with minimal input. It wasn’t easy, but she eased up and was pleasantly surprised by her very efficient teams. Despite her working from home for months, only checking in electronically, they were managing great things without her.
Staying away from the office had a drawback, however. Moving through the ballroom decorated in fall colors of gold, crimson and burnt umber, she couldn’t help congratulating people on putting together a brilliant event to celebrate the Makricosta chain’s thirty-fifth anniversary. They all reacted with great surprise and when Adara met up with Connie, a woman she’d worked closely with for years, she realized why.
Connie rocked back on her four-inch heels. “Wow, I’ve never seen a woman as pregnant as you act so happy and outgoing. When I got that big, I was a complete cow.”
“Oh, I...” Adara didn’t know what to say. Had her personality been frozen for so many years that a bit of friendly warmth was remarkable? Or was she really as big as she felt?
“That’s meant as a compliment,” Connie rushed to say, glancing with horror at Adara’s guardian angel, Gideon.
They’d learned to give each other space in the confines of the penthouse as they worked from home, but tonight he was right beside her, his ripped masculinity nearly bursting out of his tuxedo. He didn’t complain about their abstinence nearly as much as she did, but he spent a lot of time expending sexual energy in the weight room. It showed, making his presence all the more electric, while Adara’s insecurity ballooned to match her figure.
“It’s true,” he said with a disturbing slide of his hand beneath the fall of her hair. His touch settled in a light, caressing clasp on the back of her neck, making her follicles tighten. “The pregnancy glow isn’t a myth. You’re gorgeous.”
“I look like the Queen Mary,” Adara sputtered. Her reports from Karen continued to be good, and weight gain was to be expected, but playing dress-up for this evening hadn’t been as fun as it used to be. Her hair had developed kinks, she was too puffy for her rings and wearing heels was out of the question. Growing shorter and pudgier while her husband grew hotter and sleeker was demoralizing. All her excitement in having a date night deflated.
“I only meant that you seem very happy. When are you due?” Connie prompted.
Adara couldn’t help brightening at the topic of delivering a healthy baby, her misgivings from early in the pregnancy dispelled by her baby’s regular jabs and the closing in of her due date. Nowadays her fears were the natural ones of any mother, most specifically that her water would break while she was in public.
But a few minutes later, when Gideon interjected, “We should start the dancing,” and guided her toward the floor, her self-consciousness returned. He must have felt her tension. As he took her in his arms, he chided, “Are you genuinely worried about how you look? Because I was being sincere. You’re stunning.”
Biting off another self-deprecating remark, she chose to be truthful. “We haven’t been going out much, so I guess I wasn’t expecting so many stunned expressions at how huge I am. And look around, Gideon. Wait, don’t. There are far too many women with teensy waistlines and long legs and—”
“None with breasts like yours. Do you think I’ve looked anywhere but down your dress tonight? Unless it’s at your lips. You’re not wearing lipstick, are you? That’s all you, ripe and pouty and pink. You’re sexy as hell.”
Said lips parted in surprise. Everything seemed to taste funny these days, lipstick included, so she’d opted for a flavorless lip balm and yes, had noted that even her lips looked fat. She might have bit them together in an attempt to hide them, but his wolfish fixation on her mouth sent tendrils of delight through her.
With a little moue she said, “Really? You’re not just saying that?”
With a low growl, he stopped dancing and claimed her mouth with his own.
The kiss was devastating, making her knees want to fold so he had to tighten his hold on her, shifting her to an angle to accommodate her bump. That tilted her head just enough to seal their lips with erotic perfection.
He didn’t keep it to a quick punctuation to prove a point, either. Adara put up a hand to the side of his head, thinking, People are watching, but he gave her tongue a wicked tag and she couldn’t help letting the kiss deepen and continue.
Oh, this man could kiss.
A cleared throat brought her back to reality with a thunk that she felt all the way into the flats of her feet. A woman’s amused Irish lilt said, “Don’t interrupt them. They’re adorable.”
“Nic,” Adara breathed in recognition of her older brother and his wife, growing hot with embarrassment as she realized what a show they’d been putting on. “Hi, Rowan. It didn’t sound like you’d make it.”
Her brother and his wife were beyond star power, Nic in a tuxedo and Rowan showing off her lithe dancer’s body with an off-the-shoulder figure-hugging green gown.
“Evie got over her cold and we wanted to see you again,” Rowan said.
Nic leaned in to kiss Adara’s cheek before he shook hands with Gideon.
Something passed between the two men that she couldn’t quite interpret and didn’t get a chance to study. Having kept up via webcam, she and Rowan had become tight friends and that gave them plenty to talk about. The rest of the evening passed in a blur of catching up while also going through the routine of photo ops and speeches for the anniversary celebration, partaking of the buffet, and finally returning to the penthouse exhausted but still keyed up.
“That went well, don’t you think?” she asked Gideon as she removed her earrings. They were enchanting cascades of diamonds commissioned to match her ring. She’d almost ruined her makeup when he’d presented them to her before they’d left earlier in the evening, she was so affected by his thoughtfulness.
Gideon made a noncommittal noise.
“No?” she prompted, alarmed that he might have noticed a flaw she’d missed.
“Hmm? No, it was fine. Perfect. Excellent. I’m a bit distracted. Look, you get ready for bed and I’ll be in soon. I’d like a nightcap.”
“Oh. Okay.” Adara’s startled confusion was evident, but Gideon didn’t attempt to explain himself.
He breathed a small sigh of relief as she disappeared and didn’t see the full measure of bracing whiskey he poured for himself or the rabid way he drained it. Despite the burn that promised forgetfulness, he wasn’t able to stop replaying his conversation with her brother.
“I’d like a word,” Nic had said when both their wives had been drawn across the room by some fashion marvel.
“Now is fine,” Gideon had said, keeping one eye on Adara, premonition tightening his muscles.
“Understand first that I’ve always felt protective of Adara, even when the only thing she had to fear was a nightmare. Knowing what I abandoned her to, I’m sick with myself for not trying to contact her sooner. I’ll be on guard for her the rest of my life.”
“Reassuring,” Gideon had muttered.
“The way you two were arguing at the end of my driveway wasn’t,” Nic retorted sharply. “When you first arrived in Greece. Not reassuring at all.”
Gideon knew better than to show weakness, but he flinched involuntarily. “I thought she was meeting another man. Tell me how you would react if you thought your wife was stepping out on you.”
“She wouldn’t. But...” Nic shrugged, seeming to accept the explanation for Gideon’s temper that day. “Regardless, I’m a man who collects the facts before he reacts.”
Gideon had spilled a dry laugh at that point, enjoying the euphemistic phrase “collects the facts.” “You mean you had me investigated.”