He showed his teeth in a humourless smile. ‘And of course your own?’
Casey really wished he would stop looking at her like that. Almost as if she were a specimen he had placed under a microscope!
She shook her head. ‘I’m more interested in securing Josh’s future than my own.’
‘Oh, come, Casey—let’s not be coy about this,’ he drawled, ignoring the food in front of him but continuing to drink his wine. ‘Once your house is sold, and you move here, I will obviously pay all household bills, school fees, and so on, but I appreciate you will need access to money of your own for other—expenses,’ he rasped. ‘In return you will be expected to give up both the jobs you have been working at in order to become a full-time mother to Lauren and Josh.’
Well…yes. She had already worked that out. It wouldn’t be too much of a hardship when being a full-time mother was exactly what she had always been—until Sam’s desertion a year ago had forced her to juggle motherhood with two jobs in order to support them both. She accepted that it might not be every woman’s ideal to be a full-time mother, but she had always enjoyed the role, and had no doubt she would enjoy being stepmother to Lauren, too.
Although she wasn’t so sure about selling her family home…
What if Xander changed his mind and this arrangement only lasted a few months? Brad Henderson might calm down more quickly than Xander expected, and so remove the threat of a court battle over Lauren, in which case he wouldn’t need a wife any more.
Whereas she would still need a home for Josh and herself…
These were exactly the sort of details that needed to be worked out before they were married, so she had no idea why Xander should continue to look at her in that sceptical way.
‘Is that all?’ he snapped.
‘Er—no. There’s also the matter of the—the intimacy, or lack of it, in our relationship,’ she added uncomfortably. ‘Of course I accept that you’re only in your thirties,’ she rushed on, before she lost all her courage under Xander’s steely gaze, ‘that you will want—er—have needs… But as long as your—relationships are kept discreet, I see no reason why they should interfere with our arrangement in the slightest,’ she concluded awkwardly.
Xander continued to look at her for several long seconds without speaking, his hooded blue gaze unreadable. ‘You don’t think,’ he finally said softly, ‘that after our earlier—exploration of the possibility, perhaps it might be easier—less complicated—if we were to have that sort of relationship ourselves, in order to satisfy those needs?’
No, she didn’t!
She didn’t care about his previous claim that there were thousands of couples who had a sexual relationship but didn’t love each other. She had already had that with Sam, and she had no intention of repeating the experience with Xander Fraser!
‘No, I don’t,’ she told him firmly.
Xander’s fingers clenched so tightly around his wine glass that he was in danger of breaking it. Damn it, that earlier kiss might have been a little—unwise on his part, and the timing absolutely lousy, but couldn’t this woman see that there was a sexual attraction between the two of them that they would be foolish to ignore?
That it could be dangerous to ignore!
Did she seriously expect them to live together in close proximity, as husband and wife, and not explore the possibilities of the desire they obviously felt for each other?
He could see that she did. That green gaze was clear and determined as she looked down the table at him so intently.
‘We will, of course, have separate bedrooms,’ she added briskly.
That would be no hardship—he and Chloe had occupied separate bedrooms for years, by his choice!
He raised a mocking eyebrow. ‘And what of your own—needs? Do you intend to satisfy them discreetly too?’ His voice hardened. He was not at all happy with the thought.
The blush that he found so intriguing once again brightened her cheeks. ‘Certainly not!’ she denied indignantly.
Xander frowned, but something inside him eased a little, and he loosened his death-grip on the wine glass before he shattered it. ‘Then what do you intend doing about them?’
She shook her head, the candlelight bringing out the gold highlights in her hair. ‘I don’t intend doing anything about them!’ she assured him tartly. ‘The—physical side of marriage is not something that interests me in the slightest.’
She really thought she meant that, Xander realised as he took in the set of her mouth and the determined tilt of her chin.
For a woman who had been married for seven years, who had a six-year-old son, Casey was surprisingly naïve if she didn’t realise exactly how sexually responsive she was—of how she had melted against him minutes ago, her mouth as hungry as his own.
Xander’s gaze narrowed as he wondered again about her marriage to Sam Bridges.
He had despised the other man almost as much as he had despised Chloe—had thought them two of a kind, considering only their own interests of importance. But had that selfishness also permeated Bridges’ physical relationship with his own wife?
What business was it of his? Xander instantly rebuked himself; Casey was very firmly setting down the terms of their marriage, making it perfectly clear that the financial security he offered was all that interested her. That he would have to look elsewhere if he wanted to satisfy his physical ‘needs’!
‘Fine.’ He gave a sharp inclination of his head. ‘Is there anything else you want written into the contract besides what we’ve already discussed?’
Casey looked at him uncertainly, knowing she had displeased him in some way, but completely at a loss to understand how. She was being reasonable, wasn’t she? More than reasonable, she would have thought.
‘No, there’s nothing else,’ she confirmed.
‘Then I’ll go ahead and make the necessary arrangements.’
The arrangements for their wedding.
The arrangements for her and Josh to move into this house.
The arrangements for her to be Xander Fraser’s wife. In name only…!
CHAPTER EIGHT
FOR Xander, the three weeks leading up to their wedding day were some of the most puzzling—and frustrating—he had ever known.
Used to making decisions, to controlling his multimillion-pound production company both here and in America, he found dealing with the complexity of the woman who had agreed to become his wife—in name only!—more challenging than anything or anyone else he had ever encountered.
In response to that telephone call from David James he’d initially had to go to New York for five days. While there he had received a telephone call from Brad Henderson, and the older man had made it clear that he didn’t believe any marriage between Xander and the widow of Sam Bridges would ever take place.
Which had been enough of a spur—if Xander had needed one!—to set the marriage plans in motion.
Which was when his troubles with Casey had really begun!
Telling the two children of their plans had gone smoothly enough—although Xander had been a little thrown when Josh, with his mother’s candour, had innocently asked if he was going to be his new daddy.
Casey had been the one to smooth over that awkwardness by stating that she thought it better if Josh called him Xander for the moment, and Lauren called her Casey.
But following that Casey had flatly refused to comply with his suggestion that she immediately give up her two jobs at the café and the hotel restaurant, claiming that she still had to live and pay the bills until after they were married.
When he had asked why she hadn’t put her house on the market yet, he’d been given the same answer.
His question as to whether or not she had any guests she wished to invite to the wedding had also been met with a negative. Well, he didn’t, either.
And she had absolutely refused to even consider his suggestion that she make any changes—either to Fraser House, or the running of it—she deemed fit for the comfort of herself and Josh. She had assured him there would be plenty of time for that later, if she deemed it necessary.
This had given him some insight into the reasoning behind Casey not doing any of the things he had asked of her—she wasn’t sure that he was going through with the wedding, either!
As a way of showing her he was completely serious about the marriage, he’d had his lawyer draw up the contract Casey had asked for—only to have her request that it be sent on to her own lawyer for perusal.
The bundle of fury that arrived at the house that evening, only two days before the wedding, wasn’t what he had been expecting!
He was working on some papers in his study when Hilton announced Casey’s arrival. The fact that she was here at all was surprising enough, but the angry glitter in her eyes and the flush to her cheeks were even more so as she stormed into his study seconds later and threw the contract down on his desk in front of him.
‘I can’t sign this!’ She scowled.
Xander frowned darkly. ‘Why can’t you?’
‘Because I can’t!’ she snapped. ‘Because it’s wrong! Because it’s—it’s damned insulting!’ she finished furiously, her hands bunched into fists at her sides as she confronted him across the wide width of the leather-topped desk.