Lauren’s kiss-swollen lips widened into a knowing smile. “Like surfing typhoon waves in Thailand, for instance?”
“Heard about that, did you?” He made a face at the ceiling, wondering where he got the nerve to be alive after some of the stunts he’d pulled. If his child turned out like him, he didn’t know what he’d do.
“Your mother seems to think you were testing your own limits, not acting out, but were you rebelling?”
He thought back to his impatience with school and its dry courses in statistics and economics, languages and political policy. They’d made his eyes cross. The only thing that had held remote interest for him had been history because at least there was action, intrigue and battles.
“Not rebelling so much as determined to live my life to the fullest. I knew my father would eventually push the mantle onto me and I didn’t want any regrets. I pulled my application to the space program when he died. It was time to put away romantic notions and do what was right.”#p#????#e#
He thought he saw a flash of protest in her eyes, but she lowered her gaze, brows tugged together in consternation. After a moment of reflection she asked, “Were you angry with him for dying?”
“Yes. I thought I’d be old before I took the reins and hated the idea of being second in command for most of my life, which is another reason I wanted to make my mark elsewhere. In space even. But you never appreciate what you have until you lose it. I’d give anything to have had him breathing down my neck all this time, training me to take over.”
She nodded in understanding. “I always felt cheated, not really knowing my father. That’s why I was determined to spend as much time as I could with Mamie. I didn’t have your ambition for making marks, though. I took a degree with the community college in French-Canadian literature of all things. Fat lot of good that did me. I hope you’ve grown to like your job because I can’t support myself on that.”
“I do,” he assured her, surprised to discover it was true because he hadn’t examined his feelings on the job for years. He’d been too head-down busy. “In the beginning it was almost more than I could handle. For all my schooling I wasn’t prepared, and quickly developed a new respect for my father and how easy he’d made it seem. I’ve grown into it, though. It still challenges me—mentally, not physically, but the stakes are higher than I ever expected, affecting not just my life and family but in some cases millions of lives. That’s enough to keep me focused and engaged.”
“It sounds very demanding.”
“Are you worried what that means for you? Don’t.” He touched where she was crinkling her chin into a concerned frown. “You’ll make a fine banker’s wife. You have poise and style and discretion. I’m more than pleased to have you at my side.”
Her lips parted as though she was about to say something, but then her brows twitched in surprised puzzlement. “Do you travel a lot?”
“Quite a lot, yes.”
“And what does that mean for me?”
He hadn’t given it much thought. “Well, I suppose it means you’ll have some quiet days and nights. I can’t take you with me. Not while you’re pregnant.” As for after the baby came, he’d watched his sisters take their children on the road and it required as much preparation as launching a satellite. Definitely not worth the effort for anything less than ten days.
A mask of cool tolerance slid over Lauren’s features. Her smile was tight. “Not the sort of marriage I would have chosen for myself, having lived in one just like it, but it’s not about me, is it? As you said, time to put away romantic notions. This is something we did for the baby.”
That was the second time she’d made their marriage sound like something she’d done out of practicality. It chafed even more this time. That was not the only reason they had married. Was it? Reflexively, he rolled her under him, spreading her legs with the pressure of his thighs so she could feel how quickly his body readied itself for hers.
He could feel her dampness, watched a flush of anticipation bloom under the surprise that transformed her face and heard the catch in her breath.
“I keep reminding myself you’re pregnant and I shouldn’t make too many demands, but do you want me again, Lauren?”
It was a deliberately worded question, one she might have answered if he hadn’t leaned down to fill his hands and mouth with velvet mounds and firm, jutting nipples. The cry he wrung from her was thin and far away, reassuring him how quickly she succumbed to the same passion that held him in thrall.