Drake moved away from the fire as if the heat was getting too much for him. Even she could feel the warmth from her position on the sofa—waves of warmth that gave the room a safe and cosy feel. He sat on the sofa opposite hers, his expression still set along grave and serious lines.
‘It’s incredibly difficult for women and even some men to lose control of their financial affairs. Divorces are messy at the best of times...they don’t have to be, but when there’s money and assets to divvy up it can be shocking what lengths people will go to. That’s why a prenuptial agreement can make things so much more straightforward.’
‘But when people fall in love they believe the best of the other person. It can sound so unromantic, even distrustful, to ask for a prenup. It’s like saying,I love you but this is just in case you or I fall out of love some time in the future.’ Aerin screwed up her lips in a self-deprecating smile. ‘Sorry, I must sound so naïve and trusting and hopelessly romantic.’
Drake gave a lopsided smile that sent her heart aflutter. ‘Promise me you’ll sign a prenup when you do find your Mr Perfect. I’ll do it pro bono for you.’
Aerin’s own smile faded and she uncrossed her legs and sighed. ‘I’m starting to wonder if such a person exists. I mean, I’ve always had such high standards about everything. I never do anything by halves. I’m all in or not in at all, which is why I’ve got to the age of almost thirty and never had sex.’
That one word dropping into the silence sent a wave of heat through her body and a strange energy into the atmosphere, like an audience taking a collective breath, waiting for something important to happen...
‘Aerin.’ There was a stern quality to his voice. And then he let out a long sigh and sent one of his hands through his hair in an agitated manner. His eyes met hers across the distance between the sofas. His gaze glittered darkly, his brows close together, his lips set in a firm line. But then she noticed a pulse beating in his neck and his jaw working like a miniature hammer was tapping beneath his skin. ‘We’re both tired and need to go to bed, before we step across a boundary neither of us will view the same way in the morning.’
‘I wasn’t going to ask you to sleep with me.’ Orwasshe? Aerin hardly knew what was going to come out of her mouth next. When she was alone with Drake Cawthorn, her body and her brain misfired, making her want things she hadn’t thought she would want under such circumstances. Like more of his touch, his deeply passionate kisses, the stroke and glide of his tongue against hers. The heat that roared between their bodies, the surprisingly erotic heat that threatened to overrule her carefully constructed plan for her life. Her Mr Perfect checklist said nothing about having a short-term fling with a man who had openly declared falling in love was not in his game plan. Ever.
Aerin rose from the sofa and began to clear away the mugs.
‘Leave it. I’ll tidy up. You go on upstairs. I’ll see you in the morning.’
Aerin put the mug back down and straightened, aware of the heat in her cheeks and the burning desire in her body. ‘Thanks for what you did tonight. The charade and all. I think we managed to convince them we were the real deal.’
A ghost of a smile came and went on his mouth. ‘You’re welcome, Goldilocks.’
Drake mechanically cleared up their mugs and then made sure the fire screen was securely in place in front of the fireplace. The fire was still smouldering even though he hadn’t put any more fuel on it. But so too, were the flames in his body smouldering like red-hot coals. He was in danger of crossing a line he swore he would never cross. And how ironic that it was in one of his safety houses. Maybe he was the one who should have the locked room and get Aerin to lock him in, so he couldn’t be tempted to touch her again.
But he was already in a prison of sorts—the prison of his past.
He had shared more with Aerin than he had shared with anyone. The dark stuff kept leaking out of him as if holes had been bored into the steel of his armour and he didn’t know how to plug them back up. He was grateful she hadn’t pressed him for more details but he found the more he had revealed, the more he wanted to reveal. The tragic and largely avoidable circumstances of his past were something he carried with him every day of his life.
The survivor guilt was heavy and burdensome but his desire to make the world a better place for other people like his mother and sister drove him to work hard. Impossibly hard at times, but even knowing he had potentially saved some lives didn’t undo the heartbreaking damage of the lives he had lost. The lives he wished he could have saved, would have saved if only he had known what his father was capable of. The lives of his mother and sister. The two people who had meant the world to him. Their lives taken brutally by his father, who would have taken his life too, if Drake had been home at the time.
But he hadn’t been home and he had to live with the knowledge and guilt that came with that inescapable fact.He had failed to protect his mother and sister.It wasn’t something he could ever forgive himself for, no matter how many shelters and charities he funded.
CHAPTER SIX
AERINSLEPTDEEPLYfor a couple of hours out of sheer exhaustion. But then she woke around dawn to the sound of Drake’s muffled voice crying out in a long and anguished, ‘No!’
She threw off the bedcovers and quickly pulled on her wrap to cover her nightgown and made her way to his bedroom further down the corridor. She tapped on the door. ‘Drake? Are you okay?’ There was no answer other than another groan, as if he was in some sort of anguished pain. Was he having some sort of medical event? She knew he occasionally had tension headaches in the past. But Tom had told her that, not Drake.
Aerin opened the door a crack and peered inside the dimly lit bedroom. She could make out his tall frame in the bed, the bedclothes in a tangle around his waist, revealing his flat stomach and toned abdomen. His upper body was naked, his chest sprinkled with dark hair, the same ink-black as his head. He was thrashing from side to side, his eyes tightly closed, his hands bunched into fists as he clutched at the sheets either side of his thighs. ‘No, no, no, no!’
Aerin rushed over and, leaning over him, took him by the upper arms, giving him a gentle shake. ‘Drake, wake up. You’re having a nightmare.’
His eyes snapped wide open like one of those old-fashioned ventriloquist dolls. He blinked a couple of times and then let out a muttered curse and dragged himself up in a sitting position. He moved so quickly she had no choice but to remove her hands from his upper arms, but not before she’d noted how muscular and toned they were.
‘Are you okay? I was so worried about you. I thought you might be having a migraine or something.’
Drake scraped his hand through his already tousled hair, her eyes drawn to the bulge of his biceps as he lifted his arm. ‘I’m sorry for scaring you. I haven’t had a nightmare in years. Ten at least.’
She was still sitting on the edge of his bed and had no desire to move away just yet. ‘Maybe it was because of what we talked about in the car coming here last night. Your family being...’ She couldn’t bring herself to say the brutal word out loud.
Drake reached for her hand where it was resting on the bed next to his thigh. His fingers were warm and gentle around hers and a shiver scuttled down her spine. His expression was difficult to read in the muted light of a greyish dawn, but she could feel something in his touch that spoke volumes.
‘I haven’t talked to anyone about what happened since I was a teenager. I hated being that kid. The kid whose father killed his own family.’
Aerin gasped. ‘Oh, no...’ His father killed his mother and sister? His own father? How on earth had he coped with such an awful event?
He gave her a grim look. ‘He would have killed me too if I’d been home at the time, but I stayed at a mate’s that night, drinking. Can you believe it? I was rip-roaring drunk at the age of fifteen and had no idea of what my father had planned to do.’