Alejandro’s plan is a good one.
If I have a child, an heir to the Kelly dynasty, then I’ll finally be able to have a life worth mentioning. Tiernan might not want to be around me—for which I am truly thankful since the man gets on my every last nerve— but he will no longer see me as a nuisance if I just bear him a son. Right now, it’s plain to see he doesn’t know what to do with me. He doesn’t want to be married to me, that much is clear, but he doesn’t know more than that, either. He’s grasping at straws on how to deal with the awkward situation we find ourselves in. As I see it, two lives are being put on hold for the sake of the treaty. His and mine. We are both stuck on an eternal pause button, and neither one of us knows how to press play and just get on with our lives.
With a child, or maybe even more than one, both of us will have some kind of neutral ground to work with. I’ll gain his respect as the mother of his children, and he will leave me to do with my days as I see fit, only conversing with me in regards to his heirs.
He will no longer feel burdened with the shackles of the treaty and will feel free to live his life parallel to mine. Most made men have girlfriends on the side. Some even have homes for their mistresses and share their beds on the daily, leaving only the weekends occupied with their real family. It’s not the fairytale marriage most girls dream about having, but it’s a marriage I can live with.
Who knows?
If I please him enough, Tiernan may even be open to the idea of me having paramours of my own.
Although, as I ponder the idea, it doesn’t seem very likely.
After I’ve had my dinner, I tidy up the kitchen and then take my luggage that his men left beside the elevator doors back to my room. Instead of unpacking, I decide to go back into the living room and spend the rest of my evening watching TV. I scroll through the channels to find something worth watching, but nothing really grabs my attention. I leave it on some show about rich wives and how they go about their spoiled days. I’ve never been a fan of reality television, but their train-wreck drama is preferable to wallowing in thoughts of my own. I’m not sure how long I watched the show for, but somewhere between one blonde slapping another housewife on the show across the face and another making a drunken fool of herself in some swanky restaurant, I must have dozed off. When my lids flutter open, I see that the television has been turned off and that someone has placed a fleece blanket on top of me as I slept.
No. Not someone.
My husband.
Since he’s the only other person in this apartment with me.
Still a little bit groggy, I get up from the couch and walk back to my room. As I walk down the hall, I realize that Tiernan is no longer in his office. A quick glance at the grandfather clock inside his office tells me that it’s not even midnight yet. Either my husband’s busy week has finally taken its toll on him, or he’s avoiding me in his room.
How am I ever going to get pregnant if the only way I can get my husband to touch me is when I’ve somehow pissed him off, so he feels the need to spank me?
If I’m to get what I want, true freedom, then I have to take my future into my own hands and do something about it. With a new resolve, I go into my room and take a quick shower. Once I’m finished, I go in search of the bag that holds my honeymoon lingerie. I pull it over my head and quickly check myself in the mirror to see how it looks.
I feel bite-size chunks of my pride being ripped out of me as I pull down my panties so that all I have on is the embarrassing sheer teddy. I throw a quick prayer up to Virgen de Guadalupe and beg her to give me the courage I need to see this plan through.
I take a deep breath, leave my room, and walk down the hall towards the bedroom where my husband is holed up. I let out a relieved exhale when I turn his door’s knob and find it unlocked. I step inside the dark room, my heart beating a mile a minute that I’ll get caught, or worse—get thrown out on my ass before I’m able to accomplish my mission.
Even through the blanket of night, the full moon casts enough light that I can see Tiernan’s silhouette lying under the covers on the left side of the bed. I walk to the other side and slide in next to him, letting out another sigh of relief when he doesn’t stir awake.
Although now that I’m lying beside him, him being asleep isn’t exactly part of the plan. I was supposed to seduce him, not just lie here looking up at the ceiling, not knowing what to do next.
Mierda.
What now?
“Your thoughts are as loud as your feet,” Tiernan suddenly says, making my heart flip of its own accord.
“You’re awake,” I croak out.
“Hard not to be with all your racket,” he mumbles, still half asleep as he turns around to face me. “What do you want, Rosa? What was so goddamn important that you felt the need to sneak into my bed in the middle of the night?”
“Teach me,” my response is immediate.
“Come again?” he asks, sounding more alert than he was a second ago.
“I asked you to teach me.”
The room is shrouded in darkness, yet I can still see how his blue eye turns a shade darker than his green one.
“And what lesson do you want to learn tonight?”
My stomach flutters at the sound of his voice going an octave lower.
“What you said in the car. How can a woman have pleasure while on her knees? I want to know.”
“Do you really?”
“Yes,” I whisper hoarsely.
“Very well. Turn on the light.”
“Is that really necessary?” I grip the bedsheet for dear life.
“If I’m going to teach you to suck cock, then I’m going to see you do it.”
God.
Does he always have to be so crude?
And why the hell does his dirty mouth always bring such salacious imagery to my mind?
When I don’t budge, he turns over to his bedside table and switches the light on.
“There. Much better.”
For him, maybe.