Guilt made Max’s body tense and his gut burn. “Mia, I’m not going anywhere.”
“What about work, your plan to conquer the business and political world?” she questioned, her voice confused.
Yeah, at one time he had wanted to run for political office, but those desires had completely fled. He’d wanted it for all the wrong reasons, and he’d discovered he would make a lousy politician. “I told you I’ve changed. I don’t want the same things as I wanted back then.” He released a masculine sigh as he continued, “And I’ve conquered everything I want to conquer in the business world. I don’t need to travel like that anymore.” Actually, most of the trips hadn’t been critical, but he didn’t want to think about that right now. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.”
“It will be nice to have you home,” Mia said with a yawn. “I miss you so much when you’re gone. I need you to help me get used to all the changes that have happened. I wish my memory would just come back.”
Max could have told her that he understood the loneliness she had felt, but he doubted that she could handle exactly how much he’d missed her—during their marriage when he traveled a lot, and during the years she had been taken away from him.
“You won’t have a chance to even miss me,” he informed her playfully. In a sterner voice he told her, “You’re also going to be surrounded by security from this day forward. No arguments. No more going around unsecured. No more ducking our security. You’re being protected. Always.”
“I know I ought to disagree, but I won’t. Not now. I’m actually relieved,” she admitted, her voice sounding lost in the dark.
“And you aren’t going to be exposed to the media either,” he rumbled adamantly. “I’ll make a brief statement when the media finds out, and that’s all they’re getting.”
“I’d rather avoid them for now. At least until I remember what happened.” Mia shifted position slightly, rubbing against him as she moved, her ass flexing against his groin. “Max, are you…” Her voice trailed off, her question unfinished.
He knew exactly what she was going to ask. “Am I hard? Yep. My c**k is like granite right now. Everything about you arouses me, and I’ve been without for over two years, sweetheart. So you need to quit squirming against me like that,” he answered. “Be still.”
Her body stopped shifting, but she asked curiously, “You didn’t…you never…nobody ever…” She stopped and then continued, “You didn’t sleep with anyone while I was gone?”
“Nope. And I didn’t f**k anyone either. I had no desire to screw a woman who wasn’t you,” he answered bluntly.
“But didn’t you ever want to—”
“The only thing I wanted was my wife. So I got myself off thinking of you, because there was no one else I wanted.” Max figured if they were starting again, he might as well get honest. He and Mia had never discussed sexual things this bluntly, but maybe they should have. “Does that surprise you?”
She was silent for a moment, so quiet that Max thought she had fallen asleep before she answered. “Actually, the thought of you doing that is pretty hot.” Her voice was low, husky, with a f**k-me-right-now vibe running through her words that he’d never heard before and nearly made him groan with frustrated lust. “I wish I could have watched,” she added quietly, almost as though she was talking to herself.
Her comment was candid, straightforward, and as blunt as his had been. Max didn’t think it was possible for his c**k to get any stiffer, but it did. It was doing some major expansion underneath the denim of his jeans, straining the seams. They had never really flirted or engaged in sexual banter quite this blunt, and doing so now was making his whole body burn. “Go to sleep and behave yourself,” he ordered, his c**k twitching in disagreement with that idea.
“Okay. Promise you’ll stay?”
It nearly killed him that she even had to ask again, but considering how he had handled things in the past, he shouldn’t be surprised. “I promise.”
Max lay awake in the dark, listening to Mia’s breathing as it evened out and got deeper. Her body went completely pliant in his arms, and he willed himself to relax.
He thought he’d never fall asleep in his uncomfortable, cramped position, but he did. And it ended up being the most restful and peaceful slumber he’d had in a very long time.
Chapter 3
“Aren’t you ever going to stop looking and buy something?” Max commented with a smile in his voice, matching his stride to hers as they walked hand in hand around the mall. “You’ve been looking for over an hour.”
Mia had been out of the hospital for two days, wandering around their enormous home feeling lost and wondering what she really should be doing. She was a jewelry designer and she had a workshop at home, but Max had insisted she relax and not try to push herself to start working right away. Going into her workshop felt somehow “off” to her, uncomfortable, so she wasn’t feeling creative anyway. There was very little for her to do except try to figure out exactly why she felt so differently, what had happened to cause the enormous black hole she felt stretching into a huge void in her past. Everything was the same, yet she was so very different. One moment it seemed as if her married life with Max had never been interrupted, but at other times, it seemed as if there was a huge gulf between the two of them, and she could truly feel how much time had passed, how much they had both changed.
She glanced up at Max and smiled back at him, her breath hitching as she looked at him, dressed casually in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, so masculine and so damn perfect that she wanted to just stand still and drink him in.
That’s one thing that hasn’t changed. I can still hardly breathe whenever I’m near him.
“Everything’s so expensive here,” she answered, wondering when she’d begun worrying about prices.
“I think I can afford it,” Max replied with a bark of laughter.
Mia sighed as she absorbed the sound of his laughter, something that had always made her heart skitter. Except now it seemed to make her pulse pound like a jackhammer. Somehow, every moment with Max was so much more intense now, more important. Not that her feelings for him hadn’t always been powerful, and she’d always known that her love for him was much fiercer than the way he felt about her. Oh, she knew he loved her, but Max was almost an obsession for her, a crazy love that she knew she’d never get over. Max was…well…he was Max, and he did nothing to extremes.