Anticipation for his reaction is a pulse in my blood.
He raises a single eyebrow, "And I don't want anything anyone else can offer me."
A staggering breath leaves me. I ignore the exhilaration that his words create inside me.
"Then we're at an impasse. You don't want to give me more and I don't want anything less."
He stands where he is, just looking at me. I'm breathing a little harder while he looks in his element, steady as a rock with not a hair out of place.
"Are you hearing what I'm saying, Kri?" I ask softly.
His eyes are glowing facets of ice in the almost dark room.
"An ultimatum is what I'm hearing." He says, "Or something like it."
I bristle. "If you won't take me seriously, I will make you."
He says nothing, watching me impassively. If he thought for one second that I wouldn't pull all the stops to ensure that we are everything we're meant to be, he better have another thought coming.
"As ever, baby, you underestimate me." I say.
"I would never make the mistake of underestimating you, wife." he says.
"I'm not the Alanna I was yesterday Kri. I won't back off if you push me."
He steps closer, leaning right into me.
"What changed?" He asks me, his gaze showering its attention over my face.
I steel myself against the reaction my body has to the intense passion in his expression. It takes me a moment to control myself.
"I remembered I had just as much power in this relationship as you do."
He catches my jaw in his fingers, his gaze dropping to my lips.
"You've always had power in this relationship," he murmurs as he leans closer, "Perhaps more so than me."
His lashes flutter close, his lips were a hairsbreadth away from mine.
Using every single ounce of strength I possessed, I step away from him. His eyes flash open, almost stilling me in my movement.
"What are you doing Alanna?" He asks as he drops the hand that had been holding my chin, back to his side.
Taking what I deserve.
"You've dated other women." I say, a strange kind of emotion unfurling inside me. It's different if he hadn't known about me and dated other women. It's normal. But he'd known about me since he was seven. He'd uttered my name out loud as his first volunteered means of communication.
His eyes narrow. "So?"
"It says something that you knew of me for so long and chose to look elsewhere anyway." I say, the words a rock in my throat.
"Does it?" He asks and he's taken a step closer.
"Stop." I say and he stills where he stands, taking in my expression, searching for fear. When he doesn't see it, he relaxed a smidge.
"Why?" He asks.
"Because. I. Want. More." I grit out, my hands fisting by my side.
"I don't have anymore to give, Alanna." He says, his own voice a frustrated mirror of mine.
"That's bullshit!" I snap out, "That's bullshit and I know it!"
"Don't make the mistake of thinking you know me, Alanna."
YOU ARE READING
TimeBound (Time Tells #1) (COMPLETED)
Romance"Who says your life ends only when your heart stops? It ends even when there's a celebration around you." A marriage. To a man who had saved my parents' life. Their respect, their businesses, their home ... But at a cost. The cost being me. I was...
