His Pregnant Christmas Bride by Olivia Gates

Author:Olivia Gates
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2016-11-08T05:00:00+00:00

Seven

Ivan walked into the bathroom and his heart almost burst.

Anastasia was in the large shower stall, her back to him, leaning her forehead on the marble wall, as if the steaming jet beating down on her was almost too much for her to withstand. Without seeing her face, he knew she was weeping.

She hadn’t wept in weeks now. She’d even started to talk about Alex without her eyes filling, without choking on the misery and finality of his loss. And he’d managed to take her back to that terrible place of vulnerability, where she felt so anguished and helpless. But he hadn’t been able to tell her what he felt would only burden her more. Knowing his past would have been just one more scar for her to sustain.

But that wasn’t the only reason. He had to be honest with himself. He feared she’d be horrified, repulsed, if she found out the truth about him.

His slow approach toward her suddenly stopped at a slam of realization. That this could have been the real reason he hadn’t confronted her before he’d left her in the past. Maybe he’d dreaded if she’d known, she would feel relieved to be rid of such a monster, would have tried her best to forget him, to replace him.

Dog-in-the-manger, as she’d said.

He was more messed up than he had realized.

But even knowing so, there was nothing he could do about it now. Even if he overcame his own aversion to exposing the ugliness and madness in his past, telling her now would only disturb her more. And this he wouldn’t do.

But if he couldn’t satisfy her need to know, he could offer her what neither of them had been truly alive without. The all-consuming intimacy that they’d never be able to find with any other. At least he could give that to her for now. While she still wanted him. The man she thought he was.

His steps resumed as he started to unbutton his shirt. By the time he opened the shower, he was still clothed but he couldn’t wait any longer to have his hands on her.

It all happened at once. He got drenched, she gasped at feeling his entry and he was wrapped around her, taking her from her slump against the wall back against his thundering body, into the shelter of his no longer containable passion.

She twisted around to face him with a cry, her eyes streaming with both water and tears, glittering with one unspoken question.

He answered it. “I can’t let you go.”

He tried to obliterate the distance she’d put between them but her trembling hands flattened against his soaked shirt, pain filling her eyes. “I can’t have this be the only reason.”

A self-deriding and loathing huff escaped him. “The one thing that stopped me from taking you was trying to do what was best for you. For me, holding back has been a hell second only to the years without you, to when I lost Alex and thought I’d lost you, too.

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