More Than A Vow: Vows of Revenge / After Their Vows / Vows Made in Secret

And her mother’s wish to have her ashes sprinkled in the Seine was weighing on her.

So Melodie begrudgingly put on a proper tweed skirt and jacket over a black turtleneck, put her hair in a French roll and closed the door on her new apartment far earlier than necessary so even if she missed her first bus, she wouldn’t be late for her interview.

This was an old building, bordering on disrepair, and it smelled musty, but the price was right and all the locks worked.

As she walked down the stairs, she told herself to be thankful she had anything at all. After a lifetime of watching her mother struggle against negative thoughts and spirals of depression, Melodie had learned not to dwell on regrets or could-have-beens. She accepted her less-than-ideal circumstances philosophically and set goals for a better situation, confident she would get to where she wanted to be eventually. This apartment and taking a job she didn’t want was merely a step in the process.

This was also the last time she started from scratch, she assured herself, grateful her mother hadn’t lived to see her fall on her face this way.

Mom. Pearls. France.

Her hand went to her collar, didn’t find the necklace, and her heart sank into the pit of her stomach.

She tried not to think of France, but Roman crept into her thoughts day and night, taunting her with how horribly she’d misjudged him.

She blamed her sunny ideals. All her life she had wanted to believe deep emotional connections were possible, even though her mother’s yearning for a better love from her father had been futile. And even though, among the loose friendships Melodie had made over the years, she’d seen more heartbreaks than success stories.

Ingrid and Huxley had fed her vision, though. Every once in a while, she came across a couple she wished she could emulate: the people who communicated with a glance and did sweet things for each other, just because.

The only way she’d coped with her barren early years had been by promising herself that real, true love would come to her eventually.

She’d mistaken a sexual reaction for a signal of mental and emotional compatibility where Roman was concerned. Maybe she wasn’t as delicate as her mother had always been, but grief had been taking its toll. A month past her out-of-character encounter with Roman and she could see how susceptible she’d been that day. Ingrid’s joy in her coming nuptials had created impatience for a life partner in Melodie. She’d seen the possibility of a future in a kiss from a superficially attractive man.

Relationships, she decided, could wait until both her finances and her heart were back on their feet. The thought allowed her to feel resilient as she reached the ground floor. She was capable of meeting challenges head-on with equanimity. She would take this job and rebuild her life.

After striding across the lobby, she pushed open the glass door onto the street.

The bluster of a nor’easter yanked it out of her hands.

Actually, it was a man. He filled the space, blocked her exit. He wore a suit and an overcoat. His dark hair glistened with rain. He was clean shaven and green eyed like a dragon. Heart-stoppingly gorgeous.

Roman Killian.

* * *

Melodie was still in Virginia, but had moved to Richmond.

The moment that detail had been reported to Roman, he’d booked a flight. The dry, musty interior of her apartment building, with its ugly red-and-silver wallpaper, closed around him as he stepped into the foyer, forcing her back several steps into the wall of mailboxes. He barely took in his surroundings. He was too busy studying her.

She looked...thin. A stab of worry hit him as he considered what that could mean for an unborn baby. Her face was wan, too, beneath her makeup. She wore a smart suit beneath an open coat, but her eyes swallowed her face. Her pale lips parted with shock. Whatever she held dropped from her grip with a muffled thump.

It was just her purse, but he shot forward in instinctive chivalry.

She snatched it before he could, jerking upright to stare down on him.

It was the oddest moment of juxtaposition. She was the one living in a low-end ZIP code in a modest suburb of the city. He appeared on list of Fortune 500 CEOs as one of the richest men in the world. His suit was tailored, his handkerchief silk.

Yet Melodie stood above him like a well-born lady. Which she was.

He knelt like a peasant. A scab on the complexion of society.

Which he was.

He held her gaze as he rose, shedding any traces of inferiority. Refusing to wear such a label. Not anymore. The struggle to get here had been too long and too hard.

Her eyes grew more blue and deep and shadowed as he straightened to his full height. He found himself resisting the urge to smile as they stood face-to-face. He’d forgotten she was so tall. She met his eyes with only the barest lift of her chin. And she impacted upon him with nothing more than turmoil and silence.

The same fascination accosted him that he’d suffered in France. He was instantly ensnared. If anything, her pull was stronger. Now he knew what it felt like to kiss her and touch her, to possess her and release all of himself into her. The power she had over him was deeply unsettling. Through air coated in layers of old carpet and must, his nostrils sought and found the hint of roses and oranges.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

That sweetly ambling voice of hers made him want to sit back and relax. “We need to talk.”

“I’m busy,” she said flatly, thumbing the face of her phone to check the time. “I have an interview.” She started to move around him, but he held out his hand.

It was enough to stop her. She very pointedly held herself back from accidentally brushing his arm.

Her aversion stung.

“I have to catch a bus,” she said stiffly.

Seeing her in this low-end building, using public transport, gave his conscience another yank. He had another reason for being here besides the possibility of pregnancy. He needed to know for sure. Was she really estranged from her father? Had he really crushed an innocent beneath his heel that day?

“I have your things in my car,” he said, “I’ll drive you wherever you need to go.”

“Mom’s pearls?” Her averted gaze flew to his, round and anxious. “Why didn’t you bring them in?”

“I saw you through the window as I was getting out. I thought—” That she might somehow escape him if he didn’t act fast to catch her here in the foyer. His actions had been pure reflex.

She figured out what he’d almost revealed. “We have nothing to say to each other, Roman,” she said tonelessly. “Just go out and get them. I’d like them back.”

“We do have to talk,” he asserted firmly, watching her for signs of evasion. When she only gave a firm shake of her head, refusing to look at him, he reminded her, “I didn’t use anything that day.”

Her expression blanked before comprehension dawned in a dark flood of color. Her jaw fell open, appalled. “I’m not pregnant!” she cried.

Someone down the hall opened a door and peeked out.

Melodie was scarlet with embarrassed anger. Her dismayed blue eyes glared into his as she folded her arms defensively, mouth pouted in humiliation. “I’m not.”

“Are you sure?” he challenged.

“Of course I am. But I’m stunned that you’ve tracked me down to ask. I assumed you’d been careless on purpose. When it comes to ruining a woman’s life, leaving her with an unplanned pregnancy is about as effective as it gets.”

That bludgeoned hard enough to knock him back a step.

“I wouldn’t do that.” He was deeply offended she would think him capable of such a coldhearted form of revenge. When she only lifted disinterested brows, he insisted, “I wouldn’t. I know too well what it’s like to be an unplanned baby. I’m here to take care of my child if I have one. Do I?”

* * *

“No,” Melodie insisted, forcing herself to meet his gaze even though it was very hard. She was telling the truth, but she didn’t want to see his sincerity or have empathy and understand him. She only wanted to put him and her grave error behind her.

But his being here, asking the question, affected her. She’d been relieved when things had cycled along as normal. Of course she’d been relieved. Yet a small part of her had suffered a wistful moment. A baby would have been a disaster, but it would have been family. Real family. The kind she could love.

Holding out a hand, she said, “Can you just give me my mother’s necklace?”

“There’s definitely no baby.”

“Definitely.”

He absorbed that with barely a twitch of his stoic expression before he jerked his head and held the door for her.

Dear Lord, he was handsome with those long, clean-shaven cheeks set off by his turned up collar, his mouth pursed in dismay, his short thick hair tossing in the bluster of wind that grabbed at them.

The fierce breeze yanked her bound hair and shot up her skirt to bite at her skin. She clenched her teeth and beelined for the limo at the curb.

He opened the back door himself. “What’s the address of where you’re going?”

“Don’t do me any favors, Roman. I’ll just take the necklace and go.”

“You’re refusing my help out of spite?”

“I’m protecting what’s left of my self-respect.” Her knees knocked as the blustering cold penetrated mercilessly. Teeth chattering, she held out her hand. “Pearls?”

“They’re right there. Get in. I have more to say.”

“To quote you, I don’t care.”

With an air of arrogant patience, he closed another button on his coat and set his back to the wind, adopting a stance of willingness to wait for the spring thaw.

“You won’t just hand them to me. You’re determined to make me miss my job interview. Look around. Getting me fired did nothing to my father,” she charged.

“I know that I misjudged you,” he snapped back. “But your father and brother are on the attack against me. That’s not up for dispute. It’s reality. And it’s not common knowledge that you’ve lived apart from them all these years. Given the way things looked in the funeral photos, it was an easy mistake to make.”

“I know,” she said with the same impatience. She could understand and almost forgive that part. She had plenty of unexpressed anger of her own toward her father and brother. “And I have no problem believing they stole from you.”

His brows went up a smidgen. “Not many would take my word for it.”

“Anton isn’t capable of writing his own email, let alone launching a high-tech start-up. I’ve always wondered how he managed it.” She smiled bitterly. “And I have a lot of experience with how low they can sink.”

His gaze sharpened and she dropped her own, shielding herself, unprepared to let him delve into all the anguish and fury roiling inside her.

“So get in.”

“No.”

“For God’s sake, why not?”

“Because I don’t trust you!”

His head went back and his expression grew carved and stoic. “I’m not going to touch you. I didn’t mean to sleep with you that day.”

“Oh, that’s funny,” she choked, trying to end that topic before it went any further. She was mortified he’d brought it up.

“It’s the truth,” he shot back, his energy like a living thing that whipped and raced on the tail of the wind, lashing her with its force. He was tense. Very tense as he confronted her, as if he was willing her to believe him. It was weirdly fascinating.

She tore her gaze away, not wanting to get caught up in trying to decipher the truth from his lies. Not wanting to hear excuses and let down her guard. He’d already gotten past her defenses too easily, setting her back so she was as naked and defenseless as she’d been that day. It wasn’t him she mistrusted, but herself.

She ought to be able to shut him out the way she had with her father and Anton. Roman meant nothing to her. Less than nothing. As bitter as she was toward her father and half brother, she went days, weeks even, without thinking of them, but no such luck with Roman. He was top of her mind every day, ambushing her with memories of kisses and caresses and wrenching pleasure.

She swallowed, not wanting the recollections to surface now.

Her blood warmed anyway. Her senses heightened, making her aware of his scent, masculine and sharp, beneath the sweet smell of rain and the comforting notes of damp wool. Clothing didn’t make a man, but everything about his appearance amplified his stark masculinity. His cheekbones were proud and chiseled, his nose a blade, his lips twitching almost into a closed-mouth kiss as he prepared to speak.

“I slept with you in spite of who you are, not because of it,” he said in a growl.

“Had a staggering crash in your standards, did you?” Insult blindsided her as she absorbed that he was saying she’d been willing and he had merely taken advantage. Any man would. “At least when I thought you seduced me for revenge, it was personal. I honestly thought I couldn’t feel worse about that day. Thanks, Roman. You’re a real guy.”

“And you’re twisting me into a far more vicious bastard than I am.”

She stared at him, astonished. “You made hatred to me.” The words swelled in her throat. She clenched her jaw, trying to hold back convulsive shivers, trying to hold on to control and not allow emotion to rise up and sting her eyes. “At least I had some respect for you that afternoon, before you started ruining my life.”

“Would you get in the damned car?”

She realized people were walking by, staring. Overhearing.

She was freezing, and warm air radiated from the interior. With a sob of annoyed misery, she threw herself into the backseat.

He followed and slammed the door, adjusting the vents so hot gushes of air poured directly onto her.

She didn’t thank him, even though her legs were stinging and her fingers were numb. She attacked the box with her name on it, spilling her mother’s necklace into her lap. Picking it up, she pressed the treasured beads to her lips.

“I only meant to do to you what they did to me, which was cut short your career and leave you with bills to pay,” Roman said.

She dropped her hands. “But you accidentally slept with me, even though you hated me,” she charged, going hot again. Bristling with temper.

“Yes,” he asserted, as if that proved some kind of point beyond the fact he was a conscienceless womanizer.

“To humiliate me,” she confirmed in a jagged voice, looking over at him in time to see guilt flash across his expression before he controlled it.

“I thought you were throwing yourself at me for their purposes. It looked as if you were trying to trick me into letting you stay in my house. I let you come on to me so I could turn you down,” he admitted.

“But you went through with it,” she said, returning to that deep sense of bitterness that had burned through her with every step of her journey back to the hotel that day, as she’d absorbed that what had looked like a white knight had actually been the same blackened soul that the men in her family possessed. “How do people like you sleep at night? That’s what I want to know.”

“Do not lump me in with them, Melodie,” he fired back, temper riled enough to darken his expression and press her into her seat. “Do you see them chasing you down the East Coast to ask about consequences? I am not just like them.” His jaw worked. “I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a good man, definitely not a great one, but I’m not as immoral as they are.”

The way she’d set him on the same reprehensible shelf as the Gautier men ate at him. She could see it. That should have been more satisfying, but it just made her feel small.

“Sleeping with you just happened,” he muttered.

“Because I threw myself at you,” she provided, feeling the sting press forward from the backs of her eyes to blur her vision. “Because you couldn’t resist me.” Spider arms. Freak.

She narrowed her eyes, turning her face away as she willed Anton’s voice to silence and willed her tears to dry before they squeezed past her lashes and fell.

“Yes.”

She hated Roman in that moment. Really hated him. Because he sounded so begrudging as he said it. Not smooth and charming and manipulative. Resentful. He sounded as confounded by his reaction as she was by hers. That made him sound truthful even though she was convinced he had to be lying.

“I know I’m not beautiful. At best, I’m striking,” she said, straining to keep emotion from her voice. “I’m certainly not the type who inspires lust, so give it a rest. You wanted to hurt me. Which you did.”

“I’m not here to hurt you again,” he ground out, flinching as though she’d slapped him. “I can’t take back what I did. If I could...” he began tightly, emotions so compressed she couldn’t read anything in his tone but intensity.

He would take it back? Her heart clenched in a surprisingly strong contraction of agony.

Of course she would take it back, too, she assured herself, even as their heights of pleasure danced through her consciousness, reminded her how rare and singular the experience had been. He’d ruined her for accepting anything less, if he wanted the truth, which left her feeling bleak and hopeless.

“You told me that day that you were attracted to me,” he said.

“Don’t throw that in my face,” she cried, recoiling from being mocked.

“I was attracted, too. More than I knew how to handle. That’s why I slept with you. Not out of revenge. Not to humiliate you.”

She swallowed, wavering toward believing him, but it strained credulity. “It wasn’t love at first sight, Roman. I saw the way you looked at me the day I arrived. You weren’t interested.”

“I didn’t let my interest show. There’s a difference.”

She had to turn her nose to the window then, hope rising too quickly. Did she have no sense of self-preservation? Believing in him had only gotten her a giant helping of heartache the last time.

But he was very contained, not giving away much, very good at keeping his thoughts and feelings well hidden. Maybe he had been attracted.

Even if he had been, so what?

With a troubled sigh, she realized she was crushing the pearls in her clenched hands. Her fingers were warm enough to work now. She reached to close the strand around her throat.

Wool slid against leather and Roman was in her space, fingers brushing hers.

With an alarm that came more from a jolt of excitement than fear, she released the pearls and let him take over, angling herself so he could finish quickly. Her skin tightened all over her body as his knuckles brushed the tiny, upswept hairs at the back of her head. Beneath her layers of clothing her nipples tightened into sharp peaks and her blood grew hot, radiating heat outward to dispel any lingering chill for the rest of time.

The moment he was done she shifted away from his disturbing touch, adjusting the weight of the necklace so it felt right, and flashed a nervous glance his way.

He was watching her intently. “I felt it, too. There’s something in our chemistry.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she dismissed with an unsettled shake of her head. If the traffic hadn’t been so busy, she would have pushed out her side of the car. “I need to get to my job interview. Let me out.”

“Don’t start lying to me now, Melodie. Not when we’re clearing the air.” He didn’t move.

Her heart began to pound with a trapped bird sort of panic. “Look,” she said, tugging the hem of her skirt down her knee. Electricity seemed to crackle between them like fingers of lightning. “I know I gave you the impression I’m easy. I’m not. So don’t start with your moves.”

“Moves,” he repeated on a dry chuckle. “Like how I seduced you that day? You kissed me.”

“Don’t remind me!” she cried.

“I will remind you,” he said, leaning into her. “And I’ll even be honest enough to admit I lied to you that day. I said it’s always like that for me, but who has an encounter like that ever in their lifetime?”

Melodie shot her gaze to his. He was so close and disturbing. His brow was pulled into a perturbed line, his skin taut with challenge and something else. Discomfort, maybe, with how much he was admitting.

Between one breath and the next the shared memory of their wild coming together filled the tiny space behind these tinted windows.

She couldn’t look away from his rain-forest eyes. He pinned her in place with nothing but a tiny shift of his attention to her mouth.

Her heart began to race and her blood felt as though it zigzagged in her veins. Her breasts flooded with heat, growing heavy and achy, the tips tight with reaction.

Desire clouded his irises.

A fog of longing smothered her consciousness, making sensible thought slippery and vague. She found herself looking at his mouth. In her dreams those lips plundered hers. She always woke with one question uppermost in her mind: Had it really been that good?

His lips parted as he came closer.

She opened with instinctive welcome.

They made contact and intense relief washed through her as a great thirst was finally slaked. His hand came to the side of her face, open and tender. She tilted into his touch, feeling moved and cherished as he cradled her head and gently but thoroughly devoured her.

She drew on him with greedy abandon, forgetting everything except that he filled a vast need in her. There were no words, just a craving that both ceased and grew as they locked mouths and touched tongues. His body closed in, pressed. He overwhelmed her as he wrapped his arms fully around her.

She moaned, pleasure blooming in her like a supernova. She instantly ached for more intimate contact with him.

His arms tightened, gathering her to draw her with him as he sat back, pulling her into his lap.

The shift was enough of a jolt to make her pull back and realize where they were, how her knees had fallen on either side of his thighs, skirt riding up. She was losing all contact with reality. Again.

Then what?

“This can’t happen,” she gasped.

She pushed off him, throwing herself awkwardly onto the seat opposite and glaring back at him. She felt like a mouse that might have freed herself from the cat’s mouth, but only until he wanted to clamp down on her again.

“Not here, no. Come to my hotel with me,” he said, voice sandpapery and exquisitely inviting.

“For what?” she cried.

“Don’t be dense,” he growled. “We’re an incredible combination. You can feel the power of it as well as I can.”

“You’ve really perfected this technique of yours, haven’t you?” she choked. “Listen, you might sleep with people you loathe, but I don’t. I won’t sleep with a man I hate.”

He snapped his head back.

Her conscience prickled. She didn’t hate him. There was too much empathy and understanding in her for such a heartless emotion.

“Well, that’s that. Isn’t it?” He thrust himself from the car, holding the door open for her.

Icy wind flew in to accost her, scraping her legs and stabbing through her clothes as she rose from the cozy interior to the ferocity of winter, entire body shaking, heart fragile.

“Goodbye, Roman,” she said, feeling as if she was losing something as precious as her mother’s pearls.

“Melodie.”

Not goodbye, she noted, but his tone still sounded final and made her unutterably sad. Clutching the edges of her jacket closed, she walked to the bus stop on heavy feet.

CHAPTER SIX

ROMAN WENT BACK to his house in France where he could live in his own personal exile and ruminate, but despite only being here once, Melodie infused the place.

He never should have gone after her. If it hadn’t been for the possibility of a baby, he wouldn’t have, but there was no way he could have let a child of his grow up the way he had—not just poor and alone, but with a million questions and a million facets of rejection glittering into the furthest corners of its psyche. The one time he’d asked his mother about his father, she’d said, “He was a rich man who said he loved me, but I guess he didn’t because he didn’t come back.”