Mr. Blackwell's Bride: A Fake Marriage Romance (A Good Wife Book 2) Read online

  What the hell was that?

  I sat alone in the back of my limo, buttoning and unbuttoning my suit jacket, trying to make sense of this strange morning. I hadn’t slept well at all last night after I had left Noriko and returned to my own bedroom. I had tossed and turned until almost four in the morning.

  This morning I was like a zombie, moving through my morning routine like the air was made of honey. I even forgot to shave, I realized when I buttoned up my collar and found my fingers scraping against stubble.

  From my bedroom, I had to pass Noriko’s room to get to the main stairs. Instead of walking right past it like I had done every damn morning, I’d found myself in front of her door, fist held up to knock. I froze, wondering what the hell was my intention in knocking.

  After a long pause, I realized with a start that I just wanted to see her before I left. After all, that was what good husbands did, right?

  I’d told myself not to be stupid, that she was probably still asleep, even though it was later, much later, than I usually left for work.

  Before I could walk away, she had opened the door. As if she’d heard my thoughts, as if I had breathed life into my silent desires. I had kissed her.

  Jesus Christ, I had kissed my wife.

  Her lips were so damn soft and perfect, I almost gave in and sucked her bottom lip into my mouth.

  But she hadn’t moved.

  She didn’t want my kiss. How could she? She was a woman I had paid to be my wife. I pulled away before I could embarrass myself any further and practically ran away from her like a shaking dog.

  I shook my head, trying to clear it. The limo was silent even as we entered the highway towards the city, cars rushing around us. Usually I spent the time alone during my commute to make calls and reply to emails. Today, my head contained only steel wool. I pressed the button that drew down the divider to the front cab. Felipe’s dark head, covered in his usual black cap, appeared in my view.

  “Felipe.”

  “Yes, sir?” he replied, his slight accent giving his voice a music tone.

  “Do we…do we have any music or anything?”

  “Music? Sir?” He sounded totally confused.

  “Yes, music. You know, when instruments are played and sometimes someone sings?”

  “I know what music is, you’ve just never—” He cleared his throat. “Any particular type of music?”

  “Something…upbeat.” I sank back into my seat as Latin music danced from the speakers. This was a totally inefficient use of my time. Lord help me, I couldn’t help but tap along to it.

  29

  ____________

  Noriko

  “Even though Sun Tzu’s philosophies are over two thousand years old, they still apply today,” Drake said, his hand skimming up my inner thigh. “Because the fundamentals of human nature haven’t changed.”

  “I agree,” I said, sucking in a breath as he brushed the scrap of moist lace between my legs with his fingertips.

  He paused and raised an eyebrow. “You, dear wife, agreeing with me?”

  I shot him a dirty look. “I can agree with you.”

  “Only you choose not to.” He returned to his exploration of me, his touch like sparks to dry grass.

  “I only disagree with you when you’re wrong.” His hands were magic all over me, painting a starry, starry night across my body, kicking up ash and embers in a swirl of muggy heat.

  He hummed against my neck. “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”

  “Is this what you’re trying to do?” I asked, indicating the way he was palming my breasts, freed from the top of my crumpled shirt, and cupping my sex, weaving taut, silken threads between both. “Subdue me?”

  “You are certainly the most beautiful enemy I’ve ever had to battle with.” He pushed my underwear aside, finding my wet heat with his demanding fingertips. “Perhaps the most dangerous.”

  “Dangerous?” I let out a moan as he slipped two fingers deep inside me. “Why dangerous?” I breathed.

  “You are sharpness and intellect encased in a fragile, innocent-looking package. What is more dangerous than someone who is underestimated?”

  “Appear weak when you are strong,” more, I need more, “and strong when you are weak,” I mumbled as I ground my hips against his hand.

  I whimpered as he stole his hand out from under my skirt. Palming my ass, he lifted me onto the dresser, my skirt falling apart over the tops of my thighs, revealing my lacy white underwear.

  “You are so fucking sexy when you quote Sun Tzu to me.” Before I could speak, he tore away my underwear—ripped it—right from my body. “Do it again.”

  I let out a cry which turned into a moan as he thrust his freed erection into me. “Oh God, that’s good,” I cried, my head thrown back, my inhibitions dissolving, as he moved in and out of me.

  He stopped—goddamn him—he stopped moving and I wanted to hurt him. “I don’t remember Sun Tzu ever saying that.”

  I glared at him and ground my core against him. “Shut up and fuck me, husband.”

  He grinned. “That I will submit to.”

  30

  ____________

  Drake

  My skin buzzed as I pushed through the front door to my home. Home. When had I started thinking of it as home, rather than simply a place to sleep and store my clothes?

  “Good evening, Drake,” Loretta said. As usual, she was standing inside the door, ready to take my jacket and to update me on the household if needed. She studied me. “You look happy. Very happy.”

  “No more than usual.”

  She frowned at me. “You’re smiling.”

  Damn. So I was.

  “Good day, then?” Loretta asked, a hint of curiosity in her voice.

  It had been a good day. It had been a good week, actually. I felt reinvigorated at work in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time. I was full of energy, my chest swollen with purpose all day. Both Sam and Roger had commented on it.

  “A great day.” It was about to get even better. “Where’s my beautiful wife?”

  “In her room, I believe.”

  A strange surge of warmth filled my chest. For the last few days I’d been coming home to Noriko, waiting for me, her body open and with another one of my books to discuss. I didn’t think it was possible to find such a perfect combination of sexual chemistry and intellectual tussle in one woman, but I had. Somehow, I’d found her. Or she found me. I had half a mind to send Isabelle Taylor a gift to thank her.

  A gift.

  I halted, struck by a sudden urge. “I want to buy something for Noriko…something nice.”

  Loretta lifted her eyebrow. “You’re asking me for advice?”

  “No, I’m asking the butler. Yes, you.”

  Loretta folded her hands over her apron. “Well, sir. I’m flattered you’d ask for my advice. For once.”

  “Don’t make me regret it.”

  “Get her something thoughtful,” she said quickly.

  “Right. Of course.” I spun on my heel and stopped. I frowned, turning back to Loretta. “What does that mean, exactly?”

  She sighed and muttered something under her breath that sounded a lot like “utterly hopeless.”

  “Think about what Noriko has told you she likes,” she said, “things that she’s interested in, that she enjoys. Has she mentioned any hobbies of hers in particular?”

  Things she likes… Hobbies…

  An idea stirred.

  31

  ____________

  Noriko

  It was a Sunday. Drake had insisted on taking me for a drive in his car, something called an Aston Martin Vanquish. It was a very nice car. Pretty to look at. Hell if I know what went on under the hood. I didn’t even know how to drive.

  As the car wound through the streets, I tried talking to Drake. He replied with monosyllabic answers. I soon gave up and stared out the window as the city passed by us. He was silent, even as I studied his profile, a cr
ease between his brows. Something was worrying him. But there was no point in pushing with Drake. If he wanted to tell me what was bothering him, he would in his own time.

  As soon as we returned home, I made a beeline for the kitchen. Drake had initially been so enthused about this drive that he’d rushed us through breakfast. I hadn’t eaten as much as I had wanted to. My stomach had been growling for the last twenty miles home.

  Drake grabbed my hand and tugged back. “Where are you going?”

  Now he wants to talk? “Kitchen. Food. Hungry.”

  He directed me towards the stairs. “No, we have to go to your room first.”

  I gawked at him. He dragged me out for a drive where he completely ignored me and now he wants to have sex? “Drake, I’m starving.”

  “Room first. Two minutes.”

  I huffed. Drake never only took two minutes.

  He strong-armed me up the stairs and down our corridor. I glanced at him as we reached my private apartment. Now he seemed jittery, nervous, almost. “Drake, what is going on?”

  “Just two minutes, I promise. Then I’ll feed you anything you want.”

  I repressed my argument. When Drake got in this mood, there was no way in hell that anyone, not even me, could convince him to change his mind. Shifting Mt. Fuji with my bare hands would be easier.

  He opened my bedroom door, practically shoving me inside.

  I spun to face him, my hands fisting at my hips. “Okay, alright, I’m here. What do—?”

  My eyes locked onto the unfamiliar painting on the wall behind Drake.

  Oh. My. God.

  My mouth dropped open. The Japanese Bridge. The lake. The lilies.

  “Do you like it?”

  I could do nothing but stare at the whirls of color, the dappling of light on the painting, shimmering as if it were alive.

  It was the Monet from the charity auction. The one we had almost kissed in front of.

  “I wanted to do something…nice for you,” he said, his voice hesitant. “If you don’t like it, I can—”

  Something caught between a laugh and a sob came out of my mouth. I slapped my hand against my lips. Then spoke through my fingers. “For me?”

  Drake brushed a lock of my hair behind my ear. I leaned into his touch. “Just for you, Noriko.”

  I pressed a hand to my chest where I felt swollen and raw. What had he done? He’d slipped his fingers into the cracks of my guarded heart and pulled it open.

  “I can’t believe… Is…is it real?” My voice squeezed out of my throat. I walked slowly up to the painting as if it were a mythical beast that might fly away if I moved too fast.

  “You really think that I would buy you a fake?”

  Of course not.

  Drake bought me a Monet. A Mo-fucking-net.

  This was why he wanted to take me out for a drive. He wanted me out of the house so he could have this painting installed in my room. He wasn’t ignoring me in the car, he was anxious about giving me this gift. This incredible gift.

  Do you think he’ll let you take it with you when you leave him?

  Like a crane caught in violent wind, I dropped from my soaring high and crashed into the ground. My stomach felt like it had been dashed across the rocks.

  Drake was watching me with a growing frown on his face. He’d noticed the blood draining from my cheeks. He’d seen the outward signs of my wretched guilty soul.

  “I…I thought it wasn’t for sale,” I said weakly, trying to explain away my inner turmoil.

  “It wasn’t.”

  “How did you…?”

  He was serious when he spoke. “There’s a price for everything.”

  Oh God, wasn’t that the truth.

  32

  ____________

  Drake

  Relief filled me, releasing the tension I’d been carrying all morning.

  Noriko loved the painting.

  I could see the way she clutched at her heart, the way her eyes rimmed like a dam before overflow.

  Then something happened. Something broke the shell of her joy, seeped out like poison, stealing the blood from her cheeks.

  Before I could interrogate her, she walked up to me, her steps like a ballerina’s, pulling off her clothes with her dainty fingers. Her silent plea was written across her flushed body, her hardened nipples like Morse code, her pretty cunt, already wet, was calligraphy in ink.

  “I thought you were hungry,” I choked out, my decency trying to fight against the hot chains of lust wrapping around every inch of my body.

  “I’m starving. For you.”

  How, tell me how, could a man say no to that?

  Afterwards, we lay on her mattress, sated, still naked, a half-eaten platter of food I’d had sent up earlier, set aside.

  “I love it, Drake. I still can’t believe you bullied out a Monet for me.”

  “I didn’t bully…” She raised an eyebrow. I let out a huff. “Alright, then, maybe there was a little bullying.”

  She laughed and crawled into the space beside me, her head nudging into the crook of my arm. We were like two puzzle pieces. Like she had been carved from my side by the ultimate sculptor.

  “I wish I could tell my sisters about what you did for me. They’d giggle and swoon over you like they do their anime boyfriends.”

  I tensed, my defenses rising. Was she trying to manipulate me into letting her call her family? Was she trying to guilt me?

  “Sorry,” she said quietly, “I know you don’t like me talking about them.”

  I looked down upon her face and saw no signs of an alternative intent. When I picked apart the subtext of her words, I could uncover no ulterior motive.

  “Tell me about them. Your sisters, I mean,” I said without thinking.

  She glanced at me. “Really?”

  I nodded, surprised to find that I meant it. I wanted to know more about where she had come from, about her life before me. I coveted everything about her, as if every piece of gifted knowledge and stolen secrets would make her all the more mine.

  A smile lit her face, as radiant and full of light as the very painting I had given her. She was my Monet, I realized. My chaos made sense, my dappled sunlight. She was the same scene I yearned to capture at all times of day, in all seasons, and never grow tired of.

  “I have two sisters,” she began, “Tatsuko is fifteen. She’s obsessed with your singer Gwen Stefani.”

  “My singer?”

  “You know,” she flapped her hand, “you Westerners. She wants to be Gwen when she grows up. My youngest sister, Emi, is thirteen and gaga over fashion. She tried to beg and guilt my father into buying her this designer randoseru—”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s the leather backpacks that all grade schoolers take to school. They’re expensive enough already without having to buy a glamour one.”

  She continued to regale me with stories of her sisters. My chest warmed as I let her sweet voice wash over me.

  I could get used to this.

  Even as I had that thought, a flash of fear went through me. It’s dangerous to get too used to this.

  33

  ____________

  Drake

  A few nights later I slammed open my front door before Loretta could open it for me.

  Her crinkled eyes widened before drawing to concern. “Drake, are you alright?”

  No. I wasn’t fucking alright. My head felt swollen. It buzzed as if someone had thrown in a whole hive of bees. My gut churned with hunger. I ignored it, a greater need overriding it. “Where is she?”

  “In her bedroom.” Loretta knew I meant Noriko. “What’s wrong?”

  I strode past Loretta without another word. A tiny part of me chastised myself for being curt with the woman who practically raised me. But I could barely think through the poison in my blood.

  I needed Noriko. I needed her now.

  I shoved open her bedroom door, causing her to jolt from her chair and the book in her hand to fal
l to the floor. My periphery narrowed on her as I advanced. She would make things better. She would make this noise in my head stop. I needed her. My drug. My Valium.

  Her mouth moved but I didn’t hear what she was saying.

  I grabbed her, my body surging with adrenaline, all of the pent-up anger from today crashing around inside me, rattling around like steel balls.

  Her face. She was near tears and terrified. I couldn’t stand to see her looking at me like that. I just…I needed this. I needed her. Then it would all be okay.

  I needed to be inside her. Now.

  I tore at her clothes, her wretched clothes preventing me from feeling the warmth of her body on mine. My fingers were shaking from frustration. I couldn’t get the buttons running up the front of this yellow dress undone. “Fucking things.” I grabbed the material and tore it apart, buttons scattering like scared ladybugs. I’d buy her another one. Fuck it. I’d buy her a dozen. One in each color.

  I pushed the ruined dress off her slim shoulders.

  “Drake.”

  “Don’t talk.” I gripped her as tightly as I could, despite her feeble attempts to push me away. I picked her up and pulled her legs around my waist, almost losing my mind when her warm core pressed up against my hardness. Her ass felt firm and tight under my hands as I carried her to the thin mattress on her floor.

  I kneeled, dropping her down on it, grabbed her ankle and flipped her onto her front so she was on all fours. I tugged her underwear down, revealing her beautiful pink entrance. The sweet-musky smell of her sex hit my nose. I swear to God, I salivated. Holding her hips I pushed into her tight little body.

  Oh damn. So wet. So warm. My little refuge.

  As I poured my aggression into her, she tightened around me, and in turn I began to soften. My mind began to let go, the knots inside my gut untwisting. She was like warm balm on a screaming burn.

  Inside of this beautiful woman, I was free. No pressure, no requirement to achieve anything. There was no end-of-year financial, no shareholders’ report to justify my every action. With her, right now, I was unburdened, unshackled by anyone else’s expectations.