Chapter 17

17

The only girl in my world.

Rihanna was onto something. To have a man treat you that way was more than comforting … it was everything. And to have Banks—close-mouthed, hot-lipped, bear-grunts-are-my-love-language Banks—admit it was a shock that Georgia had no idea what to do with.

Stunned stupid, she turned away to the sink.

“You have a pretty high opinion of those arms and lips, Mister. Powerful enough to make me lose all inhibition and marry you, you say?”

“We weren’t drunk. From what I can see you can hold your liquor.”

He sounded closer, almost on top of her. If she turned, she’d end up right in his arms. Better not to risk it. They needed to keep the lines clear between them.

Let him call her princess, spoiled, whatever made sense to him.

Let her think one too many drinks had blurred his decision-making to the point a man as closed off as Banks would marry a bona fide mess like Georgia.

She didn’t want him to come up with valid reasons to be married. Such as he wanted her so much that he had to have her for his own. Or that he saw something in her that she couldn’t quite see in herself. Why else was she throwing out playground taunts of “you like me”? Because the joke carved out space between them, distance she needed so she wouldn’t make a mistake.

She’d made so many in her life.

Yet she’d never forget that feeling of waking in that vise of a grip, the scent of him in her lungs, the heat of him warming her through. And here she was within fingertips’ reach—she could have all that again. She could take something for her own.

She turned. He was close but not quite as much as she’d expected. Giving her space, perhaps, to make some bad decisions all by herself.

“You think I’m going to admit I wanted this to happen? That this marriage isn’t a fluke?”

“Wouldn’t expect you to admit a thing, Peaches.” He placed an arm at her side, hand on the counter, barely an inch from her waist.

She jumped at the opportunity to deflect. “You called me that before. Why?”

His mouth twitched. “That’s what I thought the second I saw you. Princess Peach.”

“From the video game?”

He nodded. “Then you said your name was Georgia. And your skin, damn, it felt as soft as the skin of a peach.”

His fingertips on her arm as he guided her down the strip …

“But you usually defer to princess.”

“Formal title, your majesty.”

He was closer now. She could feel him everywhere and he had yet to touch her.

“All you have to do is tell the truth.” His whisper was a seductive cajole.

He’d held her hand, callused against her peach-soft skin, and she’d tripped into that marriage license office, giddy as a schoolgirl.

This is crazy, she’d thought.

Go with your gut, Dani told her.

Her dead sister’s fault. Of course.

In the breath-stealing space between them, she placed a hand on his chest. He said no one had ever kissed her so good. Maybe that explained it.

“You really think your mouth made me see God, Banks?”

He smirked. Oh, she would show him angels weeping!

Her hand stroked up, heading for his neck, needing to get a grip because her knees were already starting to falter. Something preternatural in him acknowledged this; his hand curled around her hip and pulled her close. For a moment they stared at each other while realization dawned.

She was too short. He would have to lean down or?—

Scoop her up and onto the counter. With a quick pivot, her ass landed softly on the granite, the surface cool to the backs of her thighs but not enough to bank the fires within her.

A sultry gasp escaped her as his palms splayed on her thighs and forced them apart. One hand curled around her bottom and pulled her close. In this position, she looked down on him; he peered up at her.

Still his lips refused to meet hers. Infuriating.

“Worried you can’t take me to the stratosphere again?”

A squeeze of her ass cheek was her punishment for that cheeky query, and then he moved in and brushed her lower lip with his mouth.

“I’ll take you there, Georgia.”

Please. This was what it felt like that night. This was the fizzy sensation she was trying to replicate.

Better this dangerous feeling than none at all.

She sighed into his mouth and finally let go of what was holding her back. No more jokes. No more denials. Just this onslaught of feeling.

Her surrender spurred him on. The kiss turned real. Gone were the tentative nibbles, timid brushes of lips. This was now an exploration of her mouth. She loved how good it felt, the spice of him, the scent of male flooding her nostrils.

His hand curled around her jaw, held her in place to be plundered. His beard scratched, heightened every sense. The kiss was better for it.

He pulled away, his lips wet and a touch puffy, and she wanted to dive back in and suck, on the lower lip particularly. She was panting and barely holding on.

“Is that why we married?” she finally managed.

“I think it’s part of it.”

He still held her, one hand at her neck, the other curved over her ass. That hand flexed, checking for fit. Absolutely perfect , she wanted to say.

“That’s quite the superpower you have there, Big Guy. One kiss and ‘here comes the bride’.”

“It was your idea.”

Her mouth fell open. “What?”

“We had just got done watching the Bellagio fountain?—”

“Before or after the club?”

“After. You on that dance floor … well, let’s just say it did things to me.”

“Lowered your inhibitions?”

His eyes glowed. “Something like that. We went for a walk, and you were excited about the fountain, some opera song.”

“‘Time to Say Goodbye,’” she said, the memory taking a clearer shape as it broke the surface. “Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli.”

“Right. And when it ended, you said, ‘I don’t want to say goodbye.’”

“I did?”

But she remembered. Every word.

His nod was solemn. “And I said, ‘let’s not. Let’s keep going.’”

“Which I took as an invitation to get hitched?”

He considered that for a moment. “More like, neither of us wanted the night to be over. I think we were looking for a way to keep that feeling alive. Sometimes those feelings are your best guide.”

Into hell. “We went to that bar, the small one behind the Palms.”

Another nod. “And we had another drink and by the end of it, I think we knew. Neither of us wanted to return to … before.”

Before. For Georgia, that meant alone in a crowd, missing Dani all the time. For Banks, it meant … she had no idea.

Because he wouldn’t tell her. She had no idea what he was getting out of this.

“So we thought the very deliberate action of going to the marriage license place and finding someone to marry us was the next logical step? Instead of sex?”

She pushed back and slid off the counter, though he didn’t let her do that alone. Not that she needed his help, but his hands held her steady at the waist as he guided her down. For a moment she enjoyed the fluttery sensation of being in the clouds, suspended inside some dream state where people fell in love and got married and it mattered.

Her feet hit the floor and reality rose up to meet her like a two by four.

“I know you want to think that this wasn’t an accident, Banks. That a man as solid and sensible and straight-shooting as you wouldn’t be stupid enough to hitch your star to someone you had just met. But that night, I was in a strange place. It had been two years since—since Dani died.”

He sucked in a breath. “Georgia.”

“And I think I went a little crazy. I wanted something for myself. Something to ease the pain.” She placed a hand on his chest. “So you’re right. It wasn’t an accident because of too much alcohol or Nevada’s ridiculously easy access to marriage licenses and wedding celebrants, though that didn’t help. I was not in the right headspace to make such a big decision.” At his parted lips, she held up her hand to stop him. “I know you weren’t happy with how I handled the paperwork—both times. I’m sorry I was a coward. We should have discussed it, but it doesn’t change the fundamentals. Neither of us fought for this. I set the annulment in motion, and you accepted it. This was a mistake, and once we’ve both allowed sufficient time to pass, we can get back to our separate lives.”

For the second time that day, she walked out of the kitchen.