Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 108173 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108173 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
And he definitely thought Lilah was a slacker. Never mind that she’d built a respectable, lucrative business as a highly sought-after and in-demand pet photographer. So in-demand that she’d run herself ragged over the last few years trying to accommodate too many clients in too little time, leaving no room for rest. After a few too many stress-related mild asthma attacks last year, her doctor had urged her to take a break, warning her that her health was taking a knock and her condition—currently stable—could worsen if she didn’t rethink her business model.
Ben would never understand how someone could spread themselves too thin taking “silly little dog pictures” as he’d once called it. Which was the reason she hadn’t told him why she was taking that three-month break. She knew he’d thought the absolute worst of her just upping and leaving like that, as was evidenced by his mocking comments earlier, but she’d desperately needed the break.
“Look, you’re obviously different from my previous companions,” he said, in that annoyingly reasonable tone of voice. She barely refrained from rolling her eyes at his choice of word for his former lovers.
Companions… please. As if any of them had been around long enough to provide any kind of companionship.
“How am I different?”
“Because I have to be serious about you. About cultivating a relationship between us. It can’t be casual.”
“Ben, you don’t need to cultivate anything with me. There is no doubt that you’re going to be Gramps’s successor at Beckett Maritime Express.”
“It’s not about that. Come on, Lilah. I know it’s a shock but you can’t walk around feigning ignorance like this. It’s not healthy. You’ve been sitting here like someone in a daze all evening. I know this all must have come as a shock. It hit me like a ton of bricks as well. And I don’t admit that easily. The only way forward for us is to at least try this. See where it leads us.”
She shook her head.
She felt foggy, unsure. Her medication dulling her senses and her instincts. But she wasn’t sure what Ben was confessing here. Was he saying that he had feelings for her? That those feelings had hit him like a ton of bricks?
Her own, long dormant emotions for this man bubbled to the surface. Emotions that she thought she had—if not overcome—successfully suppressed. What if there truly was a chance that they could finally find a way to each other?
It was true, this conversation was confusing and not very romantic. But why not agree to go out with him? Just to see where it would lead?
“Fine. One date, Ben. Just one.”
THREE
The Groom’s Cold Kiss
Lilah tensed when her brand-new husband—upon the instruction of the beaming officiant—bent his head to kiss her. She’d been dreaming about this moment for so long, it was hard to fathom that all of her naive hope for a happily ever after, had come crashing down around her feet in mere seconds.
He didn’t love her. How could he love her when his eyes were filled with such loathing and animosity? He despised her and he resented every moment of this. And up until just a minute ago—when he’d stared at her as if she were a two-headed venomous snake—Lilah hadn’t even known it.
How could she have been so stupid? So blinded by her rose-colored glasses that she hadn’t seen this for what it was? For what it had always been? Yet another way for Benjamin Templeton to ingratiate himself to Cyrus Beckett. Ben didn’t love her, but he loved and admired her grandfather. He would do anything for the old man. And now Lilah wondered if her grandfather had orchestrated this union.
Her eyes flickered to the happily smiling man in the front pew. He was wiping tears from his eyes and was clearly unconcerned that Ben had just been blindsided by Lilah’s admission of love. Her grandfather loved her. And he loved Ben. This was a dream come true for him.
Why hadn’t Lilah realized this sooner? How could she ever have believed that Ben loved her?
Because you wanted him to. Because he’s all you’ve wanted for years.
Ben’s hard, unrelenting mouth pressed against hers, and she gasped. Hating how clinical the gesture was. How utterly lacking in passion.
He didn’t love her and—humiliatingly—this frigid kiss made it clear that he didn’t even want her.
Yes, he had blown hot and cold during the entirety of their short engagement, but she’d thought it was because he respected her grandfather too much to sleep with Lilah before the wedding.
Oh, God, she was such an idiot. If Ben Templeton wanted a woman, he wouldn’t be deterred by old-fashioned values. She knew that, but her ego wouldn’t let her see it.
Of course he wants you, she’d often appeased herself after yet another “date” night without so much as a brush of his fingers against hers. He just respects you and Gramps too much to act on his desire.