Married by Contract Read Online Free PDF Page A

as they rested on her face. “Any
time you want.”
    “Okay.” She closed her eyes,
trying to enjoy the feel of her body and not think too much about how things in
their marriage might change.
    Things had been so good
between them. She didn’t want them to get messed up. It had felt like her life
was finally in order, and that was too precious to lose.
    Of course, after sex like
that, she wasn’t sure how she was going to be able to stop herself from doing
it again.
    After a few minutes, Nick
finally found the energy to get up and walk to the bathroom to take care of the
condom and clean up. As soon as he was no longer beside her, Jenn started to
feel anxious and unsettled. She’d made smart, thoughtful, and well-reasoned
decisions all her life. That was why she’d been so successful. Even the sex
she’d had in the past had been chosen because it wouldn’t get in the way of
what was most important to her.
    This was different, though.
Nick was different.
    She got up, limping slightly
because she was sorer than she’d expected, and went to grab an oversized
T-shirt and clean underwear from her dresser. Now that the sex was over, she
didn’t want to lie around naked.
    She was sitting on the edge
of the bed when Nick came back into the room from the bathroom.
    He paused when he saw her,
his expression growing strangely still. “You don’t want to have sex with me
again,” he said.
    Her lips parted slightly.
    “You’ve thought about it and
decided it was a mistake. You can’t let your life get messy this way, so you’re
going to tell me we have to forget it ever happened.” He arched his eyebrows at
her, his slight smile not reaching his eyes. “Right?”
    “No. That’s not right.”
    He was clearly surprised by
this news and walked over to sit down beside her. “You look like you’ve been
getting nervous.”
    “I have been,” she admitted.
“I don’t want this thing to get weird or to make our lives messy.”
    “Naturally. We wouldn’t want
that. No mess allowed.”
    His tone was familiar.
Relaxed, almost lazy. Slightly mocking but not in a mean-spirited way. It
actually made her feel better, that Nick hadn’t changed, that he wasn’t taking
this any more seriously than he took anything else. He obviously enjoyed having
sex with her, and it seemed clear he wanted it to continue—but he had nothing
deeper than attraction invested in it.
    If there was any chance at
all of hurting Nick in any way, Jenn would have called an end to this without a
moment’s hesitation. Hurting him was something she was never going to do.
    “I know I’m kind of rigid and
uptight. You can make fun of me if you want.” She smiled slightly to make sure
he knew she wasn’t offended.
    “I wasn’t making fun of you.”
He reached over to put a hand on her knee, which she’d bent up to fold her legs
on the bed. “Tell me what will make you less nervous about this.”
    “I just don’t want it to get
out of control. I barely have enough time to eat and sleep in my life right now—”
    “You know the solution to
that.”
    She gave him a mild eye-roll,
not willing to get into an argument about her work schedule at the moment. “The
point is that this is going to get messy and then potentially damage our
relationship and arrangement unless we set up some parameters around it.”
    “Ah,” he breathed, leaning
back as his eyes warmed in enlightenment. “Parameters. Of course. What were you
thinking? No more than once a day?”
    She gave a little gasp. “Once
a day! That’s way too much. We’d be having sex all the time!”
    “My mistake,” he said with a
soft laugh. “What would be more appropriate?”
    “Once a week, maybe.” She
frowned as she thought, staring down at the rumpled covers on her bed. “That
would probably work—often enough to relieve tension but not enough to become a
major part of our lives. Does that sound all right to you? Or is it too weird
and restrictive, and you don’t think it’s