Read The Bride Who Wouldn't for Free Online Page B

with words, but that she could deny herself the pleasure that rippled beneath her cool surface. He stared till she could not hold his gaze.
    Yes, attraction was there.
    “You think I’m a whore,” Kate said through tense lips.
    “What is your issue with whores?” Isaak challenged. “You speak of them with such contempt.”
    “I don’t.”
    “Oh, baby, but you do. I happen to admire them, at least they do not deceive, at least they do not insist there must be more, or beg for me to speak with them, open up to them, marry them.” He looked at her. “Yes, I have a lot of respect for them, still, I won’t be needing one… I can keep to the rules.” He gave her a smile and raised his hand and made a crude gesture with his hand and wrist. “It looks like there will be a lot of this…”
    She slapped him.
    Just this stinging slap that landed on his cheek. And though the fact that she had slapped him alarmed Kate, more horrifying for her were her own words. “You vile, disgusting creature,” Kate screamed, but it was the sound of her own mother’s voice that seemed to fill the room, a repeat of the horrible things she had once said to her daughter. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”
    “Ah, but I’m not ashamed,” Isaak said and his words halted her tirade but her mind was still there, back in what should have been the safe haven of her bedroom. That she had been caught was embarrassing enough but the words, oh the words and the slaps and the shaming from her mother still played over and over in her mind.
    “Sex doesn’t shame me, Kate,” Isaak continued and she looked at the red mark on his cheek that her hand had left. “I would suggest that that might be you.”
    Kate looked to the bed in terror, the bed that she had agreed to share but had never expected to have to. “If you force me, I will go to the police.”
    “Force you?” Her words were far worse than the slap she had delivered; it was like a spit in his face. “How dare you even suggest such a thing.”
    “I apologise…” His face was as white as chalk, Kate realised, his breathing coming as if she had just delivered a very low blow.
    She had.
    “I should not have said that.”
    “No,” Isaak said. “You should not have. You have me pegged as a bastard—perhaps that is merited, but never suggest I would force myself upon a woman.”
    “I really do apologise.” She did, it was his disgust at her words that actually shamed her now. He was furiously pulling his tie and then he ripped off his shirt.
    “Where are you going?”
    “To have a shower,” Isaak said.
    He ignored the bath, the scented candles and stood under the running water.
    Talk about issues! Isaak thought, soaping up his armpits and then soaping his stomach before he looked down at his flaccid cock.
    A year.
    Despite brave words, he did not relish the prospect.
    Still, that was not troubling him now. He was enraged at her words—that she would even suggest…
    Let it go, Isaak told himself, and yet he could not.
    He turned off the taps and whipped up a towel, wrapping it around his loins and then heading out to where she stood, like some beautiful statue, still in her bridal gown.
    “I’ll be needing these.” He pulled open a drawer and pulled out underwear and she turned her back as he dropped his towel and pulled them on.
    “Are we to share a bed?” Kate asked.
    “Please, after what you just said.” Isaak gave a snort of disgust. “Anyway, I don’t sleep well with ice beside me.” He looked around—it really was a honeymoon suite and clearly designed to be spent together in bed for, rarely, there was no spare room. “You can have the sofa.”
    No, he was no gentleman!
    “I ordered breakfast for seven,” Isaak said climbing in between the luxurious sheets. “If you can set your alarm and manage fifteen minutes of torture lying beside me, I think that should cover it.” He picked up her lacy nighty that had been laid out and tossed it in her