The sound causes my balls to tighten and my dick to go rock hard. There’s something about this woman, and I don’t have a fucking clue what it is, but my body responds to her like I’m Pavlov’s fucking dog.

As she’s sitting at approximately eye level, she doesn’t miss my reaction. She looks up at me and back down to the tent in my boxer briefs.

“Ignore it.”

“Um, easier said than done.”

Once again, a smile creeps across my face, and I lift the ice from her knuckles. They’re red, and a foreign thought invades my brain. I don’t like her hurting, and especially not because of me.

“Don’t do that again,” I order her.

“Then maybe you should rethink how you speak to me,” she counters before meeting my eyes again and adding, “I’m sorry, though. I probably shouldn’t have done that. I just . . . reacted. Badly.”

I set the ice on the vanity and rise. Crossing to the shower, I shut off the water and jerk my head toward the master bedroom.

“Let’s talk.”

I hit him.

Holy. Shit.

I hit him.

I haven’t hit someone since I knocked Johnny Dagen on his ass for handing me five dollars and asking if that was enough to buy him a blow job because he heard that’s what my mama charged. I broke his nose, and he never asked again. I was fifteen at the time. That wasn’t the last time someone made me feel like a whore, but I certainly wasn’t going to spend however long this marriage lasts being treated like one.

Burying memories of a past I’d love to forget, I follow Creighton out of the giant bathroom. Even though he brought me ice, I’m assuming this is when the annulment proceedings start.

I wish I never got out of bed this morning. I need a do-over.

Jesus. Why did I hit him? Something about his condescending tone just pushed me over the edge.

I woke up this morning worried about what the record execs and the media were going to say, and he brushes my concerns aside like they’re nothing. And then I find out that he’s eleven years older than me, and suddenly the decision I made seemed to take on a whole new level of cons I didn’t anticipate. It’s no excuse, but it’s the only one I’ve got.

Creighton pulls on a pair of lounge pants—I have no idea where those came from—and settles into one of the chairs in the sitting room portion of the master suite. I take the chair opposite him.

“We need to lay out some ground rules.”

I’m not sure I like the sound of that, because I assume what he really means is that it’s time to lay out Creighton’s rules.

But what did I really expect? That I’d have some sort of bargaining power here? My leverage disappeared when I signed on the dotted line.

I know it, and he knows it.

Then again, we both want something from the other, which I suppose puts us on sort of even footing. Except . . . not really. He has the billions and I just have me.

You can cover a girl with fancy makeup, false eyelashes, hair extensions, stage-worthy clothes, and strip off my extra ten pounds by starving me half to death, but it doesn’t change who I am at heart. I’m still a girl from East Kentucky with big dreams and an even bigger fear of failure—because I don’t want to go back to Gold Haven. There’s nothing left there for me anymore, much to my gut-wrenching regret.

When I snap myself out of my impromptu trip down my pothole-riddled memory lane, I find Creighton waiting, that damn eyebrow raised.

“Please, by all means, continue.” My accent comes out stronger, and I blame it on my thoughts of home and the fact that if his rules have any impact on my career, we’re going to have a problem.

He narrows his eyes. “Rule one: I like sex. I plan to have a lot of it. With you.”

Well, then. The man certainly doesn’t beat around the bush. “I got that one.”

“If that’s going to be a problem for you, my lawyers can—”

And there it is, the threat to end the marriage, which would put my career in jeopardy.

“End this marriage faster than it started?” I say quickly, interrupting him. “Because sex isn’t a problem for me. I know what I signed up for. It’s not like I think you married me because you found my conversational skills riveting. I just didn’t realize I was going to be spreading my legs on command. I thought you’d at least, you know, pretend like I wasn’t a whore. Although I guess that’s all I really am. A really expensive whore.”

Creighton’s narrowed eyes turn absolutely molten. “Don’t you fucking call yourself a whore.”

“Then don’t treat me like one.”

We stare each other down, and I wait for his response. I’m expecting something along the lines of “I’ll treat you however I want to treat you,” but what I get instead is something completely unexpected.

“I’m sorry.”

An apology?

“That wasn’t well done of me. I may be a demanding asshole, but that’s not exactly my style.”

“Does that mean you don’t want shower sex?” I’m pretty sure it’s the slutty devil on my shoulder shoving these words into my mouth, because I certainly wasn’t planning to say that.

Creighton’s smile is lazy, predatory, and his eyes are hot and hard.

“I didn’t say that, Holly. In fact, right now there’s nothing I’d rather do more than walk you right back into that bathroom, strip you naked, and fuck you against the wall until you beg me to let you come.”

My mind skips back to our first night together. It isn’t lost on me that the man likes control. The last time we had sex that night, he toyed with me, refusing to let me come until I begged and pleaded—and then he took me. I’ve never had that before, and I was pretty sure I’d never have that again. Which was depressing to think about, because it was . . . amazing. My objection this morning wasn’t to the sex, but to the way he spoke to me.

And with his apology, maybe there’s hope for us yet.

I decide to take the first step, a peace offering, per se. I set the ice on the table beside me, stand, and snag the hem of my T-shirt. I pull it up and over my head, and drop it on the floor. Creighton’s lips twitch into that sexy smirk I’m already starting to recognize.

“Then maybe we should postpone the rest of this conversation indefinitely?” I say.