Buying My Forever Wife novel Chapter 78

"Are you trying to roll off the bed in the middle of the night?"

Hearing that, Ivy cautiously scooted a fraction of an inch toward the middle.

She stole a nervous glance at him and saw he was still glaring, clearly dissatisfied.

So, she forced herself to scoot just a tiny bit closer.

Once she was sure he was satisfied, she carefully turned her back to him. Taking slow, deep breaths, she laced her fingers together, trying desperately to calm the frantic racing of her pulse.

She didn't even know why she was so incredibly tense.

He had explicitly promised not to touch her.

Yet her heart hammered wildly against her ribs, her entire body locked up, and her breathing grew shallow.

Alaric wasn't faring much better.

Leaning against the headboard, he stared at the girl beside him. Her delicate neck, her ears, and the visible sliver of her cheek were all flushed a deep, feverish red.

A suffocating heat coiled in his gut, making his mouth go completely dry.

Was he losing his mind?

She was literally just lying there, doing absolutely nothing, and his body was reacting like this.

How the hell was he supposed to endure this?

He aggressively flicked off the lamp and lay down, forcing himself to clear his head.

Ignore the woman next to him.

If she didn't want it, he certainly wasn't going to beg. He was a billionaire CEO; he could have anything he wanted. Why stoop to forcing an unwilling girl?

But logic unfortunately had zero control over biology.

Once the craving sparked, it was agonizingly difficult to extinguish.

Alaric felt like he was slowly losing his sanity.

The girl beside him lay completely motionless, making it painfully clear she had no intention of being a real wife to him.

Finally, unable to take it anymore, he threw off the covers and stalked into the bathroom.

At the sound of the shower turning on, Ivy opened her eyes. Her palms were sweating profusely.

It seemed he was just as unaccustomed to sharing a bed as she was.

She couldn't sleep either. Her body felt like it was roasting over an open fire, so unbearably hot she desperately wanted to jump into the shower herself.

But she didn't dare move a muscle, terrified of pissing him off again.

She had no idea how long the water ran.

It felt like an eternity.

the master bedroom door slowly creaked open.

Guessing it was Stella, Ivy had a sudden stroke of brilliance and called out to Alaric in the bathroom,

"Darling, do you need any help in there?"

Alaric froze.

That single, sweet word sent an involuntary jolt of electricity straight to his core.

He whipped his head around to stare at her.

A second later, a little head popped through the doorway, grinning mischievously.

"Good morning, Mommy and Daddy!"

Alaric remained stubbornly silent.

Ivy walked over with a bright smile. "Morning, sweetie! Your daddy is using the sink right now, so let me slip past you. I need to get washed up too."

Stella blocked her path like a tiny bouncer. "Just wash up in here! Daddy has extra stuff!"

With that, she yanked the door shut and scurried happily back to her own room.

Ivy was trapped.