But Maddox didn’t follow the prelude of that kiss on her hand with an actual one to seal their marriage. The anticipation floating in her chest lost its momentum as, instead, he smiled at her, gave her a brief nod, and tucked the hand he’d kissed under his arm before turning to greet their few witnesses.
Mortification blazed in Adelie’s cheeks. She stared at a spot on the floor, the easiest solution whenever she felt out of place.
“Thank you all for coming,” Maddox said in response to the polite applause resounding in the room. He shook the commissioner’s hand, waiting as Suzie and Duncan signed their names on the certificate as witnesses. After hugging her sister and Fletcher goodbye, Adelie strolled out of the room in a sea of doubt.
What was that? She’d thought he’d been impressed by her. She felt the attraction building between them as he’d clapped eyes on her. He’d called her a goddess. She was his wife. Why, then, hadn’t he kissed her?
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Adelie mulled through the ceremony for the entire drive from downtown Westville to its outskirts where Maddox’s house was. This was only temporary, she told herself. It was only to protect her. He’d promised no physical expectations on his part. Still, the reminders didn’t help soothe the sting of rejection. He hadn’t kissed her.
She’d thought their connection was genuine. His attentiveness and comforting words during the photo shoot. The electric tension that had sizzled between them on the carousel. But he hadn’t kept the promise he’d made, to tell her when the pictures were ready, and now this.
Why would he put his entire life on hold for her if he didn’t have even a small bit of attraction toward her?
Guilt. The only plausible answer she could come up with was guilt. He was a nice guy who’d put her in danger inadvertently, and he wanted to assuage his own feelings. Either that or this was another ploy to garner publicity for his park, but Adelie pushed that suspicion aside. He couldn’t be that heartless.
Though he sat beside her on the back seat of the limo, she couldn’t bring herself to look at him or risk welcoming any kind of conversation right now. What would she say, thanks for marrying me?
The drive didn’t take long and yet took eons all at the same time. Her own sense of regret began forming like a newly growing seed inside her, but she did her best to cast it aside.
Kirk didn’t pull into the front of Maddox’s estate, as she had the one and only time she’d been here, but instead deviated around the back, to where a series of large garage doors awaited. Six garages? What did any one person need with that many garages?
The farthest one opened, and as Kirk pulled in, Adelie’s question was answered.
Cars in every make and model spread out around the garage space. Lamborghini, Ferrari, the Lexus she’d seen Maddox drive.
“Don’t mind my collection,” Maddox said, jerking her attention. It was the first words he’d spoken since they’d moved Adelie’s suitcases to the limousine and settled into the spacious backseat with her.
He hasn’t broken any promises, she reminded herself, shaking away the sting of rejection from their ceremony. He said he would marry you, and he did. That’s that.
“They’re really impressive,” she said. “You seriously own all of these?”
“I do. Just little rewards I’ve granted to myself. This one was from when my mom first approved my idea. This one was after the park opened.” He rested a hand on the hood of a fancy Mustang.
“You’re like Tony Stark,” she said.
He shrugged. “Just without the insane brains.”
“You’re not insane?”
His lips quirked upward. He’d tugged his tie loose and undone the buttons on his collar, exposing the skin at his throat. “I never said that. Just that Tony Stark’s level of intelligence far outweighs mine.”
“Then you’re not an industrial engineer.”
“I’ll tell you what I am.”
She froze, either from the tone or the insinuation buried within it. “What?”
“Hungry.”
Adelie laughed, crackling through her own tension, and took his outstretched hand.
Her fingers slid through his with the force of a shock. His soft skin sent sizzles up her arm and to her spine. It was made more intense when he closed his hand around hers and walked alongside her through the lavish columned hallway and into an expansive kitchen.
He hadn’t kissed her, but he was holding her hand. Maybe he wanted to take things slow. Her respect for him took things up another notch.
A woman stood at the stove, wearing an apron and retrieving a pan of steaming biscuits from within. Something tantalizing was cooking in a pan, and she set the pan down in time to retrieve a wooden spoon and stir.
“That smells amazing,” Adelie said.
“It’s all Martha’s doing. Adelie, this is Martha, my cook and housekeeper. She’ll be here throughout the day, cleaning up and straightening whatever messes you make.”
The smirk on his face told her he was joking. He’d been this way the first time she’d met him too, at the tea party table. Blurting things to make her wonder if he was really serious. This is not at all what she would have guessed a billionaire would be like.
“I’m not messy.”
“Don’t mind him,” Martha said. “I never believe a word he says anyway.”
“When have I ever lied to you?” Maddox faked defensiveness.
Martha dished the biscuits onto a porcelain platter and bustled them to the table. She directed her answer to Adelie rather than her boss. “This guy told me you two were getting married today.”
“We did,” Maddox said.
Martha planted a hand on her hip. “Then where’s the lady’s ring, hmm?”
Adelie dipped her chin to her chest, embarrassed. Yet another reminder that this marriage was anything but conventional.
When he didn’t answer, Martha nodded and returned to retrieve the roasting pan from within the kitchen’s second oven.
To his credit, a flush of pink colored his cheeks as well. He sidled in. “Would you like to change before dinner?”
Adelie glanced down
