Barbarian (Empire #2) Read Online Penelope Sky

Categories Genre: Alpha Male, Chick Lit, Crime, Dark, Mafia, New Adult, Romance Tags Authors: Series: Empire Series by Penelope Sky
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Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 61942 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 206(@300wpm)
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“Um, how about the price?”

His eyebrows furrowed. “What about it?”

“It’s a lot.”

“Is it?”

“Are you being serious?”

“I’m always serious, sweetheart. I’ll tell the real estate agent to submit our offer.”

“Whoa, hold on.” I grabbed his wrist before he walked away. “It’s your money. I want to make sure this is something you want—”

“Our money.”

“Bartholomew, I’m not your wife—”

“You’re my woman. Same thing.” His deep eyes studied mine. “The price is nothing to me. Let’s get it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” he said without hesitation. “Come on, let’s get our house.”

Months later, we moved in to the villa.

I was six months pregnant, entering my final trimester, and I was big and uncomfortable. I was insecure too, and I missed being the petite little thing I used to be. I missed when my tits were smaller, when my favorite jeans fit me perfectly, when my face wasn’t so full.

Bartholomew acted like he didn’t notice these changes.

God bless that man.

We’d had a designer prepare our home with furniture of Italian craftsmanship. Everything was local, but a couple culinary items were from France, like the stove and pots and pans, at Bartholomew’s instance.

By the time we moved in, it was winter, so the sky was overcast and the world was cold. The fireplace was always lit in every room, and the radiant heat kept our feet warm when we walked across the hardwood.

I still struggled to get accustomed to Bartholomew’s presence. He used to be gone all night, but now he was right beside me. He was also wide awake during the day, spending his morning in an extensive gym session before he had his morning coffee. He spent his time reading on the couch. Then in the evening before dinner, he worked out a second time, doing his cardio. He was already ripped, but he became even tighter, his muscles more pronounced.

So basically, he got hotter and I got fatter.

It started to wear me down, to make me feel like I didn’t deserve him. When people saw us together, they probably wondered what I’d done to land a man like that. Maybe I’d tricked him into knocking me up so he would have to stay.

He stepped out of the shower with the towel around his waist. He was mostly dry, his hair a little messy from scrubbing the towel through the strands. All the cords on his arms and neck bulged like a tightrope. “Something on your mind?” He opened his dresser drawer and pulled out a pair of boxers before he dropped the towel.

His ass was so tight.

I sat up in bed with a book in my lap. Or, I should say, on my stomach. “No. Why?”

He pulled on his boxers before he tossed the towel in the bin. “You’re different.”

“Well…I am pregnant.”

He walked toward the bed, his authoritative eyes locked on mine.

That was all he had to do to put me on edge, to know that he was dead serious. If he looked at our kids like that, we would never need to put them in time-out.

“Laura, I know there’s something on your mind.” He pulled back the sheets so he could lie beside me.

“It’s nothing.”

That angry look returned.

“I’m just feeling a bit self-conscious, okay?”

“Why?”

“Why?” I set the book aside then balanced a glass of water on my stomach. “That’s why.”

His gaze remained cold, like he didn’t understand the point I tried to make.

I put it back before I spilled it. “I’m getting fatter every day, and you’re getting hotter…something I didn’t think was possible.”

“I don’t have anything else to fill my time, Laura.”

My hand moved over my enormous stomach, as if I could somehow hide it underneath my arm. “I’m big. I’m ugly. I’m not the sexy woman who used to meet you in secret hotel rooms…”

“Sweetheart.”

I ignored him.

“Look at me.”

“No…”

“I fuck you every night like we’re still in that hotel room.”

“I don’t know how.”

“Because watching you struggle to carry my child is a turn-on.”

I hesitated before I looked at him.

“It’s purely biological and animalistic, but it turns me on, nonetheless. And once our baby is born and your body is different, either because it carries scars or stretch marks, those will turn me on too, because of the sacrifice you made.”

This man was something else.

“Now get on your hands and knees.” He grabbed the sheets and tugged them off my body. “Face down, ass up.”

I noticed Bartholomew had spent a lot of his time outside, braving the intense cold like it wasn’t a second thought. When I looked through the windows, I saw him on our property, farther down in the valley.

I had no idea what he was doing.

We owned a lot of land, so much of it that there wasn’t another house in sight.

He eventually returned in the late afternoon before it got dark. He stripped off his jacket and left it on the coatrack by the front door before he walked inside. Dinner was on the stove, and he took a quick glance to see what was on the menu before he washed his hands in the sink. Then he walked up to me, gave me that look I never saw him give anyone else, and kissed me as he pulled me close, his hand on my ass as always.


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