“Sex is not body abuse,” he growled between gritted teeth.

“Why are you pissed at me? I’m perfectly healthy, and now I have to go without, too. You don’t see me bitching about it.”

He gazed at me out of the corner of his eye, like he’d come up with some sly idea and was very happy with himself. “We can do other stuff, right?”

I bit my bottom lip, but didn’t answer.

His jaw dropped. “No?”

“Not unless you don’t mind, um…not finishing.”

“What? You mean no orgasm?”

“Yeah. Anything strenuous like that, even an orgasm, can put strain on your spleen—at least while it’s super swollen like that.”

“Do I really even need my spleen?” he whined. I pulled the car into the structure and parked it carefully beside his.

I laughed, opened the car door, and got out. I waited for him to follow suit before I continued. “It filters your blood and purifies it. Removes microbes and old or damaged blood cells. And it keeps your epic immune system going.”

Adam followed me down to the gate that opened the bridge to Bay Island, where we lived. “Well, my epic immune system didn’t do such a great job this time.”

I slid my arm around his waist as we walked across the bridge toward our house. “Sigh…stop with the pity party, please? When I—”

He held up a hand. “Don’t you dare pull the cancer card on me.”

I grinned wide. “It trumps everything.”

“Meh,” he said, scrubbing a hand across his face. He didn’t even object when we grabbed a golf cart at the end of the bridge to drive the short distance to our house. That right there told me he was still feeling like crap.

“I think you need to take a nice, long nap, and then I’ll make you something to eat.”

He cringed. “No food.”

“Oh no.” I shook my head. “You were constantly shoving toast in my face when I was getting chemo. You are at least going to have toast.”

“Ugh. What is this, illness revenge?”

I shook my head, laughing. “It’s payback.”

“Very funny.”

Later, I watched him sleep, making sure to monitor his temperature—still elevated, but below 101, an acceptable level. I let him sleep as long as he wanted and made sure he always had fresh fluids on the nightstand to drink. Then I slipped into bed beside him, propping myself up on pillows so I could keep an eye on him while I studied.

Right now, he was too sick to be more than a grumpy nuisance. But I knew I had to be prepared for when he was feeling better. Because he was going to be his usual stubborn self and try to ignore doctor’s orders. At least I had the wedding to hold over his head to make sure he behaved himself.

That might get ugly, but if I stuck to my guns, I’d have a healthy bridegroom to take to my exotic, faraway, and probably over-the-top wedding.

 

 

Chapter 11

Adam

In the same week that I got sick as hell, I fired my IT director and got an ultimatum from the board of directors. I had six months to sign a prenuptial or postnuptial agreement with my legal spouse or face evaluation by a committee. If found in breach of fiduciary duty, I would be dismissed as chief executive officer of Draco Multimedia Entertainment.

Talk about a triple whammy. Fuck my life.

Worse, for the first time in my life, ever, I had no desire to do anything but lie in bed, sleep, or stare at the ceiling. Even reaching for a glass of water and pushing myself upright enough to sip it was too much. Emilia solved that issue by buying me multiple insulated cups with big, flexible plastic straws so I could drink while still lying down. I was a pathetic mess.

Emilia hovered over me too much, to the point where I had to chase her out of the room, ordering her to go study where she was meant to study—in her office.

That first week was me hanging on to the edge of a precipice by my fingernails. But it got better. Slowly.

Into the second week, Jordan showed up with random paperwork. He passed through on his way to or from the office. His gaze never quite met mine—and I preferred it that way. There was definitely a lot of frost between us.

Emilia let that small amount of work slide, but she watched me like a Rottweiler. If I so much as opened my laptop—which, coincidentally, never seemed to be where I left it—she’d appear, ready to shut it again.

God help me, but she was driving me insane.

The only peace I got was when she was at school—which was a lot of the time. And I missed her after she was gone an hour or two, despite my irritation when she was here. It was a lose-lose scenario. My own private Kobayashi Maru.

Nothing made me happy. Or everything made me miserable. I hadn’t decided which.

By the end of the second week, when I was beginning to feel slightly better, I was surprised to get a visit from Heath, of all people. I assumed he was here to talk about his role as dude of honor to the bride. Strangely, he arrived at a time when he knew damn well that Emilia was in class.

By this time, I was able to sit up. So we sat out on the deck outside my office and sipped lemonade—I’d been forbidden alcohol by the doc. This lady was number one on my shit list these days. Okay, number two after Jordan. Or maybe further down if I counted the rest of the bastards on the BOD.

I tried not to think of that while I made awkward small talk with a sullen Heath. Emilia hadn’t been kidding about how depressed he was over Connor staying in Ireland. Ten minutes in the guy’s presence and I needed to return to bed—badly.

We talked about random shit, the game, whatever. In truth, I hardly ever spent time alone with Heath, and that was sad because he was my friend—for the same length of time that I’d been friends with Emilia. I was this close to suggesting we bust out the laptops and game instead of sit here and stretch a conversation between us.

“Mia says you had no idea who implemented Lord Sisyphus’s Wedding Quest or even what it does,” Heath said as he squinted out over the balcony, looking down onto the boats puttering in the back bay.

“Yeah…I’m surprised you found that,” I replied. “A few people have talked about it on social media. They are calling it the new hidden quest, but the hype hasn’t quite picked up yet.”

“Word on the street is that the quest chain is broken. People can’t get past the initial dialogue with the quest giver.”