Chapter 15
I DON’T WANT MY FIANCéE
EVAN
Our engagement is only two months old, and there is friction. A lot of it.
“Evan, please, talk to me. Tell me what’s going on?” she asks.
I look up from the book I’m reading. Navya made me want to revisit the old classics, so I’m reading Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
“I thought the book was…you know, going to have sex stuff,” she told me one night at her place when she’d cooked us dinner, her mother’s favorite, something called poha, made with flattened rice. It’s a breakfast dish, but she served it as dinner.
“And?”
“And it does, but…it’s not sexy. For that, I read romance novels. My mother used to have a secret stash of Mills & Boon books that I used to hide and read.”
Her eyes were bright with naughtiness.
“And these Mills & Boon books were sexy?”
“Yes! But very PG. Once in a while, he’d touch her boob, and there would be some manhood being hard stuff…but these days…romance novels go all the way.”
That was the thing with Navya—she never pretended to be more literary than she was because that might impress someone. She didn’t say she understood things she didn’t to show off.
Fuck, I miss her!
Being with Arabella has been a nightmare.
Everything is planned.
Reservations are made weeks in advance.
Dinners are discussed in terms of optics.
Conversations about timing and alignment and “what makes sense” are killing my soul, bit by bit.
And then there’s the sex.
We’re engaged, we should be going at it like rabbits, but….
I can’t do it. Not with her.
“Nothing is going on,” I lie. What the hell else can I say?
“Why don’t you want to have sex with me?”
She’s never been this blunt, and I see the confusion in her eyes. Arabella is beautiful. She’s used to men falling all over her…except her fiancé.
It’s unfair to her. I know it. But she doesn’t arouse me…at all.
Navya passes by me in a hallway, and I go from zero to sixty in seconds.
Arabella kisses me…and nothing. Not even a twitch. When she puts her hand on my cock, same result, plus, I feel like I’m cheating on Navya.
So, we’re in this vicious cycle.
She wants to fuck.
I can’t.
She gets frustrated.
I feel guilty.
She says fine.
I say fine.
“I’m just tired, Arabella,” I lie again.
It’s not entirely untrue.
I am tired…of her…of my life.
Looking back, the six months with Navya were the best days of my life so far.
I was a complete idiota for not realizing it then, for not believing what was in my heart, for giving in to responsibility and expectation.
And now, here I am, continuing this miserable charade.
She shakes her head and lets out a deep breath. “We don’t have to rush, I guess.”
Relief washes through me so fast it’s almost shameful. “Yes. I think that’s…wise.”
She pretends that it is some version of restrained and virtuous, even though she’s probably wondering if I need to go see a urologist or start taking blue pills. But she doesn’t say it. Decent of her.
I don’t deserve it.
I feel like shit.
Cazzo.
I hurt Navya, and now I’m hurting Arabella. I’m fucking things up—fucking my life up.
Massimo doesn’t argue when we meet for drinks at the Four Seasons bar.
“Arabella is gorgeous.” He takes a sip of his whiskey. “I’d fuck her. I genuinely cannot understand why you can’t.”
Massimo has never had performance issues. If there’s a woman within range and she’s even remotely attractive, he’s ready. It’s one of his more reliable traits.
“I—I don’t know.” I stare at the amber liquid in my glass.
He tilts his head, gives me a long, unimpressed look. “You do know. It’s the nurse.”
I don’t bother denying it.
He’s right.
I know because every night, when I close my eyes, I see Navya standing barefoot in her kitchen, hair pulled back, offering me dinner—not because she had to, not because it was expected—but because she wanted to take her turn. She wanted to take care of me.
“It’s been two months.”
“And?” Massimo prompts.
“And she hasn’t once indicated she misses me,” I confess wanly. “She doesn’t look at me like she’s waiting for something.”
Massimo whistles softly. “Burn.”
“I follow her around with my eyes like an idiot,” I concede. “She never notices. Or does a really good job of pretending not to.”
“So”—he rests his elbows on the bar counter—“you’re engaged to a woman who wants you, and miserable because the person you want is no longer available to you.”
I grimace. “When did you get insightful?”
“I slept with a therapist last week,” he deadpans. “Picked things up.”
I laugh despite myself. “With her…I felt I could be myself. Just Evan. Not a surgeon. Not a son or grandson. Definitely not a Vincenzo.”
Massimo studies me for a moment, then nods. “Yeah. You’re fucked.”
“Thanks.”
“No, I mean it.” He gestures with his glass. “You didn’t fall in love with your nurse because she was easy or convenient. You fell in love with her because she didn’t need you.”
Love? Am I really in love?
Massimo laughs when he sees the look on my face. “Yeah, asshole, you’re in love.”
Is that why I feel so fucking awful?
“And you were stupid enough to think you could walk away from it,” he concludes.
I swallow. “Well, then I’m well and truly fucked. I can’t marry Arabella, that much is obvious. Navya is not going to give me another chance because, frankly, I don’t deserve it. And then there’s Nonno.”
Massimo smirks, but there’s no humor in his eyes.
“Stop with the drama, Evan. You know, I thought you were just passing time with Navya, and that’s why…
well, it’s obvious that your feelings run deep.
Your grandfather wants what’s best for you.
If you tell him you’re in love with someone else, do you really think he’s going to force you to marry Arabella? ”
I shake my head. “But that’s not the point, Mass. It’s…I don’t want to hurt Nonno.”
He clinks his glass against mine.
“Just tell the old fart you fell in love with your nurse. You can’t live like this. You’re going to damage that smart brain of yours.”
“Too late for that,” I say somberly.