Chapter 33 Aerin
AERIN
It worked.
I can’t believe it worked.
I didn’t have a fully formed plan when facing down my father other than a determination to stick to my guns and ensure that the wedding did not happen.
He’d have to drag me down the aisle himself if he wanted me marry.
But whatever pushback he had melted away when my brother swept in with a quiet reveal of the deal he’d been working on.
To save me.
He sits across from me in the kitchen, a half-drunk mug of hot chocolate resting in one hand while he studies his phone held in the other.
I hug my mug and drink slowly, just watching him. “Giacomo?”
“Hm?” He doesn’t look up, but his head tilts in my direction.
“What I did tonight, with Dad. Cancelling the wedding and everything, it won’t impact your deal will it?”
He finally glances up. “How do you mean?”
“Well.” My cup lowers. “Everything you were doing and working on was getting planned while the engagement was still on, right? Now that it’s off, does that change anything?”
His lips curve into a gentle smile. “No, not at all. You shouldn’t be worrying about those kinds of things.”
I snort. “What should I be worrying about, my hair and my shoes?”
Giacomo rolls his eyes. “No, I just mean… I’m taking care of you. After everything that’s happened to you, this is the least I can do to keep you safe. Plus with how sick Dad is getting, it’s not the wisest time to bring another family into the fold.”
I nod along to his words, mulling them over. “Your deal…can you tell me about it?”
Giacomo stands suddenly and pockets his phone. “I have to go.”
“Tell me.” My voice hardens slightly. “In case you forget, I’m being prepped to take over, which means I should hear about every and all deals the family’s involved in.”
His brows raise, and a flash of surprise crosses his face. “Look at you. You really did grow a backbone.”
“Hey!”
“I’m just saying.” Giacomo laughs, holding up both hands. “A few months ago, you wouldn’t say boo to a goose.”
“That’s so not true.”
“Isn’t it? Ask yourself, would the version of you now even roll over and agree to an engagement?”
“Of course not!”
“And yet you did back then. See? Boo and goose.” He crosses around the island counter and laughs. “I’ll explain everything soon, squirt. I just want to make sure all my ducks are in a row.”
“What’s with you and birds,” I mutter as he leans down and kisses the top of my head.
“I’m an avian lover I guess. Go to bed. Get some rest.”
“Where are you going?”
Giacomo stares at the empty space above my head. “Out. To ensure my deal follows through exactly how I need it to.”
“Okay… Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, squirt.”
Silence envelops the kitchen and I return to my mug, hugging both my hands around it as my mind immediately drifts to Falco.
Despite his insistence, I gave him the evening off so he could see the doctor in a follow-up about his arm, but he should be free now.
My current guard isn’t easily dismissed as I leave the kitchen, but as soon as I enter the corridor with Falco’s room at the end he melts away into the shadows.
I approach his door and knock softly, humming to myself while rocking back on my heels. Everything lately has been nothing but pain and heavy clouds of grief. Today was the first of hopefully many victories.
A few seconds pass, then the door creaks open. Falco’s tired face appears. “Aerin. Is everything alright?”
“Can I come in?”
He peers outward and glances up and down the hall. “Where’s your guard?”
“I dismissed him.”
Falco’s jaw twitches. “Aerin.”
“It was literally at the end of the corridor, relax. We’re in the estate. No one here wants to hurt me. So can I come in?”
His lips form a thin line, then he holds open his door. I duck under his arm and into his room. Inside, swathes of bandages coil on the bedside table near the single light.
“How’s your arm?” I ask while an antiseptic scent tinges my nose. Turning, it catches my eye immediately. Long pink, fresh scars run the length of his arm, and they gleam in the light as if covered in some kind of oil. He walks closer then passes me to the bed.
“Healing.”
“What’s that?” My fingers brush his elbow and come away slightly sticky.
“Ointment. To help with scarring.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Sort of. Kind of like a cramp.”
“I’m sorry.” I sit next to him on the bed and watch as he picks up the cream once more. “Let me?”
Falco hesitates and something churns in his eyes, a look I can’t quite decipher.
Maybe he’s reluctant to have me touch his scars in case it triggers something, so I strengthen my smile and hold out my hand. “Please?”
After a moment, he hands me the tube of ointment. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I was having a late-night drink with Giacomo, and he left to secure something about his deal.” Falco’s arm immediately tenses under my touch. “I can’t believe how well today went.”
“I’m happy for you,” he says softly. “Not having to marry that man.”
“Me too, you have no idea. Now I don’t feel so guilty about us.” I work swiftly, smearing the ointment along Falco’s fresh scars while my gut twists slightly with guilt. He got so hurt because of me and that’s never, ever going away. I wish I could make it up to him.
I will.
For the rest of my life, I will.
My hands glide down his forearm and back up, ensuring everything is suitably coated.
After cleaning the ointment off my hands with a towel, Falco’s eyes lock onto mine and a pulse of heat lances through me.
Before I know it, I’m in his lap with my hands cradling his face and his arms around my waist.
“Falco.”
“Aerin.” His voice is low and husky as his eyes dart about my face. There’s pain in his gaze. It must be his arm.
“I can’t thank you enough,” I murmur. “Everything you’ve done for me these past months is…incredible.”
“Aerin, I—” His grip tightens around me, and I quickly cut him off, covering his lips with my fingertips.
“Hush. Let me say thank you. Please.”
His lips part slightly against my fingertips and his breath rushes between the gaps, then he nods as his shoulders slump an inch.
“Thank you.” I lean forward and replace my fingers with my lips in a gentle kiss.
A gentle kiss that grows more heated by the second and suddenly fire ignites in my gut.
His arms tighten around me and I arch my body into his, raking my hand through his thick hair and pulling hard enough to elicit a grunt from deep in his throat.
Our lips weave together with practiced ease as heat builds inside me, flushing down my arms and legs until my entire body is tingling with anticipation.
I lean up onto my knees to follow Falco as his head falls back, kissing him deeply and caressing the side of his neck. Then I settle back down, and a firm bulge beneath me alerts me to just how excited Falco is.
“Wanna celebrate the end of my engagement?” I smirk against his lips.
In record time, our clothes are on the floor and we’re hidden under Falco’s sheets once more, only this time I’m on top and, despite his encouragement to lie down, I remain there.
I want to be the one in charge this time.
Any complaints Falco has die the moment I grasp his throbbing cock and slide it inside me with a slow, controlled roll of my hips.
It’s like our first time, only there are no injuries for me to look out for. I can place my hands where I want and they settle on Falco’s lower abdomen while I rock back and forth, panting hotly in the under-blanket haven we’ve created for ourselves.
Falco’s hands roam over my body, caressing every inch of me like he’s memorizing out all the details on my body. From my hips to my waist, up to my breasts, then his hand settles on the side of my neck and he jerks me down for a heated kiss.
“Aerin,” he moans as my hips rock down hard. “Fuck—you’re incredible. Don’t ever forget that.”
“You’re only saying that ‘cause I’m fucking you,” I gasp against his lips. “But I’ll take it.”
He repeats it over and over as I fuck myself harder on his cock and bring us both to an intense orgasm that leaves me shaking and trembling beyond my control.
He repeats it when I collapse to the side and he disappears between my legs and lavishes attention on my pussy and clit until he wrings another orgasm out of me.
He repeats it when he fucks me from behind, tangling me in his arms and holding me close against his chest, repeating it in my ear with every desperate thrust inside me until I’m gasping noiselessly through an orgasm so intense it’s like bare flame is licking at my skin.
And he repeats it, I’m sure, as I fall asleep in his arms after being thoroughly fucked to my satisfaction.
I wake with a jolt the next morning, cold and ready to roll back into his arms, but as consciousness trickles back, it’s my own room that greets me.
Wait. I didn’t dream last night, did I?
Aches and pains as I get out of bed prove that last night’s fucking session was real, but how did I get back to my room?
Falco isn’t outside my room either like he usually is.
After some awkward morning eye contact with the guard stationed at my door, I hurry into the shower and wash away all evidence of our time together while confusion swirls in my chest.
What’s going on?
Falco isn’t at breakfast either, so I choke down some toast quickly while avoiding Mom’s disappointed laments about the loss of the wedding of her dreams. You’d think she was the one getting married the way she talks, and I scour the estate until I find Falco in the gym working out with focus on his healing arm.
“Falco?” I approach slowly and tension bleeds through my gut. When he looks up, that same indecipherable look from last night remains in his eyes.
“Aerin.”
“What…what happened?”
His arm curls with a weight clasped in his hand. “With what?”
I walk closer and lower my voice. “With…last night? I had a great time, I thought you did too, but I woke up in my own bed and I… I don’t understand.”
“We talked.” Falco stares down at the weight. “You got tired and fell asleep. I carried you back to bed.”
Something’s wrong. The air around us lacks the normal warmth I’ve grown accustomed to, and the fact that he won’t look at me turns my stomach. “Falco. Look at me.”
“I’m busy.”
“Falco!” Surging forward, I shove his shoulder and he stumbles. “What the hell is going on?”
Finally he looks up. “I have to work on this. I can’t protect you with an arm that isn’t as strong as it needs to be.”
“I get that, but why wouldn’t you look at me? Why did you just…” I study his face, failing at my words, then I reach for him. “Something’s different.”
“Nothing is different.”
“Falco…” My fingertips brush his shoulder, but unlike last night he pulls away. I follow. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
“I’m fine. Don’t you have something with your mom today?”
“I… not until the afternoon. It’s just lunch. Why are you?” Heat builds behind my eyes, and a sudden chill sweeps through my gut as if the toast I’d eaten is fighting against me. “Why are you different?”
“I’m not.”
“You are!”
“Aerin, stop this.”
In a sudden urge to prove to him that he’s different and I’m not crazy, I surge up to kiss him, and Falco immediately pulls away. “See!” I snap. “What’s happened? What did I do?”
Falco drops the weight with a clatter and faces me with anger blazes in his eyes. “Aerin. I was hired to protect you. Not to want you. Not to love you. Do you understand? This…this stops now. I’ve pitied you enough. So if you don’t mind, I have work to do.”
Pitied?
He turns away to me and it’s like a block of ice has slammed into my entire body. I step back, speechless. It’s as if some kind of switch has flipped and some cold, indifferent monster has replaced the man I knew last night.
Did I wake up in an alternative reality?
The urge to push gets swallowed by a sudden crack of pain in my chest, and I stumble away from Falco, out of the gym, and all the way through the estate. My feet hurry with no real destination as I replay everything Falco said in my mind.
Something’s changed.
Does he not want me anymore? Was I only desirable when I was attached to another man? Did someone get to him?
My thoughts tumble together and the coldness in my gut continues to spread, along with a cramp that brings my steps to a halt.
“Aerin?” Mom’s voice drifts toward me and I glance up, finding myself in the conservatory and she’s walking in from the garden. “Darling, you look pale. Is everything alright?”
Tears flood my eyes, but before I can speak my knees wobble and the ground flies up to my face without a single warning.