Chapter 29
VALENTINA
Iwake up to Sebastian saying my name. He’s close enough that I hear him through whatever thick, dark place my brain keeps dragging me back to.
My whole body jerks before I can stop it.
One hand flies to my stomach and the other reaches for something to shove away.
Sebastian’s hand covers mine, warm and firm without holding me down.
“Valentina,” he says again. “It’s me.”
I blink hard and force myself to look around.
I’m back in his bedroom, in his bed. The curtains are drawn.
Somewhere nearby, a woman’s voice says my name, softer this time, and I turn my head enough to see a doctor sitting beside the bed with a Doppler in her hand and a black medical bag open at her feet.
“The baby,” I rasp.
“It has a strong heartbeat,” Sebastian says immediately. “She checked twice.”
The doctor smiles at me gently.
“Your baby sounds good, Valentina. I’d like to check your blood pressure again in a few minutes, but everything I’m seeing is reassuring.”
“Gia?” I ask.
Sebastian’s hand tightens around mine. “She’s okay.”
“Don’t lie to me.” My voice comes out ragged.
“I’m not.” He smiles. “She’s got a concussion, a bruised cheek, and a split lip. She’s going to be okay. Nico’s with her.”
I close my eyes, which is a mistake. Gia is on the porch again. Adrian’s arm is around me. The cloth is over my mouth. Then the basement floods back and the gun too, with the split second when I was sure the shot went through me because my body was too terrified to understand anything else.
My eyes fly open. Sebastian is already moving closer.
“I’m here,” he says softly.
“I thought he shot me.”
“I know.”
“I thought the baby…” My hand presses harder against my stomach.
“He didn’t,” Sebastian says. “You’re both alive.”
Adrian isn’t. I remember that too.
The doctor checks my blood pressure again. She tells me I need rest, fluids, small meals when I can manage them, and no unnecessary stress, which almost makes me laugh. Sebastian listens to every word like there will be a test later.
After the doctor leaves, I try to sit up. The room tilts hard enough that I grab the sheet and shut my eyes.
Sebastian’s hand goes to my shoulder. “Don’t.”
I want to argue. Nothing comes out, which worries him more than anything I could have said. He helps me ease back against the pillows.
The next two days happen in pieces. I wake up to Sebastian on the phone near the window, speaking low enough that I can’t make out the words.
I wake up to his hand around mine. I wake up with my face wet and no memory of crying.
I wake up from a dream where Gia is still on the porch and I can’t get the door open no matter how hard I pull.
Sometimes I know where I am right away. Sometimes I don’t.
Those times are the worst. My body comes up fighting, and Sebastian has to say my name until I can hear him over whatever nightmare still has its hands in my hair.
He keeps his hands where I can see them until I reach for him first. He just sits close enough for me to find him and says, “You’re at my house. You’re in my room. Adrian is dead.”
Over and over. I hate needing the reminder.
Gia calls on the second day. Sebastian hands me the phone and stays sitting on the edge of the bed like he’s pretending not to listen.
“You look terrible,” Gia says the second the video connects.
She looks terrible too. Her cheek is bruised, a small bandage near her hairline. Her hair is clean but pulled back messily, and she’s wearing sunglasses indoors.
“I was kidnapped,” I say.
“I’m concussed,” she shoots back.
“I’m pregnant. I win.”
She narrows her eyes at me through the sunglasses. “Do not try to make me laugh. It hurts my head.”
My throat tightens, and she sees it immediately.
“No,” she says. “Absolutely not.”
“I called you.”
“And I came because I love you. What happened was not your fault.”
“You got hurt because of me.”
“No, I got hurt because Adrian is a psycho.”
“Gia.”
“Val.” Her voice sharpens. “You are not taking responsibility for the actions of a man who ambushed me from behind. I will fight you, and I have doctor’s orders to rest, so don’t make me waste energy.”
I press my lips together because if I answer too fast, I’ll cry.
She softens just a little. “I’m okay.”
“I thought he’d killed you.”
“I know.” She swallows, and for the first time, she looks as shaken as I feel. “I was scared he’d kill you.”
I cry, ugly and immediate, and she cries too, which makes both of us laugh. Sebastian takes the phone when my hand starts shaking too hard to hold it.
“Rest,” he tells Gia.
“Don’t boss me around, Dracula.”
He almost smiles. “Goodbye, Gia.”
He ends the call before she can insult him again.
On the third day, I finally shower. Sebastian sits outside the bathroom door because I ask him to without actually asking.
I leave the door cracked, and he pretends not to notice.
The shower is quick and not especially graceful, and I have to sit on the closed toilet for ten minutes afterward in a towel, trying not to pass out.
“You alive in there?” Sebastian asks from the other side of the door.
I laugh once, but it turns into a sob so fast I don’t have time to stop it.
The door opens a few inches. “Valentina?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re a bad liar.”
He comes in slowly and crouches in front of me. He doesn’t touch me right away. Just looks at me sitting there in a towel, wet hair dripping down my back, whatever dignity I have left somewhere near the shower drain.
“I hate that he’s dead and I’m still scared,” I say.
Sebastian’s face changes. Not much, but enough.
“That’s normal. You’ve still got a lot of trauma to process. Your body hasn’t caught up to the fact that the danger’s passed.”
“He’s gone,” I say.
“Yes.”
“So why doesn’t it feel like it?”
Sebastian sits on the bathroom floor in front of me, dressed in dark pants and a white shirt like this is a perfectly normal place for him to be.
“Because he spent a long time making sure you were afraid of him. His death doesn’t undo that in three days.”
The next morning, I make it downstairs because I’m sick of the bedroom and I need some vitamin D.
The kitchen is quiet when I get there. Sebastian is at the island with coffee, his phone, and a stack of papers he immediately turns over when he sees me.
I pretend not to notice. He pretends not to know I noticed. We’re very mature.
“Coffee?” he asks.
I give him a look.
He smirks. “Tea?”
“Fine.”
He gets up and makes it himself, even though there are at least four people in this house who’d probably materialize out of a wall if he snapped his fingers. I sit at the island, one hand resting on my stomach, and watch him move around the kitchen like he’s not entirely sure where anything lives.
When he sets the mug in front of me, I wrap both hands around it.
“I meant what I said,” I tell him.
He stops.
I don’t look up from the tea. It feels easier to say it that way.
“In the basement,” I add. “I meant it.”
He sits down across from me. “I know you did.”
I finally look at him.
“Can you just let me be emotionally brave for at least fifteen seconds?”
“All right.” He smirks.
I take a breath. “I love you. I’m scared of that. I’m scared of needing you. I’m scared of how much easier it would be to trust you if I could pretend you weren’t dangerous. But you are. You’re also kind to me in ways I don’t always know what to do with. That makes it worse.”
His face does something I don’t know how to read.
“I love you,” I say again, because the first one didn’t kill me. “Even though you’re bossy and impossible.”
For a second, he doesn’t say anything. Then he laughs, not that anything’s funny. More like he’s exhausted and relieved and didn’t expect his body to make that sound before he could stop it.
I stare at him.
He drags a hand over his mouth. “I’m sorry.”
“No, please. I love making declarations while men laugh at me.”
“Loving you scares the shit out of me, too.”
That shuts me up. It’s not romantic in the traditional sense. Probably the least polished thing he could’ve said, which is exactly why I believe it.
“Well,” I say after a second, “there you go.”
“I love you,” he says again. No qualifiers.
He stands, and I stand, too, even though I’m not sure why until he’s in front of me and his hands are at my waist. He moves slowly enough that I can say no. I don’t.
When he kisses me, the basement flashes through my head for half a second, and my body stiffens before I can stop it. Sebastian pulls back immediately.
“I’m okay,” I say quickly.
“You don’t have to be.”
“I know. But I am. I just need a minute.”
His thumbs move lightly against my waist. “We don’t have to do anything.”
“I want to.”
“Valentina…”
“I want you,” I say, and that comes out steadier than I expect. “And I can’t let my fear stop me from having what I want.”
Something in Sebastian’s face hardens, then softens just as fast.
“If you want me, I’m yours,” he says.
“Good.”
“And I’ll stop the second it’s too much.”
“I know.” I reach up to kiss him again.
Our bodies press together, perfectly aligned. It takes seconds for my brain to empty of every thought but his lips on mine, his tongue sliding against mine. He becomes my air, and then he’s backing me toward the stairs, the two of us making a slow, sloppy path back to his bed.
Clothes get discarded on the staircase. I consider, for just a moment, that I don’t want any of his staff finding them, but then I realize I couldn’t care less. There’s only room in my head for the way his skin feels against mine.
We only make it to the top of the stairs before I stumble and he follows me down, hovering over me on his strong arms. I can’t help but laugh as he looks down at me with concern.
“This is probably good,” I mutter, reaching up to pull his face down to mine.
“I have, like, ten guest rooms,” he says between kisses. “We can do better than the floor of the landing.”
“We have time,” I remind him. “We can have sex in literally every bedroom, on the landing, and even in the kitchen.”
He chuckles and rises, his bare chest brushing against me.
He’s already stripped down to his boxers, and I can’t help but admire the view as his broad chest rises and falls as he catches his breath.
He reaches down to pull me up, then hoists me over his shoulder and carries me to the closest bedroom.
He sets me down on the bed, then slides out of his boxers and climbs back over me. His hands travel up and down my body, caressing and stroking in sharp contrast to the firm press of his mouth on mine. I writhe against him, my whole body on fire from his touch.
I press my hand to his chest and push gently. He stops immediately, sitting back on his heels, watching me. I take a minute to catch my breath before sliding off the bed. I can feel his eyes on me as I unhook my bra and slip out of my underwear.
“Val, we don’t have to,” he repeats. “Are you okay?”
I turn back to him, approaching slowly in a way I can only hope looks sexy.
“I’m perfect,” I say, pushing him back on the bed until he’s on his back. “I just wanted to be on top for a change.”
He grins wickedly as I kiss my way up his chest, straddling him. I take him inside me, sinking down his length slowly, feeling him fill me the way that always stretches me in the most delicious way.
“Your wish is my command,” he chokes out in a strangled breath.
Our bodies find a rhythm as I ride him. I feel the tension in his hands gripping mine, see the strain on his face as he fights to last. It’s incredibly sexy, watching him try so hard to please me.
“Let go, baby,” I tell him. “You want to. Come inside me.”
He smirks, but his eyes are slammed shut in concentration. “That’s a generous offer, but I’m not coming until you do.”
He hits a spot inside me that makes my whole body clench, and it doesn’t take long for me to do just that. When he finally hits his peak, his face and body go slack with release.
Afterward, I lie tucked against him, one leg draped over his, his hand warm on my stomach. He kisses my forehead, strokes my hair.
“I love you.”
My throat gets tight again, but I’m starting to accept that this may just be my personality now.
“I love you, too,” I say.
A few days later, we have another dinner party. After everything we’ve been through, we need it.
Gia arrives with a bruise still yellowing along her cheekbone and sunglasses big enough to cover half her face. Nico hovers so hard I feel secondhand embarrassment within five minutes. Matteo brings dessert and says nothing about the last time he saw me, which I appreciate more than I can say.
Gia talks about the neighbor who found her on my porch and keeps bringing her soup. Nico complains that the man is eighty and still somehow flirting with her. Sebastian sits beside me with one hand on the back of my chair, looking happier than I’ve ever seen him.
Throughout the meal, Gia and Nico drift closer together without either of them noticing. He gets her water before she asks. She hands him her fork when he drops his. Their shoulders touch, and neither one moves.
“So,” I say, setting my fork down. “Are we discussing this?”
Gia freezes. “Discussing what?”
Nico’s eyes narrow. “No.”
“Oh, this is going to be fun,” Matteo says.
I look between Nico and Gia. “I’m just saying, if my brother is falling for my best friend, I deserve advance notice. There may be paperwork.”
Nico points at me.
“You do not get to have opinions after what you did.”
“What did I do?”
He gestures at Sebastian. “You literally did it first.”
Sebastian’s hand settles on my thigh under the table, warm and easy through the fabric of my dress. I look over at him, and he’s smiling at me in that restrained way of his, like he doesn’t want to ruin it by making it too obvious.
For once, I don’t look away. I lean over and kiss him. A real kiss, enough to make Gia cheer under her breath and Nico groan like I’ve personally attacked him.
“Disgusting,” Nico grumbles.