Chapter 30
Ava
I woke up drowning in sweat. Not the kind that came after a nightmare. My stomach clenched so hard it felt like my insides were being gripped by invisible hands. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t scream. Could barely move. I knew this pain. I’d felt it before. I had dealt with fibroids since I was a teen. My yearly check-up had come and gone because I was in Florida, being forced to be married.
But this time, it wasn’t dull or manageable. It wasn’t the usual discomfort I’d learned to live with. The pain was blinding. Like something had snapped or burst open inside of me.
My hand went to my stomach. “Luciano—” I whispered.
He was awake and hovering before I could say it again. He flicked on the bedside lamp, his face a mask of sharp lines and concern. “What is it?” “My stomach,” I gritted out. “I think something’s wrong. Something’s really wrong.”
I felt the bed shift, the thud of his boots. A second later, his arms were under me, lifting me like I weighed nothing. There was no way he wasn’t in pain—his arm that I shot couldn’t have healed yet—but he was carrying me. “I’ve got you.” His voice was low. No questions. No panic. Just action.
He didn’t put me down until we reached the car. He was so in control. I tried not to let the pain make me seem weak. Even though every bump in the road felt like glass tearing through my gut. I blacked out.
I woke up to the sound of a heart monitor and the sterile beep of something tracking my life. The room smelled like alcohol wipes and hand soap. My mouth was dry. My body ached. “I heard you wake,” a nurse said.
She was a pretty Black girl my age with long braids. She stepped into the room with a tablet and a smile that was entirely too cheerful for me.
“Your husband stepped out to get some coffee. Said he’d be right back.”
I blinked. “Luciano?”
She laughed. It was loud and warm and made me feel guilty for being annoyed with her. I shifted in the bed.
“Girl, yes. Tall, broody, scary as hell. He was almost kicked out twice. He scared one of the residents half to death when he tried to move your IV.”
I tried to sit up. Regretted it instantly.
“Don’t,” she warned gently. “You had a ruptured fibroid. That pain you were feeling? Could’ve gotten real bad if he hadn’t brought you in when he did. He advocated well for you. He told the doctor to check everything. Said, and I quote, ‘Check everything. If anything happens to her…’”
She paused, smirking. “He was threatening everybody. And everybody believed him.” I blinked hard. She patted my arm. “He’s something else, that man. You’re lucky.”
"I am." I agreed.
When Luciano came back, he didn’t say much. But he looked me over like he was trying to X-ray me to make sure I was okay. Then he sat in the chair beside my bed, arms crossed, coat still on over his expensive silk pajamas like he didn’t plan to stay long—but he didn’t move. Not for hours.
He didn’t sleep either. I watched him from the corner of my eye as I drifted in and out of sleep, as the nurses came and went. His face was unreadable, but I could see the tension in the line of his jaw. I didn't say anything because I knew he didn't want to talk.
When I shifted and winced, his eyes were there instantly. He reached up and pushed the button for my pain meds. “You’re okay,” he said.
The discharge papers came the next day. Luciano carried my bag. My prescriptions. Then me , when I got dizzy trying to stand and get out of bed and into the wheelchair the nurse had brought for me.
My whole face was hot because it felt like everybody in the hospital was looking at me as we left. Once we got back to the house, he didn’t leave my side. Not once.
Every pill was on time. He made me soup. Gave me water. He watched me sleep. No sugar, no dairy, no processed food. The doctor’s instructions had become his doctrine. If it said I needed rest, I got it. If I even tried to argue about doing something for myself, he just stared until I backed down.
He barely spoke until he decided to apologize.
“I’m sorry.” It came out of nowhere.
“Because it’s a social norm?” I asked, because I was confused as to why he was apologizing.
“Because I let this happen. If you wouldn’t have been—” I cut him off. “This has nothing to do with you. I know you researched fibroids. You know that.”
“But it feels like it is my fault,” he said—and he was right. Because of him, I’d missed my appointment. But he had been violent for me. Brutal. Protective. And now he was... this.
Gentle. Careful. Quiet.
I think I was a little harsh in my judgment of him. He wasn’t emotionally stunted he just processed differently. He felt everything—deeply, completely. But in silence
“It’s not your fault. Why don’t you lay with me and watch TV or something? You need to relax.”
He nodded and stripped down to his boxers. My eyes got cut on the deep v that led to his dick.
Even in pain, my vagina reacted to him being nearly naked. I sighed as he laid next to me. It was still hard for me to believe he was a virgin.