Chapter Twenty
Vincenzo
I WAKE SOMETIME in the late afternoon, the sun shining through a crack in the linen curtains of my bedroom, turning the white sheets golden.
My Caterina lies beside me, still asleep, the black storm of her hair lying over my white pillows.
The sheet has fallen off her, exposing her naked body as she lies on her side facing me.
Her skin looks as if it has been gilded by a master painter, highlighting all her delicious curves, her breasts, her hips, her thighs, the delicate line of her cheek.
She is so beautiful.
I’m filled with a pleasant post-orgasmic haze, unable to stop thinking about her nails scratching my back in the shower, criss-crossing the scars I already have with the scars she gave me.
I want those scars of hers. I want the pain of her nails on my skin, cancelling out the pain of my father’s belt.
And I want the child we hopefully created between us, new life after all these years of death.
But what if she’s not pregnant? Will you keep her here like your father kept your mother?
The pleasant haze fragments as a cold thread of unease winds through me.
I wouldn’t do that, of course I wouldn’t. If she’s not pregnant then it’s fine, we can try again and I’m all for trying as many times as it will take since isn’t that the best part?
I throw back the sheet and get out of bed, stalking into the bathroom.
I splash some water on my face to get rid of the lingering effects of sleep, but I can’t stop thinking about her, standing on the beach, looking out to sea.
Her telling me that a facsimile of freedom isn’t what she truly wants, no matter what I can promise her.
You know what she truly needs. That’s to be free of you.
I brace my hands on the black marble vanity and look down unseeing into the basin. What she wants is impossible. She’s forever tied to me as my wife now, and if she’s pregnant—
You forced her into marriage, screwed her without a condom, told her that freedom for her is impossible, and that she’ll never be loved. All of this is about what you want. None of this is about her.
I’m cold inside and getting colder, and I could lie to myself, deny that I feel anything at all for her and that there’s no escaping the situation, no escape for her, but…
I’m not sure I can lie anymore or pretend she’s not important to me. Act as if her feelings mean nothing, when they in fact mean everything.
She means everything.
I slowly lift my head and stare in the mirror at the man looking back. The face of the monster I’ve become. The Wolf of Sicily.
I have my father’s eyes, his colouring and his height. I have nothing at all of my mother, except perhaps my heart, which was once as fierce and tender as hers. But it’s not anymore. There’s only a stone where my heart should be, hard and cold and impervious. Like my father’s heart.
You know what you have to do.
Everything inside me goes tight, my chest aching as if a bullet has torn a hole right through it, but there’s no escaping the truth and I know it.
I want to keep her here. I want to keep here with me forever, but if I do that, I’ll be my father through and through.
She won’t ever taste that freedom she so badly wants.
She won’t ever have that little flat or a career, or a life outside the cosa nostra.
All she’ll ever have is a husband who keeps her at his side and gives her nothing in return.
I know what she needs, even though she might not know it herself.
The thing that’s been missing in her life since my family destroyed hers.
She needs love, and that’s the one thing I can’t give her.
Because slowly but surely the Argentis kill love.
They strangle it, starve it and beat it to death.
Then, once it’s dead, we fill the space it left with violence and murder, with sorrow and pain.
That’s the true Argenti legacy. My legacy.
And I can’t involve Caterina or any children we may have in that legacy.
I can’t pass that on to the next generation.
I promised myself the violence would end with me, but I know that if I keep her, it won’t.
It will go on and on, down through our children and there will never be an end to it.
The shadow Stefano Argenti casts is too long and I can’t escape it.
It has to stop. Now. Here. With her.
Ice fills my veins, my cold stone of a heart pumping it around the rest of my body, and I let it. I’m not the wolf now, I’m the man, and the man has a purpose to fulfil. He cannot let himself be distracted from it and he cannot let anyone get in his way.
I push myself away from the vanity and go back into the bedroom. Caterina is stirring, giving a sensual little stretch as she does so. Then she sees me standing next to the bed and smiles, reaching out for me. ‘Come back to bed,’ she says. ‘I need my husband.’
But her husband is gone. I can’t be him any longer, no matter how badly she wants him.
She must see something in my expression, because her black brows draw together in a frown, her green eyes full of concern. She sits up, drawing the sheet about her. ‘Vincenzo? What’s wrong? Has something happened?’
Hearing her say my name makes my resolve falter, but only for a second. There can be no second-guessing and no regrets, not now. This is the right thing to do, the only thing to do.
‘Sadly, I’ve had a small change of heart,’ I drawl. ‘You wanted your freedom, so I’ve decided you shall have it. I’ll organise a new identity for you, a new passport and a new life. You can have the normality you wanted.’
She blinks, shock slowly filling her gaze. ‘What?’ The word sounds blank, as if she doesn’t understand what I’ve said.
‘A new identity,’ I explain patiently, my voice cold. ‘That’s what I gave your father and that’s what I’ll give you. You’re right. You should have the normal life you wanted and I’m going to give it to you.’
She blinks again, understanding dawning across her face. ‘But…you said that was impossible. You said that if I was pregnant—’
‘I know what I said.’ My voice sharpens, a hot flare of temper penetrating the ice I’ve surrounded myself with. ‘But I was wrong. I don’t want to do to you what my father did to my mother. I don’t want to imprison you here.’
‘I won’t be a prisoner,’ she says, as if it’s self-evident. ‘You said yourself you’ll give me as much freedom as you’re able to manage.’
‘But you didn’t want that, remember?’ The cold in me is beginning to melt no matter how hard I try to hold onto it, fury coming hard on its heels, thick and hot. ‘You’ve made no secret of the fact that it’s not enough for you.’
Colour is leaching from her face, making her green eyes seem even greener. ‘Yes, I did say that, but… Maybe I’ve changed my mind.’
My fury leaps higher. I was expecting her to grab her freedom with both hands, not suddenly decide she doesn’t want it after all. Which is unacceptable.
The wolf is elemental, savage with sharp teeth and claws, and it doesn’t understand what I’m doing. It doesn’t understand why I’m sending her away, when all it wants is to keep her.
But I’m not the wolf now and I refuse to be Stefano, and so there’s only one way this is going to go.
‘That’s too bad,’ I say coldly. ‘I’ve made my decision.’
She’s sitting rigidly upright, the sheet now clutched in her hands. ‘I like the villa and I like you. I like being your wife.’ Her tone is light, but there’s a strange current running through the words.
‘Since when did you suddenly like being here with me?’ I shouldn’t keep arguing with her, not when nothing she says will change my mind, but I can’t seem to stop. ‘When not a few hours ago you were telling me that it wasn’t enough?’
Her mouth tightens and she looks down at her hands clutching the sheet. ‘You’re right. If I’m pregnant then—’
‘Caterina,’ I say roughly, unable to let go of the sense that she’s hiding something from me. ‘Give me the truth.’
She continues to stare down at the sheet for a long moment. Then abruptly, as if she’s come to some decision, she lifts her head and meets my gaze. There’s some powerful emotion burning in her green eyes. It’s fierce, hot, determined, and it momentarily steals my breath clean away.
She lifts her chin. ‘The truth? Okay, here’s the truth. I changed my mind because I think I’m in love with you, Vincenzo. And now I don’t want to leave you.’
The shock of it guts me. All I can do is stand there staring at her, the words echoing in my head.
That thought that she might fall for me, the man who did all those terrible things to her and her family, never occurred to me, not once.
And for a second I can’t believe it, that she must be lying to me in some way, but there’s nothing but truth in those beautiful eyes of hers.
It’s too late. You’ve hurt her. Irrevocably.
There’s an agony somewhere inside me, but I ignore it. I have to. The Argenti legacy must be more than all the violence and death my father perpetuated and it must be more than what I’ve perpetuated myself. And it has to start right here, right now, no matter how much she loves me.
I give her a slight but regretful smile. ‘Unfortunate,’ I say. ‘But nothing that can’t be fixed. You’ll have to forget me, gattina, since I will not be featuring anywhere in this new life of yours.’
Her gaze is very fixed and she sits still as a statue.
Then abruptly, she drops the sheet, leaps from the bed, coming over to stand in front of me.
She’s beautifully naked, her hair tumbling around her shoulders and falling in an inky waterfall down to her waist. Her eyes blaze with the spirit of the warrior inside her; she’s ready to fight a battle and she’s ready to fight hard.
‘No,’ she says fiercely. ‘I won’t go. I want to stay here with you.’
But it’s a battle she can’t win, because I am a warrior too, and I’m stronger. I have the scars to prove it.
‘I don’t care,’ I say coldly, clearly. ‘If you won’t go then I’ll make you.’
The blaze in her eyes falters as she looks at me, finding no give in my expression. ‘Vincenzo…’ She lifts a hand to my face. ‘Please…’
I stand rigid as her fingers brush my skin and there’s a part of me that wants nothing more than to kiss her palm, pull her close, tell her I’ve changed my mind after all.
But I can’t. This is the way it has to be and after all, I’m used to pain.
‘I’m going to organise some documents for you,’ I say, my voice flat with control. ‘Pack your things.’
Then I turn and stride out of the bedroom.