Chapter Six Raffa #3
“I’m heading up.” Guinevere’s voice came from over my shoulder. When I turned, she was in the archway, swaying slightly with obvious fatigue. “Leo insisted when I almost broke my jaw yawning,” she added bashfully. “It must be jet lag.”
Or running through a skyscraper trying to avoid two Italian thugs trying to murder you, I thought, but I did not distress my mother and sister by saying that aloud.
“Yes, bed for you,” Mamma declared. “Raffaele will show you to your room. Emiliano already put your suitcase there.”
I sighed, because my mother was incapable of not playing matchmaker, but I still went to Guinevere’s side.
“Do you need me to carry you?” I asked quietly, noting the drawn, pale cast of her face.
I wanted to carry her to my room and tuck her into my body so I could shield her from the world and bury myself in her scent.
“No,” she said simply, carefully moving away to avoid touching me.
I let her lead the way up the stairs even though she did not know where to go. When she hesitated at the second landing, I eased by her to walk down the left hall all the way to the last room on the right.
“Every room in this house has a name,” I told her, my hand on the knob, the shadows thick around us, only a shimmer of moonlight pooling in from the large window at the end of the hall. “I thought it was appropriate you have this one.”
I stepped aside so she could read the little ceramic plaque on the wooden door.
Papavero.
Poppy.
She made a thin noise like air escaping a puncture wound, but followed me without objection into the dark, cool room.
I flipped a switch on the lamp beside the bed, illuminating the large space for her to study.
There was a large bed with a carved wooden headboard and matching nightstands, a floor-to-ceiling gilt mirror propped against the wall between two windows, and an ornate chest of drawers and matching bureau.
Everything was done in soft creams and reds—passionate, romantic colors that suited my cerbiatta.
“It’s beautiful,” she admitted, stepping into the room timidly as if she was afraid to be alone with me.
I could not blame myself later, when I lay awake and unblinking in my own room, for what I did next. It was the wine, maybe, or the late hour and the fact that I officially had not slept in over two days.
Mostly, though, it was the sight of her in that old college tee with all that thick, dark hair spilling around her shoulders, the pale oval of her face exhausted but utterly, devastatingly beautiful.
All of it amplified by having this woman, my wish on a shooting star, here in my house after a long, wonderful dinner with my family, who seemed to like her almost as much as I did.
Whatever magic it was that moved me beyond rational thought, I found myself stalking across the room toward her.
“R-Raffa,” she stuttered, stepping back against the partially open door so that it swung shut with a shudder.
Seconds later, I was on her, shoving her into the door with the full press of my body, my hands diving deep into those tousled locks to hold her head back for the kiss I bent to seal over her mouth.
She tasted divine.
Like something holy. Something that could absolve me of my sins and baptize me anew.
I understood suddenly what it must have been like for Dante’s fallen angels to have known heaven and to have been cast from its light forever.
Something like a sob lodged in my throat as I thought about never holding her like this again.
Only the fact that she kissed me back for one euphoric moment allowed me to swallow it down, chased by the heavenly taste of her mouth against mine.
“Raffa, no,” she said against my lips, even though it was her thigh hitched over mine and her fist caught up in the collar of my shirt.
“What do I have to do to earn your forgiveness?” I rasped against her neck as I pressed kisses like question marks into her skin. “Tell me, mia stella cadente, what I must do, and I will do it.”
The fist in my shirt flattened to push me away farther.
Only the heaviness of our breath punctuated the room. I could not take my eyes from her swollen mouth, slick from my kisses, sweet from that single taste of dessert wine.
“Space,” she said finally with a shiver as she pushed me away again. She waited until I reluctantly stepped back before saying, “Give me space, Raffa. Being back in Italy with you . . . it’s enough to make me lose my head, and I’m not willing to be your blind bambolina anymore.”
“You are not blind. You are here in my inner sanctum. In my home, with the people I care for the most, because I count you among them now.”
Do you not see? I wanted to shout. Do you not see how my love for you eclipses all else?
But I could not and would not say it.
She did not want to hear it, for one thing.
And for another, what did I expect? That she would forgive me and love me enough to make a life with me here in Italy as the Proserpina to my Pluto? That she could accept and love the dark in me just as she had been drawn into the light?
Even if she did, could I keep her safe from all the enemies forever at the gate, seeking to take the power and glory of my empire from me and mine?
Could I condemn her to the kind of lifestyle where she could be hurt or killed because of me?
Could I even bear to live with that responsibility and the shame of bringing danger to her door?
It was as hopeless a situation as I had found myself in nearly five years ago, when my father died.
Sometimes in life, you are shown the things you most desire just as a reminder that you do not deserve to have them.
“Space,” Guinevere repeated, canting her chin into the air, the dimple in her left cheek flaring as she pursed her lips. “And time.”
“Bene,” I said, rubbing a hand over my mouth as if I could erase the taste of her enough to willingly leave the room. “I will give you space and time, Guinevere.”
I stepped to the side so she could move deeper into the room and I could turn to leave. The knob was in my hand, my body already in the hall, when I hesitated, peering through the shadows into the golden-lit room.
The words were out of my mouth before I could rein them in with rationality.
“You may need time and space. You did not ask what I need, but I will tell you anyway because hope has been a hand around my throat, strangling me, every day we have been apart. Love is not something that recognizes just the good in someone. It sees the bad and ugly. It acknowledges the dark because it accepts every part of who a person is. I am not all good. I am not even divided wholly in half. But whatever good I am I would give to you. Whatever bad I have I would use to shield you from harm. All I ask for in return is that you love me for who I am. Not Prince Charming, but tuus Rex Infernus.”