Chapter Forty-Two
Gualtiero
I’m boiling up inside. Sitting here beside Ella, watching her wince every time the car hits a bump, tests my ability to keep my cool.
Her tears have dried, but her face tells the real story.
Red blotches stain her cheeks. Her eyes are swollen, her lashes clumped together. She stares out the window without really seeing anything, breathing carefully, like each breath has to be negotiated.
She’s in pain, and not just physically.
If I asked her, my angel would claim it’s all from the fall.
But I saw her eyes when I reached her on the steps, before her fear fully took hold and the pain stole her focus.
They were already swollen. Already raw.
She was upset before the accident. Something happened inside that cabin with Rhia, and I don’t need Ella to spell it out for me.
She would have told her friend about us, about giving me another chance. And Rhia wouldn’t have approved. The looks she sent my way earlier made that clear.
I don’t look at her friend. If I do, I’ll lose what little control I have left.
Ella wouldn’t be hurt if she hadn’t been pushed to that breaking point.
My jaw tightens as I stare straight ahead, my arm locked around Ella, my hand resting where it belongs, over her stomach.
I should never have left her alone with Rhia.
Did I expect her friend to be supportive of Ella’s choice to come back to me? No. But I didn’t expect her to upset her so much.
Every instinct I have is screaming at me to deal with it, to confront Rhianna Lily Bannaghan.
Ella is mine to protect. And I failed her on the very first day of us being back together.
Sitting here, doing nothing, goes against everything I am. But Ella will want to handle this herself. I know that.
So I resist the urge to act, forcing myself into stillness.
It takes everything I have.
“Ella, darling,” her psychic friend says from the back row. She reaches a hand over the seat and touches Ella’s shoulder.
Ella turns her head toward her.
“Peanut is going to be okay,” Claudette says gently. “Your fall hasn’t harmed her.”
She pauses, then adds, “And before you ask, this is in the eighty percent range.”
I have no idea what the hell that means, but Ella’s shoulders ease. Just a fraction.
A faint smile touches her lips. It’s a balm I didn’t know I needed, easing my worry for the space of a single breath.
“Thank you, Claude,” Ella murmurs.
She glances up at me, then gestures back. “I don’t think you two have been officially introduced. Tiero, this is Claudette.”
“Hello there,” Claudette says, far too cheerful for the situation.
I give her a curt nod. No smile. No small talk. My attention stays where it belongs, on Ella, on the rise and fall of her breath.
“So,” Claudette says lightly, “you are a man of few words.” She tilts her head. “Or no words at all.”
Ella smirks despite herself. Even in pain, she finds room for that expression. And I admit, my lips lift ever so slightly at the corners.
“They do say, silence is golden,” I reply.
Claudette chuckles. “I’ve heard that too. Though I prefer the silver lining of conversation.”
Before I can decide whether to shut that down, Ella speaks again.
“And the other man of few… actually no words, at least for now, is Lex. I know you’ve heard of him.”
I turn my head. Dougal meets my gaze without flinching. No hostility. No warmth. Just assessment.
He’s been silent the entire drive. Watching. Calculating.
He’s already planning how to get them all away from me. I’d stake money on it.
Ella hasn’t spoken to him yet, and Rhia hasn’t had a chance to fill him in. He doesn’t know Ella has chosen to stay.
He will.
Another confrontation is inevitable. But not now.
Ella’s potentially broken arm and the pain she’s under take priority.
But nothing will take her from me.
Not doubt. Not fear. And definitely not well-meaning friends who think they know what’s best for her.
I check my watch. Why is this drive taking so long?
“Almost there,” Santino says from the front, and I swear the man reads my mind.
My thumb moves in slow, deliberate circles over Ella’s abdomen, careful to avoid the sling so as not to aggravate her arm.
The hospital signs appear ahead.
Finally.
I lean down, my mouth close to her ear, keeping my voice low and steady.
“I’ve got you,” I murmur. “Both of you.”
She doesn’t answer.
But she leans into me, just a little more.
And that’s enough to remind me of what I can’t afford to lose.