Valentina #3
He finally turns to me and lifts me like I weigh nothing.
I gasp softly as his arms tighten around me, my body instinctively leaning into his chest despite everything. Despite the pain. Despite the fear.
He doesn’t look at me.
He carries me out, his steps steady and controlled, but I can feel the tension in him, coiled tight beneath the surface, like he’s one breath away from snapping.
The cool air outside hits my skin as he places me carefully into the car.
Still no eye contact.
I watch him as he pulls back, as he turns away from me like he can’t stand to look.
My face throbs, each heartbeat a reminder of what just happened. The taste of blood still lingers on my tongue.
For a second, I hesitate. My pulse is still racing, my ears still ringing. Then I place my hand in his.
His fingers close around mine, warm and steady.
He holds onto me the entire way home, speeding to get me to Dr. Drew, but he doesn’t say anything to me.
The ride is completely silent, but not the comfortable kind. The kind that presses against your ribs and makes it hard to breathe.
I want to ask about my father. The question burns at the back of my throat.
Where is he? Is he alive? Did you move him?
But I can see he’s trying to hold it together, and my head is fucking throbbing.
* * *
The doctor’s there when we arrive. Salvatore carries me from his car into his bed.
Dr. Drew assesses me and gives me pain meds.
“You hit your head pretty hard, but you’ll be okay. These will help with the headaches, and I’m going to give you some meds now to help you through the night.”
“Thanks, doc,” I smile, starting to take them from him when Salvatore takes them and places them on the nightstand.
When the doctor leaves, he stands, looking out of his bedroom window, angry, afraid, I don’t even know anymore.
“They could have killed you, Valentina.” His voice is low, wrecked. “Why would you do something like that?”
I look away completely because he can’t be serious.
“Why? Because I wanted to rescue my father. I thought,”
“You thought what?” He whips around, and I see fear. “You thought you could rescue your father from who? From these guys? From another family? From me? You walked into a fucking warehouse alone?”
“You wouldn’t tell me anything!” The words rip out of me. “You keep me in a beautiful cage, you touch me like you love me, you look at me like I’m the only thing that matters, and then you won’t tell me if my father is alive or dead!”
“Because I’m trying to protect you!”
“By lying to me?”
“By keeping you out of a war you don’t understand!”
The silence that follows is deafening.
“I may not understand your war or your world, but I understand love.” I turn back to look at him. “You do these things. You hold me like you did, you look at me like that, and you make me feel like you love me, but…”
“I do love you.”
I blink. “No, you don’t.”
“Valentina…”
“How can you love me and plan to kill my father? Do you know how much just the thought of that hurts me? People don’t intentionally hurt the people they love, Salvatore.”
“Don’t you think I know that? I am not going to kill your father.”
“What?”
He exhales through his nose. "I'm not going to kill your father."
“You’re not?”
“No.” He says it quietly. “I declared your father untouchable under my protection.”
The words don’t make sense at first. They bounce off the walls of my chest and I have to let them in slowly, one at a time.
“When? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was going to. The other night, in the garden, but…”
He stops. Looks down. Whatever he was about to say, he swallowed it.
He stands and steps back. “Get some rest. I need to go. Don’t be surprised if I increase your security. After tonight, they’ll retaliate.”
He walks toward the door.
“Salvatore…” I call softly.
He’s already halfway to the door, but he pauses just for a second. Just enough for me to feel it. That invisible thread between us tightening.
There’s so much I should say. So much I want to say.
None of it comes out.
“Thank you,” I whisper instead, my voice fragile in the quiet room. “For saving me… for protecting my father.”
He doesn’t turn around fully, but I see the slight tilt of his head. Feel the weight of his attention like a touch.
“Anything for you, Tesoro.” Then he’s gone.
And I’m left alone with the echo of him.
The medication pulls at me heavily, dragging me under, but even as sleep claims me, it’s him I feel. Him I see.
The way we circle each other is like something inevitable.
The way he looks at me . The way he is every fantasy I ever buried. Every dark, forbidden craving I never thought could exist in flesh and blood.
A man who calls himself a monster… and doesn’t apologize for it.
A man who protects me with the same hands that destroy.
And maybe… that’s the real reason I’ve been so afraid to let myself fall.
Not because of what he is.
But because of what I am when I’m with him.
Because I don’t run from the darkness in him.
I lean into it.
And as sleep finally drags me under, one thought lingers, sharp and inescapable,
If I’m falling for a monster…
what does that make me?