Chapter 36
Romeo
Lucia is asleep, tangled in the sheets, her breathing soft and even. She looks peaceful, like nothing in this world could ever touch her.
I’m sitting on the edge of the bed with my elbows on my knees, staring down at the blood on the towel in my hand.
The same towel I used to clean her up after I blew my load inside her, and never once considered the fact that I wasn’t wearing a rubber.
It’s not much blood, just a smear, but it feels heavier than any body I’ve ever buried. I finally crossed the line I swore I never would, and now I’m feeling conflicted. I took something from her that she can never get back. I changed her life tonight.
There’s no denying that I wanted it. She pulled me in like I was the only thing she ever needed. And God help me, I craved her just as badly, but seeing proof of what I’ve done twists something in my gut.
I’m not used to feeling guilty. You don’t get to be where I am by second-guessing your actions. You pull the trigger, you clean up the mess, and you move on.
But this isn’t business.
This is my life.
This is her life.
I swipe the towel over my dick once more, slower this time, before I drop it to the floor by my feet and run a hand down my face, trying to shake the weight sitting on my chest.
She stirs behind me, making a soft sound. When I feel her hand brush along the base of my spine, I glance at her over my shoulder.
“Come back to bed,” she murmurs in that sleepy voice I’ve come to love.
I expel all the air from my lungs as I use the bedside table to help me stand, before pulling back the covers and climbing in beside her.
“Are you okay?” she asks, snuggling into my side when I reach out and pull her closer. “Are you in pain? Do you want me to get your medication?”
I lift my head off the pillow and place my lips on the top of her head. “I’m good, babe,” I say, because I don’t want her to know I’m having regrets about what we just did.
A smile curves her lips as she places a soft kiss on my chest, right over my heart, like she’s done every night since we wed. “Goodnight, Mr De Luca,” she murmurs against my skin.
“Goodnight, Mrs De Luca.”
“Ti amo (I love you).”
I open my mouth to say it back, then close it again, still too chicken shit to say those three fucking words.
“Do you have any regrets about what we just did?” I find myself asking her instead.
She shifts slightly, leaving her head resting on my chest, and I feel the hesitation in her breath before she answers.
“No. Not even a little.”
I stare up at the ceiling. “Even though it hurt?”
She lifts her head just enough to look at me. “It hurt for a second,” she says, brushing her fingers gently along my ribs. “But I wanted it to be you. I chose you. That makes it worth it.”
Her words land heavy, like a blessing I’m not sure I deserve.
“I just …” I trail off with a tight jaw. “I didn’t think it would feel like this after.”
“Like what?”
“Like I broke something I can’t fix.”
She leans in and kisses my jaw, slow and deliberate. “You didn’t break anything,” she whispers. “You made us real.”
I close my eyes.
She believes that. She really does. And that terrifies me more than anything else, because I know what kind of man I am. I’m not sure there’s a version of this story where I’ll ever be good enough for this woman.
“Can we do it again in the morning?” she asks out of nowhere.
A smile curves at my lips because that fucking mouth of hers is going to get her into trouble one day.
“Let’s wait and see how you’re feeling first. You might still be sore.”
“I won’t be.”
“How can you know that?”
She lifts one shoulder in a lazy shrug, her fingers tracing small circles on my stomach like she owns me, and maybe she does.
“I just know,” she says, her voice soft but certain.
The room falls silent, and I will my mind to stop overthinking … to stop overanalysing everything when it comes to this woman.
“Remember when I told you on the other side of fear, you’d find happiness?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s true, you just need to accept it, let the negative go and watch the magic that is us unfold.”
I chuckle. “The magic?”
She lifts her head off my chest. “You can’t deny that what we just did was magic. Imagine how good it’s going to be once you’re fully recovered.”
“I wish I shared your optimism.”
“You will in time, you just need to chill out and accept this is your life now. Relax and enjoy the ride.”
“I enjoyed your ride,” I admit as my hand moves down to palm her luscious arse.
“Mmm, same. Who needs book boyfriends when I have the real deal?”
“I still hate all of those fictional fuckers.”
A soft laugh falls from her lips. “None of them compare to you.” She shifts slightly before adding, “You deserve good things, Romeo. I hope you know that.”
My throat tightens, but I don’t say anything.
“You keep waiting for someone to take it all away from you, don’t you? Me, this, whatever peace you manage to grab, but not everything has to come with a price.”
I glance away and swallow thickly because she always sees straight through my facade.
She presses a kiss just beneath my collarbone and continues.
“You didn’t get love the way you should’ve growing up, so this is foreign to you.
I see it in the way you flinch sometimes when I’m kind to you.
Like you don’t trust it.” Her voice breaks a little as she speaks her truth …
my truth. “Please believe me when I say I love you. And not because you earned it, or fought for it, or even bled for it. I love you just because you’re you.
That’s enough. You are and always will be enough for me, Romeo. ”
I feel her hand smooth over my heart, steady and warm, and for the first time in a very long time, I start to believe maybe she’s right. Maybe I am worth loving.
“Lucia,” I whisper into the darkness, needing to give her something in return for all she’s given me.
“Yeah?”
“I love you too, baby.”
I’m standing at the basin in the bathroom, shaving, when Lucia comes up behind me, snakes her arms around my waist, and places a soft kiss on my bare back.
Even when we lived in the safe house, I had some privacy. I’ve done things solo for so long; this new part of my life is going to take some getting used to.
“I’m going to head out for a bit,” she says, poking her head out from behind me and shamelessly running her eyes over my torso in the reflection. “Our borrowed driver is on his way here now.”
I pause the razor midair and meet her eyes in the mirror. She’s already dressed for the day, her hair is pulled back, and those plump fucking lips of hers are glossed. She looks like a goddamn angel wrapped in sunlight. And she’s leaving, and for some reason I’m not happy about that.
“For what?” I ask, trying to keep my voice neutral.
“To run some errands. I shouldn’t be gone long.”
“You don’t want me to come?”
“And do what? Push the shopping cart around the grocery store, while I have to fight off all the desperate housewives fawning all over you?”
I smirk at her reflection in the mirror. “Could be fun. It will give you a chance to show off your new husband.”
She raises an eyebrow. “I don’t trust those women not to slip their numbers into your pocket when I’m not looking.”
I set the razor down and turn to face her. Her arms are still anchored around my waist.
“I wouldn’t even look at anyone else. Not when I’ve got the prettiest wife in the entire world.”
She raises a perfectly sculptured eyebrow. “The entire world? I doubt I’m even the prettiest woman in town.”
“You are,” I say, reaching up to bop her cute little nose with the tip of my finger. “You are more than I deserve, Mrs De Luca, and I’ll never take that or you for granted.”
She’s all the family I have now, outside the Famiglia, that is.
My parents are gone. My uncle too. I’ve only seen my maternal grandparents once in my entire life, and that was at my uncle’s funeral. I stood just behind my mother as she tried to approach them after the service, her shoulders drawn tight, as if she were bracing for impact.
She didn’t even get two steps in before my grandmother looked her dead in the eye and turned her back.
As for my father’s side? They may as well be ghosts. I don’t know a single name or face. I’ve been on this earth for almost thirty-three years, and never got a call, a letter … nothing. I figure if they gave a shit, they’d have shown it by now.
“I thought you might appreciate some time on your own.”
I tilt my head. “Why?”
She hesitates, then shrugs. “You’re not used to this, so I want you to have space to breathe without me clinging to you every second. I’m a lot, I get that.”
I brush the tips of my fingers along her jaw. “You’re not clinging. You’re grounding me. And I’ll admit you’re a little full-on at times, but that’s just one of the many things I adore about you.”
I woke up this morning to my dick down my wife’s throat; it was a surprising yet pleasant way to start the day.
I’ve always had a healthy appetite when it comes to sex, but I think I’ve met my match with this one.
The blowjob somehow morphed into a sixty-niner, and ended with her on all fours while I took her from behind. That was her suggestion, not mine.
When we finally dragged ourselves out of bed to have breakfast, she casually said, “What are your thoughts on bondage and gagging, because I’m so down for that if you’re keen?”
I’d just taken a mouthful of coffee when those words came out of her unfiltered mouth, and I ended up spending the next few minutes coughing up a lung.
I’m pretty sure there’s a long list of sexual positions she wants to try, buried somewhere in that pretty little head of hers, and she’s mentally checking them off one by one.
When I’m fully healed, I’ll gladly give her all she wants and more. I’ll be more than happy to show her just how lacklustre those pretty boys in her books really are.
“I’ve made you a sandwich. I covered it and put it in the fridge just in case you get hungry while I’m gone.”