79. Rico
Rico
We sat in the closet for hours. No talking. No more crying. Just her curled in my lap and my arms caged around her like I could keep her here just by not letting go.
She didn’t try to fix me. God, that was the worst part—she didn’t try. She just was. And it gutted me more efficiently than anything a cigarette or a blade ever had.
When she finally peeled herself off me, slow and soft, she pressed a kiss to my mouth like a period at the end of a sentence. Final. Clean. Unapologetically certain.
She didn’t say the words, but I heard them anyway.
Pick yourself first.
I wanted to tell her not to bother waiting. That the choosing part was already done. I choose you. Loud and clear, over and over. With fists and blood and pain. With every breath I didn’t deserve.
But I understood what she meant, even if I hated her for being right. Choosing her while I still hated myself would be the equivalent of proposing marriage while actively digging your own grave. A bit of a mood killer.
So she left. And I let her.
Then I did what any man with decades of unresolved trauma and a questionable moral compass would do—I went to therapy.
Yes. Therapy.
I told Dr. Dingleberry—because no way in hell am I calling him by his real name—the whole sordid story.
From the moment the van door slammed shut to the very last bloodstain on the concrete floor.
I unloaded it all like a confession to a priest who charges by the hour and thinks emotional progress is best measured in “assignments.”
“I want to be better,” I told him. “Not just for her. Not just for my family. I want to stop waking up every morning and loathing the air in my lungs. I want to not hate the guy in the mirror.”
He smiled. That knowing, smug little I’m about to assign you journal prompts that’ll make you cry in a Target parking lot smile. I should’ve walked out. But I didn’t. Because apparently, when you hit rock bottom, you collect gravel like its currency.
That was a week ago.
Since then, I’ve texted Allie every morning.
Pointless facts. Personal confessions. Random bullshit I used to scribble on Post-Its, except now it's digital and pathetic.
She texts back. We talk at night on the phone like love sick teens who can't stand to be away from one another.
I purposely stay up just to call and tell her goodnight.
I wait up for her to get home. Her current home, which, by the way, is Kai’s house.
I’m not saying I want to burn it down.
But I’m not not saying it either.
“How the fuck do you know about a custom ring maker?” I deadpan, side-eyeing Marco, who’s currently slouched over the glass counter about as enthusiastic as if we were shopping for lightbulbs.
He doesn’t even bother to look up. “You’re welcome.”
This—this shop—was his idea. Dragged me here like I’m a groom picking out cufflinks, not a man crawling back to the wife he never properly asked to marry him in the first place.
Also, let’s not pretend this is new information. He pulled up the jeweler’s website on my laptop in front of my brothers. The same laptop I used to hide several offshore accounts, and occasionally Google things like “how to stop wanting to burn down your life for fun.”
I knew what he meant. Everyone knew. My original sin, laid bare in 4K.
Allie’s wedding band had come from here.
From me. Custom-designed, rushed, and delivered like a damn pizza.
Only I never told her because that would have required me talking to her, then trying to explain why the fuck I felt the need to get her a custom wedding band, but not bother with the engagement ring.
Marco bought the engagement ring. I didn’t even propose. Just married her because duty and legacy demanded it. Love, apparently, was a footnote I forgot to write.
“Do you want the new ring to match the band you got last time?” the sales associate chirps. Courtney. Young. Cheerful. Unaware she’s playing jeweler to a man who would rather be waterboarded than say I love you out loud. I'm in therapy, but that only cures so much.
She recognized me, of course. Hard to forget the emotionally void gargoyle who bought a wedding band while looking like he was planning his own funeral.
Marco grins. “So you did get it here.”
“Uh huh. Does Allie know?”
“No.”
“She will now.” He pulls out his phone like a tattle-tale in Armani.
I sign the order form, adding an extra twenty grand to expedite it. Because of course I’m rushing. Not because I’m impatient. But because I want my wife home. In my house. In my bed. Wearing my ring. Maybe screaming my name, if I’m lucky.
“She doesn’t need a ring to come home,” Marco mutters.
I shoot him a look. “Are you still in your tantrum era?”
“Are you going to propose or just toss it at her and hope she doesn’t duck?”
“I have a plan.”
“You have a plan?”
“I’m working on it.” I give him a once-over.
His whole storm-cloud vibe is throwing me off.
Normally, Marco looks like he’s two seconds away from breaking into an illegal poker game or strangling someone with a silk tie.
Now? He’s just... tense. Brooding. It’s unsettling.
I almost miss the chaotic bastard version of him.
“Are you going to tell me who’s pissing you off, or should I guess based on your blood pressure?”
“Vi should help,” he mutters. “I’m sure she has a scene or three in one of her smutty epics about grand romantic gestures.”
He’s not wrong. We’ve both read them. But we’re men, which means we’ll both die before admitting it out loud. Death before book club.
“Your ability to dodge the question is pathetic,” I say.
“Says the man buying a second engagement ring for his wife.”
Okay, fair.
“Can I at least get a hint?”
He turns to me slowly. That’s when I get it—the look. The Don look. The one that strips the bullshit from your bones and makes your soul flinch. The one that says, if you press this, I will make you regret it in ways that rhyme with body bag. Pretty sure that look is why he reigns supreme.
“Leave it,” he growls.
Charming.
“Wow,” I deadpan. “Maybe you need a therapist.”
“You’d be the expert. What’s Voldemort think about your proposal plans? Did you get daddy’s blessing?”
He pouts. Actually pouts.
I resist the urge to punch him. That’s growth. My therapist should give me a gold star and a juice box.
My phone pings.
“Seriously?”
Marco shrugs like a smug little gremlin. “You need a distraction or you’ll keep poking the bear. You’re welcome.”
Violet: OMG yay! I can’t wait to help you plan this. When can we meet? Oh hell, this is even better. I’m coming to lunch with you. Can you believe this is the first time I've ever texted you? I didn't even have your number!!! We are going to spend so much time together.
Well. That’s a horror film title waiting to happen.
Marco claps a hand on my shoulder, all gleeful menace. “Have fun.”
“You know payback’s a bitch, right?”
“Nope. That’s karma. And she’s projectile vomiting all over my life right now, so I’m good.”
I sigh, glance down, type.
Rico: As much as it physically pains me to say this—yes. I need your help, Vi.
Violet: I’m just thrilled you pulled your head out of your ass. Also, good news—I already planned the whole proposal.
Rico: For fuck’s sake. Is this in a book?
Violet: I plead the fifth.
Fantastic.
Exactly what I need—my proposal idea written by a woman whose last male lead had a praise kink and a secret yacht.