Chapter Thirteen #3
I turned and walked away, storming through the house.
I got dressed, threw a few things into a bag, then headed down the stairs into the courtyard where my men were waiting.
But as I climbed into the car which would take me to the airport, the storm of emotions she had caused still raged inside me—not just fear and fury and panic now, but by far the most terrifying emotion of all… hope.
Mia
I was still shaking, still struggling to control my tears when Lorenzo arrived at the Milan house a few hours later, sent to escort me back to Isla Donna.
I kept my spine ramrod straight, feeling sick to my stomach when the bags and boxes of our shopping spree the day before were loaded into the car which had arrived to take me to the airport.
Had it really only been yesterday that everything had seemed so possible, so light between Vito and me?
His lavish generosity during the day-long shopping spree, his smiles every time I tried to save him money—which only seemed to make him insist on spending even more—his enthusiasm as he showed me the city, his attention to my needs and the fact he’d upheld his part of our bargain to let me off the island even though I knew he was still concerned about my safety, had made me feel cherished and precious to him and seen…
When he’d woken me just before dawn, his callused hands stroking my stomach, I’d turned over, eager to make love to him again, to confirm what I already knew.
I’d seen so much of who Vito was since he’d brought me to Isla Donna.
Not just the darkness inside him, but also the light which I was pretty sure he had never intended for me to see, but which he also hadn’t been able to hide.
And it had given me hope for so much more, not just yesterday, but even before that.
He was ruthless, and I knew he wouldn’t hesitate to kill when he considered it necessary…and I’d had to accept that about him.
But each time he touched me with such tenderness, each time he held me securely, each time I saw his eyes glaze with awe when he caressed my bump or heat with approval when I challenged him or burn with passion when he thrust heavily inside me, I saw that other man.
The man he was to me. So protective, so possessive, but also vulnerable in ways I suspected he hadn’t been since he was a little boy, beaten by the man I now knew he had eventually killed.
And over the past weeks, I’d fallen hopelessly in love with both those men.
But when the helicopter finally arrived back at the villa on Isla Donna, I had been told Vito was locked in his study and had no wish to see me until later tonight.
Dismissed, I rushed to the bedroom, locked the bathroom door and let the tears come, unable to hold back the well of fear any longer, the tearing pain caused by our argument… I stuffed a fist into my mouth because I didn’t want anyone to hear the wracking sobs.
Until this morning, I’d convinced myself he had struggled not because he couldn’t love me, but because he was terrified to be that vulnerable. I knew he saw love as a weakness, and it would be a major battle to prove to him it could also be a strength.
But as I’d sat alone in the Milan house and on the journey back to Isla Donna, I’d had far too much time to examine and dissect every part of our argument, and the way he’d treated me, and all the awful things he’d said to me in that scathing tone…
And it had made me wonder if I’d been a naive fool to ever hope for more from him.
What if this was a struggle neither of us could win?
What if he could never allow himself to love me too?
I’d accepted that it would take time to break down all the barriers he’d had to erect since his childhood to keep himself and the people who relied on him safe.
But what if I’d sold my soul to the devil, and he really didn’t want more from me than someone to warm his bed and give birth to his son?
I’d seen the fury in Vito’s eyes when I’d mentioned Dante’s name, seen the anxiety and the conflicting emotions battering him when I’d woken up and watched him speaking to Lorenzo that morning.
I knew from the older women I’d befriended on the island that Vito and Dante had been close as children for a year before his father had kicked the boy and his mother out of the compound. But I hadn’t known they were also brothers.
Ultimately, though, this wasn’t about Dante. I didn’t know the guy. And I would happily shoot him myself if he ever threatened me or Vito or our child again the way he had in Naples. Because I was much tougher and more resilient than I had been then.
All I’d wanted Vito to know was that there was a way out—if he wanted to take it. That killing Dante didn’t have to be inevitable, if it meant destroying a part of his own soul. But his furious reaction to my suggestion had told me exactly how hard it was going to be for him to ever let me in.
When the gulping sobs finally passed, I pushed myself off the floor and took a shower.
I felt weak and groggy and still scared.
Because I knew, whatever he did about Dante tonight, I’d revealed my feelings.
If he talked to me again or made love to me the way he had this morning, with that furious look in his eyes, it would make me doubt myself even more.
And every time he pushed me away, every time he used sex to control his feelings, to control me, it would chip away another little piece of my heart and my self-respect and my hope.
And if he killed Dante just to protect himself from feeling anything at all…if he treated me again with the contempt he had this morning, how did either of us come back from that?
I’d wanted to prove to him I was strong, that I wasn’t afraid of loving him, that the passion we shared, the desire to protect each other, went both ways.
But what if I wasn’t tough enough to ever punch through the walls he’d built around his heart?
What if hope wasn’t enough to weather the pain he could cause me while I waited for him to let me in?
And how would I ever survive being a mafia don’s woman, changing my own life so fundamentally to love him, if he could never ever offer me the same love in return?