Chapter 20 #2
“Then I met you. You were angry. You were brave. You insulted me with complete confidence. You looked at every kindness like it might have a knife hidden behind it.”
A wet laugh escaped her.
“I wanted to protect you. At first, I told myself it was strategy. Then I wanted to protect your employees. Your brother. Your impossible little bird drawings. I wanted to hear you argue with Tonio about kitchens. I wanted to watch you color beside me while you pretended you were not resting.”
Her tears fell silently.
“I do not want your gratitude because I helped bring you home. I do not want obedience because you call me Daddy. I do not want dependence because I make you feel safe.”
I opened the box.
The sapphire caught the terrace light. Pale blue. Quiet. Old. The color of her eyes when she was not trying to hide what she felt.
“I want the woman who challenges me. The woman who protects people no one else sees. The woman who loves her brother so fiercely she would burn the world for him. The woman who colors firebirds. The woman who sometimes needs to be held.”
I looked directly at her.
“And I want the woman who could leave if she stopped being happy. Because every version of you is free. Every version gets to choose.”
“Yeah,” Yelena whispered, crying now. “Yes.”
My chest broke open.
“Lena, I have not—”
“Yes.”
“I need to ask—”
“You are asking.”
“No.” I shook my head, and something close to laughter moved through my fear. “Little one. Please. Let me finish.”
She pressed her lips together. Nodded.
I drew in a breath.
“Yelena Lvovna Sokolova, will you marry me?”
“Yes, Salvatore Scordato.” Her voice shook. “I will marry you.”
For a moment, neither of us moved. Then I stood.
She threw herself into my arms before I could put the ring on her hand. I caught her. Held her. Buried my face in her hair while she cried against my neck.
“I love you,” I said.
“I love you too.”
The words were not small.
They were everything.
I took her left hand carefully.
The ring was old. Platinum, softly worn at the edges. The sapphire sat low in its setting, pale blue beneath a halo of tiny diamonds that did not compete with it.
Donatella had found it.
“It looks like her,” she had said, standing in a private jeweler’s office with the expression of someone being held hostage by sentiment. “Not like your fucking bank account.”
I had bought it before she could insult me further.
Now I slid it onto Yelena’s finger.
It fit.
Of course it fit. I had known her size from one of the rings she wore on her other hand. Still, when the metal settled against her skin, I had to swallow hard.
Yelena lifted her hand toward the terrace light.
The sapphire caught the glow.
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“It is not too much?”
She looked at me.
“No. It’s not a claim. It’s not a trophy.” Her thumb passed over the stone. “It looks like me.”
Yelena laughed, then leaned her forehead against mine.
“I know where I want the wedding.”
“You do?”
“The courtyard.”
I did not need her to explain. I knew.
“The space between Filoxenia and Mezza Notte,” she said. “Not a cathedral. Not a ballroom. Not one of my father’s properties. Not some place where everyone has to whisper and pretend nobody ever got blood on their shoes.”
“The courtyard,” I said.
“It burned. Both businesses did, in different ways. Then everyone rebuilt it. We’re all at their heart.”
“The courtyard.”
She smiled through fresh tears.
“You are agreeing before I have finished.”
“I agreed when you said Filoxenia.”
“I want flowers. But not too formal. And food. Too much food. Tonio should cook something, but only if Katerina supervises or we will all die of olive oil poisoning.”
“Done.”
“And Kiryl should have a role. Something that doesn’t make him feel like a child.”
“Done.”
Her hand pressed over my chest. The ring touched my shirt.
“Done?” she asked.
“Anything you want.”
Her expression sharpened with that familiar distrust.
I corrected myself.
“Anything we agree on. Together.”
That made her smile again.
I kissed her forehead. Then I stepped back enough to give her room.
“We can go back to Nero,” I said. “We can drink champagne until Donatella becomes sentimental and denies it. We can call everyone. Or we can go upstairs and sleep.”
The choice sat between us.
I had planned the proposal. I had planned the ring. I had planned the lights.
I had not planned what came after.
Yelena looked at the notebook. Then she closed it.
She climbed into my lap where I sat on the terrace chair. Her knees bracketed my hips. Her hands came up to frame my face.
“I want you,” she said.
Every muscle in my body locked.
“How?” I asked.
Her mouth curved.
She took my hand and placed it over the sapphire.
“Everything,” she said softly. “Slowly.”
My thumb brushed the ring.
“Do you want Daddy tonight?”
She kissed me once. Deeply. Deliberately.
“I want Sal,” she whispered against my mouth. “I want Daddy. They are the same man.”
I held her face in both hands.
“I can give you that,” I said.
Then I carried her upstairs.
In the bedroom, Yelena set me down at the edge of the bed, then she put one hand flat against my chest.
“Stay.”
The command was quiet. It went through me harder than any order I had ever given.
“Yes, little one.”
Her eyes flashed. “No. Not little one yet.”
I nodded.
“Yes, Lena.”
She took off my jacket first.
Her hands moved over my shoulders, slow enough that I felt each button release beneath her fingers. She pushed the jacket down my arms and let it fall to the floor. Then my tie. Then my shirt.
I had undressed her before. I knew the shape of wanting her.
I had never understood how vulnerable it could feel to sit still while she looked at me like I was something precious.
Her fingertips traced the scar on my forearm.
“You got this for Tonio,” she said.
“Yes.”
“You were sixteen.”
“Yes.”
Her mouth touched the scar.
Not a kiss meant to make me hard. Not at first. A kiss meant to honor the boy who had bled and lived and decided he would carry everyone if that was what love required.
My breath broke.
Yelena looked up.
“You all right?”
“No,” I said honestly. “Not at all. I barely feel as though I’m real.”
That made her smile.
“Good.”
She kissed my throat. My jaw. The hollow beneath my ear. Her mouth moved down my chest while her fingers worked at my belt.
I wanted to take over. It lived in my bones, that instinct. To guide. To ask. To make sure she was comfortable, protected, cared for.
But she had told me to stay. So I stayed.
Her palm slid over me through my trousers. I shut my eyes.
“Sal.”
I opened them.
“Look at me.”
I did.
Her expression had gone soft. Not teasing now. Not exactly.
“I want you to trust me too,” she said.
The words landed in the deepest place.
I had trusted men with weapons. I had trusted cousins with my life. I had trusted my own judgment through violence and betrayal.
Trusting someone with pleasure was different.
It required surrender.
“Yes,” I said.
She opened my belt. My trousers. Her hand slid inside, warm and sure.
My head dropped back.
“Beautiful,” she murmured.
“Lena.”
She kissed the corner of my mouth. Then she moved lower.
I could not think after that.
Her mouth wrapped around me with a slow, deliberate patience that made my hands grip the mattress hard enough to hurt. Her tongue moved over me. Her hand kept time beneath her mouth. Every breath she took touched me.
I watched her until I could not.
Then I watched her anyway.
My control began to fracture. I felt it in my hips, in the rough sound caught behind my teeth, in the way my name became a prayer in her mouth.
“Wait,” I managed.
Yelena looked up.
Her mouth was swollen. Her eyes bright.
“Do you want me to stop?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I am close.”
Her smile became wicked.
“I know.”
She stroked me once more. Twice.
Then she took her hand away.
I stared at her.
Yelena sat back on her heels, looking unbearably pleased with herself.
“You stopped.”
“I did.”
She laughed, climbed into my lap, and kissed me before I could make a proper objection.
“You make me wait sometimes,” she whispered.
“That is not—”
“I know. This is not discipline.” Her nose brushed mine. “I just wanted to know you could give me this too.”
I touched her cheek.
“You have it.”
Her expression changed. The play remained, but tenderness moved beneath it.
I turned us gently, laying her back against the sheets.
“May I?”
“Yes.”
I undressed her slowly.
Her dress came first. Then the delicate things beneath it. I kissed every stretch of skin I uncovered. Her shoulders. Her ribs. The soft curve of her stomach. The small tattoo hidden where her dresses always covered it.
Nothing about the ring made her mine.
Nothing about loving her gave me permission to stop asking.
“You’re so beautiful,” I said.
“Do not get sentimental now.”
“Too late.”