Chapter Thirty-One
Lucas
She looked too small and fragile in that bed, in that big house that felt more like a tomb than a home.
I had told myself that I would just come to watch her breathe, to make sure she slept.
But then she shattered in my arms, and there was no fucking way I was leaving.
Even though she was drowning in grief, my tainted heart had faltered in my chest when she clung to me, like I was the savior she needed.
I want to be her savior. I want her to need me.
I need her to need me. And I’ll fucking do anything to twist her life so that I’m the only one she’ll turn to.
I’m aware that my thoughts are fucked up, but I can’t help the blackness seeping into my soul and spreading like rot where she is concerned.
Last night, I wanted to burn the grief out of her, with my hands, my mouth, my body.
Make her forget everything but me. I wanted to make it public that she is mine.
But I didn’t, because even if my entire being craves to claim her for everyone to see, I also know how our world works.
My name carries a certain…reputation. If anyone suspected I was in her bed on the first night of mourning, they’ll whisper behind her back, assuming she is another of my meaningless flings.
And I refuse to be the reason she is diminished or pitied.
When I claim her, it will be loudly, proudly and publicly, so there is not a shadow of a doubt that she is the queen meant to walk by my side.
Hence, I just held her in the dark, torn between needing to give her space and the brutal truth that staying away from her is the most excruciating agony I’ve ever known.
Leaving her this morning had felt like ripping my own skin off.
I slipped out before dawn, before the staff woke, before she could open her eyes and see me.
But tonight, I’ll be back, because I can’t stay away, because she is mine, whether the world is aware or not. Soon they’ll know, I tell myself.
By sunrise I am already neck-deep in calls and meetings, and the endless stream of problems that come with running a company and being the second in the famiglia.
However, as busy as the day is, she is never far from my mind.
I should be focused, but I can’t get her out of my head.
That’s why I left men behind to be my eyes and my ears.
They update me throughout the day, every time she has a visitor, every time she steps out to the garden to breathe, every tear she cries, I know.
The day stretches on, interminable and uncompromising, and I go through the motions like an efficient robot, but in my thoughts, I am not really there.
I am still in that bed, breathing her in, holding her…
waiting for the night to fall, counting down the seconds until I can feel her against me again.