Chapter 35 Raffael
Proposing to her hadn’t been part of the plan. Not really. But maybe it had been buried there all along, some subconscious itch I couldn’t ignore. Because I had the perfect plan mapped out, didn’t I? Divorce papers. Alibis. Nevada. Marriage.
It slipped out of me too easily for it not to have been festering somewhere inside.
The truth is, I don’t know which way she’ll go.
If she’ll accept what I’ve offered—accept me—or if she’ll vanish into some new life, under another name, faceless and untouchable.
I tell myself I’ll give her the choice, that I’m not Roberto, that I won’t take her freedom from her. But deep down, I know that’s a lie.
I can’t let her walk away from me.
I’m not that type of man. I’m not noble. I’m not a hero. I’m not pure or self-sacrificing, all the things she deserves. What I am is a scarred monster. A killer who has blood ground so deep into his hands it will never wash out.
And yet… she is the only thing in this world that makes me wish I could be more.
But even if I can’t be, I can give her what no other man can.
Security.
The kind that doesn’t come from locked doors or guards outside.
The kind that comes from knowing the devil himself will tear the world apart before letting another hand touch her.
She may not believe it yet. She may not even believe in me.
But I’ll make damn sure she knows one thing: Nobody will ever hurt her again. Not while I still breathe.
We move to the couch, the plates forgotten in the kitchen, the world outside fading into nothing. She lets me guide her down beside me, and then—God help me—she leans into me. Just a little. Just enough that her arm brushes mine, her leg tucks close to mine, her warmth seeps through my shirt.
It shouldn’t undo me like this. But it does.
Her head rests lightly against my shoulder, like maybe she belongs there, and my chest feels like it might split open.
I sit perfectly still, fighting the instinct to crush her closer, to bury my face in her hair and breathe her in until she’s all that exists.
Instead, I let her decide the distance, let her settle.
And when her skin brushes mine—barely, accidentally, devastatingly—it drives me half mad.
I’ve killed for less temptation than this.
But what she doesn’t know, what no one knows, is burning its way up through me, demanding to be said. I’ve carried secrets like chains for years, and I’ve never cared—never trusted anyone enough to set them down. But now…
With her, I want a clean slate.
I want her to know me. Really know me. Not just the scars on my skin or the blood on my hands, but the truth of who I am beneath all of it. The truths that I’ve never spoken out loud because they could be used against me.
I turn my head slightly, just enough to see the soft curve of her cheek, the lashes resting against her skin. She looks so fragile like this, yet her weight against me feels stronger than anything I’ve ever known.
I want to tell her everything.
The secrets only whispered to the dead. The nightmares I’ve woken to with my knife in my hand. The bloodlines and betrayals. What Carlos did. What I became. Who I am. Whose blood runs through my veins.
She deserves that truth. Deserves me stripped bare, no lies, no shadows.
Because if I’m asking her to take this risk with me—to stay, to choose me over escape—then she should know exactly what kind of monster she’s tethering herself to.
I tighten my arm around her just slightly, careful not to break the spell, and breathe her in. Vanilla. Warmth. And the faintest trace of Gardenia. For the first time in my life, the weight of my secrets feels heavier to keep than to give.
"I have a confession to make." I have to clear my throat; it's too rough.
Sophia stirs against me and lifts her head from my shoulder so her eyes can search mine, quiet but expectant, like she already senses something heavy is coming.
"That day," I begin slowly, "in the garden. When you came to me."
Recognition flickers across her face, and I know she remembers.
"I was terrified," I admit. "Because you were too young. Too untouchable. A mafia princess. And me? I was nothing but a soldier—disposable, replaceable. I had no right to even look at you the way I did."
Her lips part, but she doesn’t speak.
"I swore to myself, right then, that one day I’d make myself worthy of you," I continue, the words tearing out of me like they’ve been waiting years.
"So I built a kingdom in the shadows, stone by bloody stone.
Every move, every risk, every scar—I took them all with you in mind.
So that one day I could sit here and say this to you without shame. "
Her eyes widen in disbelief, and something softer shines in them.
"I loved you even then," I tell her. "Even when I wasn’t allowed to. Even when it was the vilest thing I could have done. That one stolen kiss was all I could think about for years. I wanted you. Enough to shape my whole damn life around a plan of how I could one day have you."
"You fooled me," she whispers in a trembling voice. "I thought you hated me."
I lift my hand, brushing the backs of my fingers over her cheek. The softness there almost undoes me.
"I tried," I murmur. "God, I tried. But nobody can hate you, bella mia. It isn’t possible. You’re too beautiful. Too graceful. Too full of light, even when you don’t know it. You walk into a room, and everything stops. I stopped. And I hated myself for it, not you."
Her breath catches, and I let my thumb trace the curve of her jaw.
"I was nothing, Soph—just muscle with a gun. I’d barely finished high school. I was all wrong for you in every way that mattered. And still, I wanted you more than I wanted air."
Her hand is warm against my cheek, small and fierce.
She leans in, and the words tumble out: confession, apology, love tangled with doubt.
“I had such a crush on you…” she tells me.
“Ever since you became my bodyguard… I thought I loved you when you saved me the first time. I’ve loved you through all those years with Roberto…
But some days, I hated you too, Raffael. ”
It lands like a punch. I deserved every ounce of that hate. I hated myself too, for not being there, for being a shadow when she needed light. The room narrows to the steady press of her palm and the tremor in her breath.
“And now?” I ask because I need the shape of it. I need the truth, even if it’s messy.
“I don’t know,” she says, utterly honest and terrifying. “I don’t hate you anymore. But I don’t know if I even know what love is. All I know is I’ve been longing for you for years. That I feel safe with you.”
Her eyes are wet and open and full of a kind of frightened hope. It should break me; instead, it awakens something in me—something patient and feral. The corner of my mouth lifts without permission.
“You feel safe with me,” I repeat, tasting the words like they’re illegal and holy both. “That’s more than most men ever get.” My voice is rough. I reach up, fingers sliding over the curve of her wrist, stalling because the urge to close the distance is an animal inside me.
The thing I’ve buried for years—dangerous, useless, beautiful—answers. “I loved you, too,” I say, not hiding it now. “I still do. I have for a long time.”
Her breath catches like wind through paper. She shifts, searching my face, as if she needs proof I’m not a mirage.
“I don’t know how to be gentle with you yet,” I say, and the confession is a different kind, honest in its own way. “I’m built for other things. But I can learn. I will learn.”
She lets out a shaky sound that might be a laugh or a sob. “Will you promise me one thing?” she asks.
“Name it.”
“Don’t make me choose you because I owe you. Don’t make me choose you because I’m scared. Don’t make me choose you because there’s nowhere else. Make me want you. Don’t let me feel like the only thing standing between you and revenge or power.”
I study her—her freckled temple, the way her lower lip trembles—and my chest does the dumb thing it does when I want to protect something sacred.
“I swear,” I say, and I mean it with every splintered, stubborn piece of me.
“I’ll only ask for what you can give. I’ll be slow.
I’ll be steady. I’ll show up. If you ever tell me to leave, I leave.
But if you let me stay, I will spend the rest of my life making sure you have options, not obligations. ”
She closes her eyes at that, relief and terror braided together. Her fingers tighten once against my skin and then soften. I lean in because everything in me wants the electricity of her mouth on mine, but I don’t hunt for it. I let her set the pace.
When our lips meet, it’s careful, an exploration, not a conquest. No shouting.
No fever. Just two people mapping fault lines and finding something that won’t crumble when pressed gently.
Her hands find the back of my neck; mine settle on her waist like an oath.
The kiss deepens with consent and slowness, and when we break apart, she’s breathing through her mouth, eyes glossy but steadier.
“You’re not alone,” I tell her softly, forehead resting against hers. “We’ll find out what love means together. One small, honest thing at a time.”
She laughs, a small, broken sound that turns into something like a promise. “One small thing at a time,” she repeats.
I tuck that vow under my ribs beside the queen on my skin and the ledger in my head. I don’t know how to give her back the years she lost, but I know how to spend the rest of my life proving I'm different from the men who took them. Starting tonight.
We sit frozen, staring at each other, caught in the weight of years neither of us can undo. My heart hammers. Her eyes glisten, but she doesn’t look away.
And in that suspended silence, it feels like the whole world narrows down to just this: her hand on my face, my heart in her eyes, and the truth we can’t hide from anymore.