CHAPTER 32
Roxanne
Ilay facing him, my body still humming from the wreckage he’d left me in.
His chest rose steadily beneath my palms, his warmth wrapping around me as though letting go had never crossed his mind.
I shoved at his chest, my palms pressing against warm, unyielding skin, but he didn’t move.
Didn’t budge an inch. It was like trying to push against a wall—solid, immovable.
“I need to shower,” I said, the words coming out sharper than I intended.
Because I could still feel him. Everywhere. On my skin, lingering like heat that refused to fade. Between my thighs, a dull, aching reminder of just how thoroughly I had unravelled. Inside me—like he’d branded me.
I needed it gone. Or at least pretend it could be.
His arm tightened around my waist instead of letting me go, pulling me back into him as though the distance I was trying to create didn’t exist. Like distance was a lie he refused to believe in.
“Five minutes,” he murmured, his voice low against my temple, steady in a way that made my chest tighten.
“Santino—”
“Five.”
I sighed. Somehow it felt natural. To just lay there, in his arms. How easy it would be to stay right there and forget everything that came after.
I pulled away the moment his grip loosened, not trusting myself to hesitate even a second longer. Creating distance from him—from whatever I was feeling. From the way he looked at me.
Because I knew that look now. Had felt it. Given into it.And I wasn’t sure I could survive it twice in the same night.
“I need to shower,” I repeated, softer this time.
Not waiting for his response as I turned and walked toward the bathroom. Each step felt deliberate, measured. If I slowed down, if I gave myself even a second to think, I knew I’d turn back and curl right back into him.
The door shut behind me with a soft click, but it echoed louder in my head than it should have—a fragile boundary already threatening to break.
I stepped into the shower before the water had a chance to warm, letting the cold hit me full force. It stole the air from my lungs. Sharp. Punishing. I welcomed it.
My hands dragged over my skin—arms, stomach, thighs—scrubbing harder than necessary like friction alone could erase the last hour. Like I could undo the way my body had responded, the way I had let him in without hesitation, without thought.
But it didn’t work. Because no matter how hard I tried—he wasn’t just on my skin anymore. My body still felt too aware, too alive, too… changed.
Then hot water hit my skin, relentless and heavy, as if the sheer heat could burn everything away.
I wrapped my arms around myself, squeezing hard in a desperate bid to hold myself together. Anything to stop the unravelling.Scrubbing.Scrubbing.Until my skin stung, turning an angry shade of red, and it still wasn’t enough. As if I could erase what had happened. Like I could erase me.
A sharp pang hit my chest—so sudden it made my heart squeeze.
What was this feeling? And why was it because of him?
My breath hitched, and I leaned forward, bracing my palms against the cool tile, letting the hot water run over my back.I tried to think, to breathe, to understand why I was this way.
I knew better.
I should’ve known better.
And still, my body had opened for him like it had known him all along. As though it had been waiting and none of this was new. Like I wasn’t betraying anything at all.
My mind fought it, screamed, clawed, trying to force me to be rational. But some part of me had already surrendered.
Pathetic.
My hands stilled for a second before moving again—harder.
This is who you are. Weak. Easy. A woman who spreads her legs the second someone touches her right.
Disgusting.
My throat tightened, breath turning uneven as the words sank in—familiar, cruel, impossible to shut out.
You don’t get to have anything good. Not love. Not loyalty. Not a life like that. You ruin it. You always do.
My thoughts were interrupted as I felt him behind me. The air changed, thickened, pulled tighter around me. My shoulders tensed instinctively, but I didn’t turn. His hand ran down my back to my hips, grip iron, pulling me flush to the heat of him, as he kissed my neck. I didn’t move away.
He picked up the body wash and started scrubbing my shoulders. My body softened into his touch before I could stop it, answering him in ways my mind was still desperately trying to resist.
His hands moved over me, my sides, my breasts, cupping them, brushing over them once before moving lower.
Till his hands found my waist. His touch moved over the same skin I’d nearly scrubbed raw moments ago—gentler than I deserved.
As though he was trying to soothe a sin I had been trying to punish.
And then he turned me slowly, until I was facing him. The water hit my back, sliding down my spine in slow rivulets, but all I could feel was him—close, too aware of every inch of me standing exposed in front of him.
My arms came up instinctively, a weak attempt to shield myself. He caught my wrist before I could, lowering them.
“Don’t,” he said, voice rough, threaded with desire and smug satisfaction. “You don’t get shy now. Not after I just had my hands and mouth all over you.”
Heat rushed up my spine, sharp and immediate, clashing with the warmth of the water.
“That’s not—” I started, but the words fell apart before I could finish them.
Because what exactly was it? What was this? I didn’t have a name for it.
“You think I don’t know what you look like?” His gaze dragged over me, slow, unhurried, like he had all the time in the world. “What you feel like? What you taste like?”
A ragged breath caught in my throat. This was supposed to feel wrong. But instead, the tight knot in my chest just eased, a strange warmth settling over me. And for some reason, my instincts no longer saw him as someone to hide from.
He washed me without urgency, demanding nothing nor proving a point as though this were completely normal. Like we hadn’t just crossed a line that neither of us could come back from.
My shoulders dropped before I could stop them. A small betrayal, one I didn’t have the strength to fight anymore. His hand slid up again, resting at my neck, his fingers settling there, pressing against my pulse.
“You do this thing,” he said. “When you start thinking too much… your breathing changes.”
My chest tightened.
“I’m fine,” I said automatically, even though my voice came out softer than I intended.
“Liar.”
Silence stretched between us, filled only by the sound of water hitting tile and the sound of my pulse hammering against his fingers. He looked at me with quiet certainty in his eyes as if he had already decided I was his. It should’ve terrified me, instead, I couldn’t look away.
He leaned in slowly this time, like he was giving me space to move, to stop him, to say no.
His mouth brushed mine—light, almost hesitant, before deepening the kiss.
Like he was learning me instead of taking me.
And that undid me in ways lust never could.
My lips parted on instinct, and I kissed him back.
He pressed closer, his rigid heat hard against my midsection. My hands found his hair, pulling him closer as I moved against him without thinking, driven by a shameless, needy urge.
I was just a body chasing friction, chasing him. I was nothing but hunger wrapped in skin. Control was gone. Dignity and restraint were meaningless. And in that moment, I hated how easily I gave in.
He pulled back first. Breath uneven. Eyes darker than before—but controlled.
“I’ll heat the soup,” he said, pretending as though we hadn’t just been standing there, suspended in an unnamed tension.
It was a blatant denial of how everything had just shifted between us again.
The door slid open. And then he was gone. The water kept running. But the space felt colder without him in it. I stayed a moment longer, delaying the inevitable. Because the moment I would step out, everything would come rushing back. Everything would become too real.
I found him in the kitchen. He’d laid out two bowls and was cutting some bread. A few hours ago, he’d had me falling apart on that same counter. Like I was his last meal.
I’d been consumed so thoroughly the memory alone made my body react—nipples tightening under the fabric.
“Can we… sit on the couch?”
He nodded understandingly. As I reached for the bowl, my breath caught.
My heart skipped a beat as I saw my hand, the ring was missing.
I checked both my hands, as though the ring would magically appear where it should have been.
I turned to rush back into the room when I saw it in his hand as he leaned against the counter. The ring glinted between his fingers.
“Did you… take it off?”
He crossed the distance between us slowly, like he wasn’t in any rush. And before I could react—before I could decide if I wanted to stop him, he took my hand. His thumb brushed once over my knuckles before sliding the ring back onto my finger. The metal felt colder than I remembered.
He kept looking at the ring.
“In that moment…” he said, voice lower now. “I didn’t want anything between us.”
His gaze met mine. “Not even him.”
The words didn’t feel like a confession. They felt like a warning, settling somewhere deep, somewhere dangerous. I swallowed, my pulse picking up beneath my skin.
“Is that why you didn’t use protection?”
It came out before I could stop it. For a fraction of a second—just a fraction—uncertainty flickered in his eyes. Then his shoulder lifted in a half-shrug.
No apology. No explanation. Nothing. The asshole just shrugged. He let go of my hand.
“Come eat.”
Just a blunt command to end the conversation, completely ignoring the fact that we’d crossed a line neither of us could uncross. And yet, my body still listened when he spoke with that authority.
I could feel the silence building between us, weighted with everything we weren’t saying. Everything we couldn’t. Pressing with guilt, desire, and the kind of truth that ruins lives.
“I—”
“Don’t.”
My head snapped up to find his eyes already on me, sharp and completely unyielding.
“Don’t do that thing where you pretend it didn’t happen.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were.”
He leaned forward slightly, elbows on his knees, his gaze never leaving mine.
“You’re already trying to bury it.”
I swallowed the acrid lump lodged in my throat.
“I have a life,” I whispered. “Marcello… my children… that means something.”
My voice cracked. “I can’t be this reckless woman sleeping around because my body reacts—”
“Your body doesn’t react like this to just anyone.”
The absolute certainty in his voice felt like a heavy weight settling deep in my chest.
“And stop degrading yourself,” he snapped.
“I’m not—”
“You are.”
His voice softened, but it didn’t lose its edge.
“You think I didn’t try to stay away? I walked away for the same reason you’re trying to now.”
My chest went tight.
“I didn’t want to be the one who ruined your life. But the universe…” he exhaled sharply, almost a laugh, “has a fucked-up way of pulling you back into my orbit.”
He took my hand and pulled me into his lap, my legs falling to either side of him without thought.
“And now…” His thumb dragged across my lower lip. “After I’ve had you… felt you… held you when you were breaking…”
His jaw tightened. “I can’t let go.”
I didn’t know what to say. Suddenly my gaze caught on the dark cursive inked along his ribs.
‘Senza di lei.’
My brows pinched faintly.
‘Without her.’
The translation brushed the edge of my mind quiet enough to make my heart skip a beat. My fingers lifted before I could stop them, tracing lightly over the script. Santino went still, and then a subtle shudder rippled across his chest beneath my fingertips before his eyes locked onto mine.
A flash of vulnerability crossed his face so quickly I almost missed it, and suddenly the air between us felt dense with an intimacy that was far too real. Neither of us spoke. We just stared at each other, breathing the same air with certainty that the damage had already been done.
Before I could ask—his hand slid into my hair, and his mouth crashed into mine—ferocious and entirely desperate. He held me tighter after that, as though showing me that crack had cost him more than he wanted me to know.
Everything blurred. For a moment, it was just him. His voice. His hands. His presence.
The world receded.
Marcello. Responsibility. Right and wrong.
For one reckless moment, none of it existed.
It was only us, trapped in this impossible world of push and pull and choices that should’ve mattered more. And for one terrible, beautiful moment—he was all I could see.