Page 43 of Isle of Seduction
We stay silent, exchanging a look that I’m not sure how to interpret, and I decide to change tactics and go to her bathroom to draw her a bath. It’s time I properly seduce my wife.
EIGHTEEN
YELLOW ROSES HAVE NEVER LOOKED SO GOOD
“Go get a bath, guerrieritta, food will be ready in half an hour. And don’t argue for the sake of arguing.”
My stomach decides to growl with hunger right when Andrea offers.
He steps back and walks to the open kitchen, grabbing the leather apron hanging from a nail on the wall and ties it around his waist. The action should look ridiculous, but it’s anything but. Andrea Capaldi, in his white kitchen with moulded ceiling, cooking on marble with a leather apron around his waist is my own version of what porn should look like. I drop my gaze to his body, admiring the way his forearms bunch and how the tattoos glisten in the low light of the space.
Andrea’s allergic to overhead lights and the house is always illuminated by side lamps that give him a warm atmosphere to the space.
“Please, sweetheart.”
I’m left speechless. It’s so rare that Andrea asks for anything so gently. I can’t help but frown at him, ready to uncover whatever new hell he’s about to make me walk through. But I listen.
When I get to my room, the bath is already drawn. Petals of yellow roses float in the bathwater that smells of vanilla and a mix of spice I don’t recognise but that brings the image of a naked Andrea jerking off on top of me. I groan at the visual.
I step into the warm water and moan as heat dissolves the tension in my muscles. In the silence of the bathroom, I close my eyes and let myself feel safe. I know Andrea might come in to give me wine or whatever else but somehow, it feels even safer knowing he’s close by. I almost hope he’d come in and wash my hair. A scalp massage would be divine right now. He’d have vigorous hands and clear away the fog at the back of my eyelids.
Thirty minutes later, my skin is pruning and still no Andrea. My functioning brain is thankful for the reprieve, but my stupid heart is disappointed. Let’s not even talk about my pussy because she’s the most traitorous of them all. I dry myself and decide against dressing up. My flannel pyjamas will have to do, I need comfort right now and the perspective of putting on restricting clothes could make me cry. Fuck PMS.
Andrea started a fire in the chimney and the smell and warmth melt my tired bones and the anxiety from my body.
“If you’re hoping to turn me off with the pyjamas, you’ll have to try harder, sweetheart. They’re too fucking cute and you look delectable in them.”
I roll my eyes. “Andrea, what are you doing?” I sound tired because I fucking am. I had no clue trying to get my fake husband elected and solve a murder would be so draining. With my period coming any day now, I want to avoid the world and just take care of myself.
Andrea frowns at my tone but comes up to me with a single rose in his hand, handing it to me. “Seducing my wife.”
The rose is yellow. Fucking yellow, just like in the bath water, and somehow, that irrationally makes me see red.
“Yellow roses, Andrea? Fucking seriously?”
“What’s wrong with yellow roses? It’s roses. I thought it was the flower of seduction, is it not?”
“Yellow roses are a symbol of friendship, O baullo. And that’s exactly what we need to remain. Friends. Now, can we please eat? You cooked and I’m pissed to say, it’s smells too fucking good.”
I grab the Le Creuset dutch oven, and place it on the table, plopping down on my chair with excessive attitude. I perfectly know I’m being ridiculous. We have rules not to fuck around, but he’s trying to seduce me and it makes me feel untethered. I still don’t trust him with my heart and can’t let him in, yet the faux-pas is driving me insane. I could blame it on my period and the moon or some shit, but I know damn well I just want him to pass the tests my brain has conjured up, and he didn’t pass that one.
Andrea looks at me with intention and grabs the knife on his side of the table, wrapping his fist around the blade and pulling. His blood spills over the white tablecloth and my eyes widen.
“What are you doing?”
He takes the rose he just offered me and holds his closed fist on top of the petals, painting them crimson red. He doesn’t let up until all traces of yellow are erased and replaced with the drying colour of his lifeforce.
“I should have gone for red,” he says while handing me the flower once again. My heart skips a beat at his display, all for me. He leans his lips to my ear and whispers against my skin, “I won’t make that mistake again, but let me be clear, guerrieritta. We are not friends. Now, I’ve spilled my blood for you and nothing has ever felt more right in this fucked up world.”
Words stay lodged in my throat, but my heart picks up speed as his mouth descends on mine in a chaste kiss. I’d beg him to kiss me deeper, but the sound of dripping liquid brings me back to my senses and I almost run to the guest bathroom to get a first-aid kit.
“You’re fucking deranged,” I say, but it lacks heat.
I set up on the table and clean the wound with alcohol while Andrea watches me the entire time, his gaze never leaving my face and mine never straying from my task. The intensity of his attention on me is heady and I bloom under it, ready to demand it every single second of every day.
Was that his plan all along? Get me addicted to his brand of unhinged, to his eyes on me, just to take it away later when I’m settled in routines and showering him with my love? Been there, done that.
He gets up to serve the food and I press my hand on his shoulder. “Stay. You did enough for tonight.” I keep pretending, over and over, that he annoys me and doesn’t entrance me. I’m not sure I’m convincing anyone.