Page 45 of Isle of Seduction
“Is there something you want to tell me?”
“You’ll use it against me,” she answers.
“For Christ’s sake, woman.” I jump up from my seat on the couch and pull the first paper I find next to me and the pen lying on the coffee table. I scribble down what I need her to understand.
I, Andrea Capaldi, will not use anything Giulia Moretti tells me against her during the course of our marriage, however long it might be. The jury to determine what “used against” means will be held by Giulia Moretti and Giulia Moretti alone.
I sign and hand it to her, pulling a soft smile from her pouty lips. Fuck, how I want to kiss them again.
“Happy now?”
“No,” she sasses but sits back down. After a heavy sigh, she shares something about her and it’s one of the most precious pieces of her I have seen yet. “When I was sixteen, there was this guy. He was a year older, and I fell in love. After a year, I realised he only wanted to be close to me to get to my brother and the organisation, but when I tried to break up with him, he threatened to kill himself. He used that against me for another year. Every time he wanted sex, or he wanted a job with my father and my brother Dom, he’d say the same thing and I was so scared he’d actually do it, that I’d be responsible. Anyway, one day, Lana asked me why I was still with such a tool and I cracked open.”
Murder is the only thing on my mind. I want to hold her, but I know she won’t want that right now. I need a fucking name.
“What’s his name?”
She smiles, all mischief and no regrets on her beautiful freckled face. “He died. I realised you don’t threaten a Moretti and live to tell the tale. Lana took care of him, though. I couldn’t do it. I still had feelings for him.”
She says feelings like the word tastes acrid on her tongue and I empathise. Giulia fights because she doesn’t want to be weak. She fights because not only did she have to be stronger in her family to claim her place, but because people abused the big heart she hides behind her attitude. I don’t do feelings because I’m scared of losing people; she doesn’t because she’s scared they’ll be used against her. I’m the biggest coward of the both of us.
But no longer.
I take her hand in mine and kiss her fingers, reverent and tender.
“Thank you for sharing that with me. I need a partner, sweetheart. If you don’t want to help me, I’ll send you back to Kalliste tomorrow, but I’d like you to stay, as my wife. Not only on my arm when I need to be seen, but here as well, when I need a reminder of where I’m going.”
“Let’s try. But for now, I’d rather keep the other two rules in place.”
It’ll have to be enough. For now.
She kisses my lips in a too short peck, and leaves for her room. The soft click of the handle sounds like doom in the silence of the house.
I’ve always known being close to me was a risk for the people around me, so I’ve never tried to develop relationships with my lovers. They were a means to an end, as awful as that sounds. It was my way of protecting them. But when I see Giulia fighting for everything she wants in life, it makes me want to give it all to her so she doesn’t have to. I don’t know what that will mean for the future. I can’t change our past and how we got together but I want to be better for her. I want to be the man that lays everything at her feet, including himself.
I follow her into her room, knowing she never closes the lock, letting me know I can come in but have to be careful with her.
In this room that became hers, I can’t escape the sweet smell of vanilla and I never want to.
I advance on her until she leans against the cherry wood desk piled with paper set under one of her windows.
“Andrea…” My name is the sweetest sound in her mouth.
One of my hands lands on her hips and I take hold of her hair with the other, tilting her face up to look up at me.
“I… It’s not a good idea,” she breathes.
“I want you and I know you want me.” She opens her mouth, but I stop her by a sharp pull on her hair, making her gasp. “Don’t fucking denying it. Don’t you get it, guerrieritta? You never have to fight to have me. I do the fighting. I’ll fight for you and I’ll fight with you.”
I frame her face in both my hands, our foreheads connecting. “Stop fighting, I’ll catch you. Let go. Let go,” I repeat.
“I don’t know how.”
“Will you let me show you, cara mia?” I hesitate. “You can keep pretending if you want, but let me show you that you never have to fight for anything with me.”
She nods and my lips crash on hers. They’re soft and taste like acceptance. My warrior, my sweetness. I don’t ever want to come up for air. Her smell in my lungs is enough.
“We’re not having sex.”