Page 94 of Trapped
How did this man make me feel so cherished? Warmth spread through me, filling the spaces that had been so empty for so long. I’d been so used to the push and pull between us, but this was different. There was something raw in the way he looked at me.
Something warm and overwhelming bloomed inside me. I couldn’t say it out loud yet, but I…I loved him. He fought for me. He gave me space even when he wanted to keep me close.
“You make me happy, Delilah.”
I smiled. “You make me happy, too.”
I didn’t add what my heart was screaming—that I’d fallen for him.
He grinned. “I know.”
His hands rested on my hips as my fingers traced his jaw. The pull between us was stronger than it had ever been. He wasn’t just someone I wanted in my life. I couldn’t imagine my life without him.
He stepped back and looked around. “So, what’s the next step in getting this place up and running?”
I slid off the counter. “The mural. I hired an artist to paint it, and she should be coming in soon. Then there’s the inventory, marketing, and a million other things.”
The artist popped through the door a moment later and got to work painting. In the meantime, I brought Santino up to speed about everything the boutique needed. After we wrapped things up at the store, we went home to Santino’s penthouse.
He disappeared into his gym, and I drifted into the kitchen. As weights clinked, I looked in the fridge.
I pulled out ingredients for spaghetti carbonara—Santino’s go-to comfort food. A peace offering. I set the water to boil and chopped garlic and pancetta, sizzling it in the pan.
He came into the kitchen, wiping sweat from his brow with a towel draped around his neck. “Smells good.”
“It’s your favorite, right?”
He nodded, a hint of a smile on his lips. He disappeared into the bathroom to take a shower, leaving me to finish up the meal. Iset the table, plating the pasta with a sprinkle of fresh parsley. The aroma filled the kitchen, making my stomach rumble.
A few minutes later, Santino returned, his hair damp and a clean shirt clinging to his muscular frame. He sat down at the table, his expression full of anticipation.
I set a plate in front of him. He waited, fork poised, as I sat down with my own plate. Then Santino dug in, shoveling the carbonara into his mouth. He moaned with the first bite. He finished his plate by the time I was halfway through mine, his fork scraping the last bits of egg and cheese.
Santino set his fork down and wiped his mouth. “So good.”
“You’re welcome.”
He patted his lap. I slid off my chair and moved over, settling onto his lap. His hands found my hips and pulled me close.
“Making me dinner, sitting pretty on my lap. What are you up to?”
I leaned against him, playing with his T-shirt. Something lingered in the back of my mind that I’d been too afraid to bring up before. Maybe it was the softness of the evening or the way Santino had opened up to me lately, but I felt like I could ask him.
“The fire,” I began, my fingers stilling on his chest. “The one that…killed your cousin. You’ve never really talked about it.”
His entire body tensed. “What do you want to know?”
“What happened?”
He exhaled a rough breath. “I was just a kid. Twelve years old. My aunt and uncle were like second parents to me. My aunt,uncle, and cousin. Gone in one night. I watched the whole thing.”
“That must have been horrible.”
“It was,” he admitted, his voice rough. “My cousin was only ten. We’d been playing together earlier that day. And then he was gone.”
“What happened?”
His jaw tightened. “Arson.”