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“Did he ever re-marry?”
Rocco pulled a face. “He was full of contempt for the whole institution of marriage. It’s a miracle that even one of us is willing to walk down the aisle after our indoctrination into the church of being a bachelor for life.”
Maddie wondered at the strange feeling tightening in her chest, a sense of pain for Rocco, she assured herself. A feeling of sadness that a man with so much goodness to give should be left to feel so scathing of something like marriage.
“This is your philosophy too?”
“I don’t know if it could be called a philosophy, it’s just the way I am.”
“That’s why you go through women so fast?”
He lifted his shoulders. “I like women.”
She smiled to hide the coldness slicking her veins. “Lots of women?” She affected a teasing tone to her voice, proud of herself for hiding the uneasiness she was feeling behind the façade of easy amusement. It wasn’t amusing though, and nor was her instinctive reaction to what he was saying.
“I’m not a saint.”
She made a soft sound of mirth—or what she hoped would pass for it—then lifted her champagne flute to her mouth, sipped it thoughtfully. “Have you ever been in love?”
The question wasn’t planned, and it surprised her as much as it did him, but she was strangely glad she’d asked it. She wanted to understand him, and this was a part of him. By his age, not having loved a woman was most definitely a choice, in her opinion.
“No.” The answer came immediately and without hesitation. “Not even close.”
Maddie considered that. He didn’t sound unsure, he didn’t sound like there was someone whom perhaps he had loved, once upon a time. That meant that even as a hormonal teenager, he’d been like this. Cold, closed off, refusing to commit, pushing people away as a matter of course.
Sadness for him washed over her. In many ways, they were polar opposites. Despite having known rejection from her mother, in a way that had blunted her self-esteem and made her doubt her worth, Maddie had always craved the deep roots that came from belonging to a happy family. She’d dreamed of finding her soul mate, falling in love, marrying, having children, and living a long, happy life surrounded by people who cared for and adored her. All of the things that had been missing in the formative years of her childhood. She wanted a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence, a golden retriever, the works.
“What about you, Maddison?” he prompted, his voice thick and throaty, his accent flooding her body with warmth now, driving away the cool.
“What about me?” She pretended to misunderstand.
“You asked if I’ve ever been in love. Now I’m asking you.”
“Oh.” Her skin warmed for another reason now. Embarrassment. “I—was. Yes. Once upon a time, forever ago.”
He arched a brow, silently encouraging her to continue, but there was something in the set of his jaw that spoke of a tension. Was he so dismissive of love that he didn’t even want to think she’d felt it?
“There’s nothing to tell, really,” she lied. “You know the story: boy meets girl, boy flirts, girl falls, they date, fall in love, fall out of love, break up.”
Cynicism darkened his eyes. “Because love is a myth.”
Her eyes widened. “That wasn’t really my point.”
“No? What other lesson can you take from your experience?”
“Plenty of lessons, believe me, and they’ll haunt me for a lifetime.”
He looked at her in confusion, and she didn’t blame him; he couldn’t understand what she’d been through, and how it had taught her to think and act differently.
“Brock was a mistake,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “I did love him, but at the same time, I never really knew him. No, that’s not accurate. I never really saw him. I was so caught up in the idea of him, of what I wanted him, and us, to be, that I imagined him to be a man that didn’t exist. I imagined him to be perfect.”
“Nobody is perfect.”
“Brock was far from it.”
Rocco leaned forward, eyes on her face with an intensity that stole her breath. “Did he hurt you?”
Maddie’s eyes dropped to her plate, a stinging in the back of them catching her off guard. She didn’t want to cry!
