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I can see the sadness that fills Gabriel’s face. The longing. I can see how much he wants to reach out for me, to forget that we said just one more time. I can see desire and yearning and need—but I’m not sure if I see love, because I don’t know what it looks like.
I need to hear it to be sure.
“If that’s what you need, Bella,” he says quietly. His hand is resting between us on the bed, but he doesn’t reach for me. He doesn’t say anything else. He just closes his eyes, as I reach over to turn out the light.
He doesn’t say the one thing that I need to hear.
And lying there in the darkness, I can feel my heart breaking, all over again.
24
GABRIEL
Leaving to go to Rome is harder than I could possibly have imagined it would be.
It’s made even harder by what Bella and I shared last night. I woke up at five in the morning, looking over at her sleeping next to me, and wondered if I should simply back out of the deal. If I should tell the buyer that I’ve changed my mind. If I should tell Bella the same thing—that I want to stay here, with her, to keep her as my wife, to live a life that I know would make her happy.
I lay there, and I turned over every possible response in my head. I always came back to the same thing.
Yesterday, she said she wanted a divorce. She said she wanted to leave. I can’t keep her if she doesn’t want to stay. I can’t force her to stay in an arranged marriage, when I know very well that it’s what she’s been trying to run from this whole time. If she wants her freedom, then I have to keep my promises, and facilitate that.
Even if it breaks my heart.
Even if it feels like it’s going to kill me to let her go.
I get up before she does, unable to stay in bed next to her any longer, and not touch her. Far from satisfying my desire for her, last night made me feel even more hungry for her. If I could, I’d keep her in bed all day. I’d find out just how many times I could make her come before she said no more, before she pleaded for me to stop instead of continuing.
I’d fill her up with my cum over and over again.
A small jolt of alarm follows that thought, even as I feel my cock start to harden. She said it was the wrong time of the month for it to matter that I forgot to pull out—but what if that isn’t true?
What if I take Bella home, give her a divorce…and she’s already pregnant with my child?
The thought fills me with panic—not over having a child with her, but over the possibility that I could lose them both. This baby isn’t even a reality, and already I can feel a cold fear rippling through me, a possessive need to keep her and our potential child close.
I shake my head. She said flat out that the chances of that being a reality were almost impossible. There’s no reason to think about something that isn’t going to happen.
Much like our actual relationship.
Bella is quiet during breakfast, which doesn’t surprise me. I see Agnes’ eyes flicker to the small red mark at the edge of Bella’s throat, where I got carried away last night, but she says nothing. Bella picks at her food, and my attention is constantly pulled back to Cecelia and Danny, who are hammering me nonstop with requests for things I could bring back for them from Rome.
“We’re going home to New York when I get back,” I tell them, when I can get a word in edgewise. “So make sure you help pack, and don’t make Bella and Agnes do all the work. Okay?”
They both readily agree, and I glance over at Bella, who is staring down at her eggs with a blank expression on her face. Agnes looks worried, and she corners me as soon as breakfast is over, herding me into the kitchen as Bella takes the children outside.
“Is it safe to go back?” she asks me unceremoniously, her hands on her hips. “I saw the extra men left. But the threat is taken care of?”
“As much as it can be.” I run my hand through my hair. “Salvatore brokered a truce with Igor. Bella is my wife, and so Igor has no right to her. The don has told him that any further action is considered an act of war. That he is expected to leave Bella alone, from here on out.”
Agnes sniffs. “And you think he will abide by this?”
“No,” I admit. “But I don’t know what else to do. We can’t stay here forever. I’m meeting the buyer for the estate in Rome, to arrange the sale tomorrow. We can’t spend our whole lives hiding from him.”
“No,” Agnes agrees. “But what happens when Bella is no longer your wife?”
“What?” I narrow my eyes at her, and she waves a hand carelessly.
“The house is not so big that I don’t know what’s going on. You say Bella is protected because she’s your wife, but you’ve promised that the two of you will go your separate ways when you get to New York. So what then?”
