Page 109 of Corrado

Not for one second had she really been able to handle her grief for her mother. Until now, really.

“It’s worse at night,” she admitted. “Maybe because that was the time I used to spend the most with her … we would read, or talk.”

Corrado made a noise under his breath. “I know, I hear you crying.”

She kind of wished he didn’t say that. It just made her feel worse to know that someone was a witness to her pain, and couldn’t help.

Nothing helped.

“You’re allowed to grieve,” he said quietly, leaning against the island and giving her a bit of breathing room. “And you’re allowed to do it however you need to. If that means crying at night when you’re alone, then that’s what it is.”

“It doesn’t make it better, though.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

Ginevra glanced away. “Then, I ran away, and left my sisters there.”

“Hey,” he murmured, his hand coming up fast so that his fingertips could graze down her arm with a soft touch. That light stroke was enough to send heat licking up her arm, but somehow, she ignored it. “I think someone else made that choice for you, and you’re doing the best you can with it. Because what were the options, huh?”

“Well—”

“What were your options back there?”

“To marry a stranger.”

Corrado nodded. “And your sisters … you were told they’d be taken care of, I’m sure.”

“But what if they aren’t?”

“And you think, what, calling them, getting tracked down, dragged back there, forced into a marriage, possibly being hurt for running away … do you think that will help their situation at all?”

“When you put it that way.”

“Perspective helps everything,” he murmured.

Sure.

Still … “That doesn’t make the guilt easier to swallow.”

“Yeah, you’re not wrong.” Corrado smiled crookedly. “I know that. All too well.”

Did he?

“What makes you feel guilty, then, Corrado?”

He straightened in place, the widening of his brown eyes telling her that he hadn’t expected that question. Still, he continued pulling items from the cupboards, before moving to the drawers where he found utensils. “I don’t know what to make of you, Ginevra.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You continue to surprise me.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“I haven’t decided yet. People rarely surprise me anymore. I’m not sure what to do with the ones that manage it.”

“You know, you didn’t answer my question. About what makes you feel guilty, too, I mean. Instead, you deflected it back to me.”

He pointed a butter knife at her, and winked. “You’re absolutely right. And look at that, you’re surprising me again.”