Page 114 of Bene

“I—”

He didn’t care to hear what she had to say.

At all.

“No, it’s my turn now,” he snapped, taking one risky step toward her, “because I think you’ve had more than enough time to lie and tell me stories, didn’t you?”

She said nothing.

Bene nodded, expecting that. “Yeah, you know, our parents never hid shit from us. They didn’t want us to be ashamed of their life—of this legacy they made for us. I bet you think I didn’t know about my father’s first wife, huh? Or is it you that doesn’t know very much about her, Vanna?”

Her brow dipped. “I only know what my father told me.”

“Another bastard made by Gabriel Canali—the only thing he ever gave my father’s first wife was his last name, and she was so desperate to get rid of that small piece of him that she was willing to trick my father into a marriage with her to do it, too.”

Vanna straightened a bit.

Bene didn’t back off in the slightest. “Oh yeah … and then when she had what she wanted from my father—to get away from hers—she couldn’t get away from him fast enough. But don’t worry, she came back just long enough to almost get my mother and brother killed, before she swallowed a bottle of pills, making sure to kill my uncle’s child she was carrying while she did it.”

Her throat jumped as his words slashed through the still air between them, settling like a heavy weight. He could see the understanding dawning in her eyes, the fact that she knew he was telling the truth … or at least the truth as he knew it.

And it didn’t match with what she had been told.

Clearly.

“I get why you hated us—you thought we took from you, I bet,” he said, ignoring the thickness building in his throat the longer he spoke, “but it means nothing to me, and it won’t save you when the time comes for you to answer for what you did.”

“I’m sorry, Bene, I am.”

She reached out for him, but he couldn’t have that.

“Don’t touch me—don’t fucking even come near me,” he snarled at her. That surprise in her eyes, the hurt, had him barking out a bitter laugh. “How dare you look at me like I just did something wrong to you after everything? After what you did, you think you get to be hurt?”

“I do care, I care so fucking much, no matter what you think or say. It won’t make that less true. Nothing else you said was a lie, but nothing I just said was one, either.”

Bene glared.

Vanna held firm. “And I can’t touch you now?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because then you’ll be too goddamn close.” He pulled in a burning lungful of air, wishing it wasn’t so hard to breathe lately. “And when you’re close, all I can think about is how much I want to love you, but because you made me hate you, too, I don’t know how to do both.”

“But—”

“Don’t speak because when your lips move, you lie.”

“I don’t lie.”

“You do.”

“I don’t! Not right now. I’m not, I swear.”

Her staunch denial only served to have his control breaking altogether. Before he could think better of it, he crossed the three feet between them, the force of him coming forward for her making Vanna step backward until she hit the edge of the counter. Not that it stopped Bene from crowding her altogether, his hands resting on either side of the wall for the vanity to keep her locked in place.

Now, she wasn’t going anywhere.