Page 78 of Bound in Ruin

This is what I wanted. This was the entire damn plan from the minute I put a ring on her finger.

So why the hell doesn't it feel like a success?

Why does it feel like losing her would not be worth it?

She’s currently staring at me in horror, her beautiful eyes wide with shock and something else—utter disappointment.

My chest clenches.

“Rosalia.”

I look at her—at the tense curve of her shoulders—and the truth hits me like a blow to the ribs.

Seeing Rosalia happy is the ultimate high. There is nothing better. Nothing in my entire bloody, brutal life has ever felt this clean, this right.

And that is precisely what is tearing me apart.

It feels like I’ve betrayed her.

My heart slams against my ribs like a battering ram. A sudden wave of ice-cold sweat breaks out across the back of my neck.

"So... you've always known?" Rosalia chokes out, her voice breaking. Her wide eyes search mine, desperate and completely heartbroken. "You've known the whole time that I didn't kill him?"

I bow my head, unable to bear the sheer agony in her gaze. "Yes," I say solemnly. "I knew."

"Then why?" she cries, a tear streaking down her face. "Why did you marry me, Dominic? Why go through all of this?"

I swallow hard, the truth scraping against my throat like broken glass.

"Because Luciano hid the encrypted files under your name," I whisper, the absolute, ugly truth finally laid bare. "He tied access to your legal identity. I married you because I needed those files. I needed what you had."

Rosalia gasps again, the sound small, fragile, and utterly shattered.

Her knees buckle, and she sinks heavily onto the edge of the plush bed, burying her face in her hands.

Standing across the room, watching the light I had just put in her eyes burn out completely, my heart breaks into a thousand irreparable pieces.

"If you came into his room that night so quietly, so undetected," she begins, her voice tight and trembling with realization, "it means you knew I wouldn’t be there. You knew where I was."

My jaw tightens, but I say nothing. The truth is, I didn't actually find out about the termination of her pregnancy—the secret, illegal procedure she did that night—until after we were already married. But pointedly correcting her on the exact timeline right now would just sound like defensive semantics.

To her, it’s all part of the same terrible tapestry.

When I don’t respond, her eyes flash with a sudden, violent spark of fury.

As much as I hate her anger, as much as it burns to see it directed at me, I'm infinitely glad she’s not crying. I don't think I could survive watching tears fall from her eyes without losing my mind completely. Especially knowing I caused it.

"You used me," she says, her voice rising, sharp and acrid with betrayal.

“Rosa—no.”

"You forced me into this marriage just to get to that account! You let me carry the terrifying guilt of thinking I might be accused of his murder—you let me sit in fear every single day—just to protect yourself!"

"Rosalia, listen to me⁠—"

"No! You knew about Luciano. You knew about the murder. You knew about what happened to me that night, and you sat back and leveraged my absolute worst trauma into a business deal!" She stands up from the bed, her chest heaving, her hands balled into tight fists at her sides. "I need you to get out. I need space, Dominic."

"Rosalia," I choke out, taking one slow, agonizing step toward her, holding my hands up in surrender. "Whatever reason I had in the beginning... whatever I felt when I signed those papers... it changed. I care about you now. In a way I've never cared about anything in my entire life."