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But it wasn’t possible to resist his own different pull.

“You don’t think it’s a good idea because of him,” Dario said against my throat. “My brother.”

I hesitated before admitting, “Yes.”

He pulled away to look at me. “Do you think you love him?”

No hesitation this time. I tipped my chin. “Yes.”

His laugh was a cough. “You don’t even know him or half the things he’s done.”

“He’s a killer,” I replied. “He kills and he enjoys it. He might regret it now, but he killed my family. I think, knowing that and still being able to admit to my real husband that I have feelings for his twin brother after they’ve lied to me for half a decade, you should believe I do love him.”

Dario’s brow furrowed. “How can you love a man like him?”

It felt as if he wanted to ask, How can you love a man like me?

“He’s honest,” I admitted, causing him to bark out another hollow laugh. “He is, in his own way. As soon as I knew who he was, he cut himself open for me to examine, and he didn’t hide from his feelings even though they confused him.”

“They confused me too,” Dario confessed almost shamefully, pressing his forehead into mine and his hands spasmed on my hips. “The last woman I loved . . .”

“She was killed,” I finished for him. “You should have told me.”

“Maybe,” he allowed. “But keeping my distance from you was meant to keep you safe. Mostly, it’s worked.”

“But was it worth it?” I countered.

His sigh shuddered out of him, and he slumped against me, letting every inch of his big beaten body sag into me. It was the first moment of vulnerability he had ever shared with me.

I braced my feet and accepted every inch of him.

For him, because he obviously needed it, but also for me.

To feel like this half of my marriage hadn’t been dead too.

“I was worried,” he admitted, fisting a hand in my hair and banding the other around my hips in an approximation of a hug, only I felt like a stuffed animal in the arms of a frightened child. “I could never find out for sure who killed her, and I couldn’t shake the thought that it could have been Lando who ordered it. He never liked to cede control of my leash to anyone else.”

“You really think Lando would harm me?” I asked, utterly alarmed given I was ready to go with him to his house for safety while we figured out who we could trust.

Dario leaned back to look into my face, his own troubled. “I don’t truly think so, but I haven’t stayed alive this long because I’m not a paranoid motherfucker.”

My exhale was part laughter and relief. “You think I’m safe to go with him now, then? He came to save me from the cops.”

“Yes, but take Stefan and Luigi with you and tell your crew where you’re going. Luca tells me Hank is so obsessed with your safety that he’ll probably have his boys doing drive-bys to make sure all is well.”

“And you two are okay with that?” I asked incredulously.

His smile was grim. “No, but we’ll take what we can get when it comes to your safety. You might not understand this, Fiammetta, but it’s not just my brother who . . . cares about you.”

Before I could respond, he was kissing me.

He tasted hot, while Luca was cold, a searing lash of his tongue against my lips before they parted to allow him into my mouth. He didn’t hold me with the same tension Luca did, as if I was both sacred and something he was capable of tearing apart. Instead, Dario cradled me close to him for the first time in our marriage and seemed to drink from my lips, staving off his dehydration with an elixir only I could provide.

I didn’t know what Luca would say if he knew I was kissing his brother, I didn’t even know what I thought as it happened.

After the chaos of the last few weeks, I simply let myself be pulled away on the strong tide of Dario’s need for me. It felt life affirming and also oddly validating, to know that he wanted me in his own way, needed me even when he didn’t want to.

“I wasted so many years being too fucking cowardly to touch you the way I wanted,” he declared against my lips as he lifted one of my legs and bent it back toward the wall, opening me for the slide of his cock along my wet crease. “Now, I’m too late.”