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“Would you tell me if it was serious?” I asked. Surprisingly, my voice came out steady.
He paused by the door and considered it. “Probably not.”
Then he was gone, sweeping from the room and leaving me in stunned silence. I jumped from the bed and snatched his discarded shirt, pulling it around my body, and took off running after him.
I caught up with him in the front hallway. “How could you just have sex with me knowing my father is in danger? You should have left right away!”
“The car wasn’t here yet,” he said coolly.
“You should have told me,” I cried.
He opened the door and looked back at me, his dark eyes impassive. I hated this side to him, the detached coldness of it. He was so different than the man who had come to my bed with a naked gaze and a vulnerable need for intimacy.
“Iris, swear to God, I will keep your father safe,” he said. “Now stay here and don’t leave the compound. Ahmed and Adriana are coming to stay with you until I get back.”
He took me by the upper arm and pulled me roughly against his chest and kissed my mouth. There was desperation in the touch and painful longing in the final strokes of his mouth as he pulled away.
“I’m sorry I’m such a goddamn bastard, Iris,” he said quietly. “I’m afraid.”
I blinked, unsure what to say. “You’re afraid?”
“A lot of people have hurt me, physically, mentally,” he said. “You make me afraid because even if you hurt me the way they did, I could never hurt you back.”
“What does that mean?” I breathed.
“It means I fucking love you, Iris,” he said.
Then he was gone and the door slammed shut in my face. I stood there with my hands clenched at my sides and my heart beating against my ribs.
He loved me. Duran Esposito loved me in his own strange, stunted way and that knowledge flooded me with pure joy despite everything. I laughed aloud and sank back against the front door, biting into my knuckles. His confession seemed to allow all my suppressed thoughts and feelings to come out of hiding and I sat there and let my imagination run wild.
Would I become his wife? Did this mean he wanted to marry me? What would life look like as the wife of a made man like Duran? Would it mean too many nights where I laid awake and worried about him the way I worried for my father now?
And if he did marry me, he would want children. I knew that made men needed sons to fill their places when the time came. I closed my eyes and imagined myself, swollen with his child while he looked on followed by an image of myself sweaty from labor while Duran stood over me, proudly holding his newborn son. Was this something I wanted with him?
As I got to my feet, a sense of peace settled over me. I would tell him when he returned that I loved him back and we would figure out what to do next together.
I paced my room for the next few hours, my mind fraught with too many emotions. When I was too exhausted to pace anymore, I changed into my swimsuit and headed down the hall. I needed something to distract myself, so I went down to the kitchen and poured myself a full glass of red wine and sat on the edge of the pool.
The sun was high in the sky, oblivious to my suffering, and there was a gentle breeze. I closed my eyes just as I heard the front door from the other side of the house and I knew Adriana and Ahmed had arrived.
I got up and went back into the kitchen and found Adriana standing in the fridge studying the wine. She wore a blue bikini that went beautifully with her dark hair, large gold earrings, and a set of gold bangles around her wrist. She was the kind of casually sexy that I’d always wanted to be, but knew I could never manage to pull off.
She turned when I came in and leaned over for a hug. “Duran told me about your father,” she said. “I’m sorry, you must be so worried.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
“I know it’s hard not to feel anxious about it, but if anyone is going to protect your family, Duran will.”
“I know,” I sighed. “Thanks for coming over. It’ll help to take my mind off things to get outside for a bit. Do you want to join me by the pool?”
“Of course,” Adriana said, taking a glass down from the cupboard.
I watched her pour some chardonnay and followed her out into the back yard. We slid into the pool and hung side by side on the edge, sipping our wine and pretending everything was fine. There was a knot of anxiety in my chest that I just couldn’t shake, but I didn’t want to bother Adriana with my problems so I kept quiet.
“Can I ask a question?” Adriana said after a while. She took a dainty sip from her glass and set it aside, her perfectly manicured nails leaving marks in the condensation.
“Sure,” I said, a little apprehensive.
