Forgivable Sins (Bellandi Crime Syndicate 2)

"Seriously though, I've been meaning to ask if you could help me. I just kind of got sidetracked with all the changes, not to mention Lino won't let me leave the house until he can arrange full-time security like a psycho." She stood, picking up my favorite violet pillow and tossing it into the air to catch it. Ever the Queen of fidgeting, I should have known she wouldn't sit on the couch

with me for long.

"Yeah? How can Mama Sadie help, darling?"

"I need to know how to protect myself. I won't rely on any of the security Lino is no doubt arranging. Look at what happened to Ivory. I just, I don't ever want to be vulnerable like that again. So can you teach me to protect myself?" I asked, watching as she turned a thoughtful face my way.

"Sure," she responded, dropping to the floor and sitting with her feet pressed together in a lotus position. "I doubt Lino will object, though he might want to be the one to teach you. I have to say, it would be much more fun for him to teach you."

I had no doubt about that. None. Whatsoever. "I'm not learning to have fun. I'm learning to defend myself. I can't think when he touches me. I swear my brain turns to oatmeal in my head and there's absolutely no ability to function. I wouldn't remember a thing he tried to teach me."

"Okie dokie," she shrugged. "Your loss. If you do decide to let him spar with you at any point, can I watch? You guys have some serious unchecked chemistry, and I just broke up with Patrick. I'm having a dry spell."

"No!" Lino yelled from his office down the hall, where he'd clearly been eavesdropping like the creep he was. I knew my eyes must have darted over to the wall that separated the living room from the hallway, calculating just how hard he had to have been focusing to listen that efficiently.

"Fucking creeper!" Sadie yelled back. Never one to be daunted by the fact that she was yelling at a criminal mob guy, she grinned at me even as I had to admit that listening in was in fact creepy.

"Really? You just asked to watch Samara and I roll around on a gym mat!" he pointed out, and I hung my head as I laughed silently. "Voyeurism much?"

"Don't knock it until you try it," she teased more quietly.

What the fuck had happened to my life? Like seriously.

I just couldn't

???

I loved Sadie.

Really, I did. Her energy was infectious, her smile made even the most callous of men melt, because she was always just so damn happy.

But during my period, she was exhausting. Catching the tail end of Lino’s phone call and the rage in his voice hadn’t helped. Connor was gone. Vanished without a trace, and in spite of how he tried to hide it, I knew it weighed on Lino every day.

By the time she left, murmuring congratulations again and giving us a warning to tell my brother as soon as possible because rumors were making their rounds, I flopped onto the couch in a puddle of nothingness.

Lino chuckled, abandoning me to my misery from the entryway. I closed my eyes, content to pretend to sleep in his absence.

I only opened my eyes when the sound of a can hitting the coaster on the coffee table snapped me out of my misery. A can of diet soda, my favorite chocolate bar, and two pain pills on a napkin sat on the table. All lined up and ready for me while Lino fetched the remote and took a seat next to me on the sofa.

I hadn't breathed a word. Hadn't mentioned my period or anything of the sort. While we'd had no conversations that dove into the intricate details of my womanhood, Lino most often gave me a refuge during that time. A place to watch a movie and curl up on the couch with my favorite treats. He'd paid far more attention than I gave him credit for, taking care of me and expecting my needs better than I could have ever hoped for in a spouse.

And he'd done all that when we were just friends.

When he settled on a lighthearted romantic comedy, my spirit soared. The ridiculous over-the-top connection was exactly what my insane brain needed. I scooped up the pills and popped both into my mouth, swallowing them with a swig of soda. "Come here," Lino murmured, patting his lap.

“Do you even know how to ask for anything?” I snapped, and I immediately winced. As true as it might have been, the appropriate time to point that out was not when he provided a service I desperately needed.

I couldn’t even remember a time when I hadn’t had Lino to baby me through my period.

He only looked at me with his brows raised. “Oh please, my darling wife. Would you bring your head over yonder so that I might ease your pains?”

I glared at him one last time before rolling my eyes. My head hit his thighs, so I stared up at him while we waited through the previews. One strong, deft hand guided my shirt up to bare my stomach, and he pressed lightly against it in an easy massage that eased some ache. One might have thought his strong, muscled thighs would be a poor pillow.

But I didn't think I ever loved a pillow so much. The movie continued, but I drifted in and out of sleep as his hands worked their magic. I couldn't have cared less that I only caught bits and pieces of the movie, that it seemed to filter in one ear and out the other. The only thing that mattered was the fact that Lino was there, his hands working at my belly to ease the pain that came every month. I didn't know a single man who cared for a woman the way he did, didn't know a single one who loved so fiercely.

As a friend, it had seemed like a horrible reality I would one day have to face. The day that he fell in love with a woman, and she wasn't me. As his wife, I hoped one day I'd be that woman. That the way he took care of me would continue into the next phase of our relationship, that everything would shift to take a new meaning as we became more intimately acquainted with one another's bodies. There was nothing I wanted more.

"Sit up and lean forward for me, Little Dove," he murmured, and the sound of his voice echoed through the fog. Like I could find him anywhere, without seeing him or feeling him.