One Reckless Decision

Her breath deserted her then, and she realized that she had actually forgotten all about that seemingly harmless lie. She wrenched her gaze away from his and contemplated her hands for one moment, then another, while she attempted to remain calm. Why did she have the near-overwhelming urge to confess the truth to him? Did she really believe that would change anything?

“My lover,” she repeated.

“Of course,” Leo said, his gaze never leaving her face. “We must make sure we do not forget him in all of this.”

She fought off the flush of temper that colored her face. None of that mattered now. And she knew why he pretended to care about any lover she might have taken—he sought to own her, to control her, because she bore his name. It was about his reputation. His honor. Him—and that damned Di Marco legacy that he saw as being the most important part of himself.

“I am surprised that you have taken the news of him so …easily,” she said, holding herself too still. “I rather thought you would have a different reaction.”

“The fact that you have taken a lover, Bethany, is a grave and deep insult to my honor and to my name,” Leo said softly, a thundercloud in his coffee eyes—confirming her own conclusions that simply. But then his brows rose. “But, since you are in such a great hurry to divest yourself of that name, thus removing the stain upon the Di Marco name, why should I object?”

She stared at him, a mix of despair and fury swirling in her belly, making her flush red. He would never, ever change. He could not change. She even understood that salient truth differently now, having had these past days to really investigate the mausoleum where he’d been raised, and having finally, belatedly understood the kind of life he must have led.

He had been carefully cultivated his whole life to be exactly who he was. He’d been educated, molded, primed and prepared to assume his title, his wealth, his lands and his many business concerns. She was the idiot for having ever expected something different.

And if his belief that she could have betrayed him would help her gain her freedom, that was what she wanted. What she needed. She did not really believe that she could hurt him—that it was possible to hurt him. She told herself the softening she felt inside, the longing to explain herself, was no more than a distraction. She took a deep breath and refused to allow herself that distraction.

“What is your excuse this time?” she asked finally.

She raised her gaze to his and was surprised at the expression she found there. Not the fury she might have expected. Something softer, more considering. More dangerous. Her pulse skipped, then took on a staccato beat.

“For not going to court immediately?” she hastened to add.

He shrugged, a wonderfully unconcerned Italian gesture that should not have warmed her as it did. What was the matter with her? Their most recent parting had been bleak, and yet she practically fell at his feet simply because he’d bothered to return?

She was aghast at her own weakness. Her susceptibility. She knew that his vow to keep from touching her was a godsend. It might very well be the only thing that saved her from herself.

“It is Friday afternoon,” he said. When she stared at him blankly, he laughed. “The court is not open on the weekend, Bethany. And Monday is a holiday. I am afraid you must suffer through a few more days as my wife.”

She could not understand the undercurrents that swirled between them then. It was as if he’d changed somehow, as if everything had changed without her noticing it—but why should it have? She remembered his bitter expression in the breakfast room, the things he’d said, the same old cycle of their frustrating conversation. Blame, recrimination and that ever-tightening noose of shame and hurt she carried inside of her, made all the more acute when she was with him.

She’d had days to ponder the whole of that interaction, and had come away none the wiser. Yet somehow she was even further determined to simply put an end to the back and forth. What was the point of it, when it got them nowhere, when it only made her feel worse?

He moved farther into the room and Bethany had to fight the urge to rise to her feet, to face him on a more equal physical level. The room was too small, she told herself, and he too easily dominated it. That did not mean he dominated her. She would not let it. She would not let him.

“Have you ever wondered what would happen if I did not, as you say, keep you in a box?” he asked, his voice so smooth, so quiet, it washed through her like wine. Like heat. It took her too long to make sense of what he’d said. She blinked. If he had produced a second head from the back of his sweater and begun speaking with it, Bethany could not have been more surprised.