I check the time and sigh as I walk into the house at eleven in the evening. For days now, I’ve been avoiding Luca, working late and making sure I’m out the door before he is in the mornings. I’ve felt oddly flustered and uncomfortable ever since we slept together, but it wasn’t the sex that threw me off. It was the intimacy that followed.
Luca has been treating me the same at work, but the way he looks at me has changed. I’m scared that he thinks less of me now, or that he’ll take pity on me. I worked incredibly hard to cultivate my professional image, and I feel like I ruined it all in just one single night. Besides, I’m worried about the thinning boundaries between us.
It’s been a long time since I shared so much of myself with another, and I’m worried I revealed too much. The last time I opened up to someone that way, I ended up heartbroken.
Luca has been confusing me lately and I’m uncertain how to handle this new version of him. I thought I knew exactly who he was and what I could expect in this marriage of convenience, but nothing about it feels convenient anymore. When he asked me to marry him, he made it seem so simple. I figured I’d pretend to be his wife in front of his family, and in private, nothing would change. I couldn’t have been more wrong. With each passing day, I grow more scared to lose my heart all over again, permanently this time.
I pause on my way to the kitchen and instinctively hide at the sound of Luca’s voice. “Yeah?” he says, his voice soft. I thought he’d be in bed by now, but it looks like I was wrong.
I peek around the corner to find him standing in front of the stove, his earbuds in. He’s dressed in gray sweatpants that give him an entirely unfair advantage, and the black t-shirt he’s wearing strains around his muscles in a way that makes it impossible to look away.
“Don’t be upset,” he murmurs, his tone gentle.
I tense, a knot settling in my stomach. Who is he speaking to? I’ve never heard him take that tone with anyone but me, and he only started speaking to me so sweetly once we got married. Who is it that’s got him exposing a side of himself that he hid from me for years?
“I know. I’ll handle it, okay? I promise.”
My heart clenches tightly and I inhale shakily. Is it Natalia? I still remember the way he looked at her when she came into the office. When they first got engaged, he seemed patient but reluctant around her, but the last time they spoke, he acted different. He was kinder, more gentle. Something about that time didn’t sit well with me and left me feeling irrationally jealous. I hide behind the door and continue to listen in, unable to suppress my curiosity. The news of their engagement being called off was shared this morning, so perhaps he’s reassuring her that it won’t negatively affect her?
I watch as he takes out his earbuds, my heart uneasy. “How long are you going to stand there, Valentina?” I tense, and he chuckles as he turns around to face me. “Are you done running away from me yet?”
I clear my throat and tear my gaze away. Luca looks amazing in a three-piece suit, but I think I like him best this way. “I wasn’t running.”
He turns the stove off and leans back against the counter, his hand disappearing into his pocket as he retrieves the golden pocket watch he carries everywhere. “It’s way past eleven, and you’re only just coming home. You’ve somehow managed to be in meetings every single day for a week straight, and you’ve been coming home late. Why are you hiding behind your work?”
I walk up to him and reach for a glass in the cupboard beside him, trying my best to act nonchalantly. “I’ve just been busy,” I tell him, but it sounds unconvincing even to me.
Luca turns toward me and wraps an arm around my waist as he moves behind me. He pushes me against the counter and presses his body against mine, trapping me in his embrace from behind.
I inhale sharply when he brushes my hair aside and leans in, his lips settling against the back of my neck. “Yeah?” he whispers. “Or are you running from this?” He kisses my neck, his touch soft as he moves his way up to my ear. “Are you just busy, or are you scared of giving into this thing between us?”
His hand moves up to my breast and a soft moan escapes my lips when he kisses me below my ear. I can feel him harden against my ass, and he thrusts his hips into me, showing me how much he wants me. “Answer me,” he demands, one hand moving into my hair even as he tightens his grip on me, pulling me against him harder. Luca grabs my hair and pulls on it, exposing more of my neck. His lips trail down to my throat, and I inhale shakily.
“Just busy,” I lie, my voice husky.
He chuckles and lets go of me, eliciting a frustrated groan from me. “Oh,” he says, taking a step away. He leans against one of the counters and runs a hand through his hair, his cock clearly on display for me through his gray sweatpants. “My bad,” he adds. “I guess I got it wrong, huh?”
I blink in disbelief, disappointed he’d stop there. He looks into my eyes, his gaze provocative, almost as though he’s daring me to walk up to him and ask for more. I bite down on my lip and tear my gaze away, my eyes settling on his phone. I stare at it for a moment, unable to push aside the unease I’m feeling. He was definitely speaking to a woman earlier. I have access to his work phone, but not his personal phone, so there’s no way for me to figure out who it was.
He promised me fidelity, but I can’t enforce that. It wouldn’t be too late for him to regret marrying me and rectify his mistake. When it comes down to it, Natalia is better suited to him than I’d ever be.
Luca glances at his phone and chuckles as he picks it up. He stares at it for a moment and shakes his head before holding it out for me. “The code is my grandmother’s birthday, paired with my mother’s. It’s 327812.” I frown and shoot him a questioning look, but he merely smiles at me with the kind of patience he’s never shown me before. “Take it.”
“I… um… why would I—”
“Just do as I tell you to, Valentina.”
My hand trembles as I take his phone from him, my heart racing. I feel sick to my stomach at the thought of him with someone else.
“Check who my last call was to,” he says, his voice soft.
I look up sharply, but he merely tilts his head and looks at me, his eyes filled with something I can’t quite describe.
My fingers tremble as I put in his code and unlock his phone. Part of me doesn’t want to do this for fear of what I’ll find, but a larger part of me needs to know.
“Sierra,” I whisper, profound relief washing over me.
Luca takes a step closer to me and cups my face, tipping my head up toward his. “I don’t know what’s going through your mind, Valentina, but I can tell you this much: I will never, ever, cheat on you. I will never mistreat you or wrong you, you hear me? I know I fucked up in the past. I treated you harshly, and I went way too fucking far when you quit your job. I know, baby. But all of that? It was only because I didn’t want to lose you. I will never do anything that will make you want to walk away from me.”
I look into his eyes, taking in the fierce sincerity in them. “Why are you being like this?” I ask, my voice trembling. We agreed that we wouldn’t fall in love, so why is he looking at me that way?
His thumb brushes over my lips and he smiles, but his gaze is unfocused, as though he’s lost in a memory of his own. “Because I recognize the worries in the questions you refuse to ask. I recognize the damage of betrayal, Valentina. I don’t know who he was, and I don’t want to know either, but I’m not him. For as long as we’re married, there won’t be anybody but you.”
A different kind of jealousy settles deep in my stomach. “Who was she?”
Luca pulls his hand away and smiles humorlessly. “Someone who will stay in the past, which is exactly where I expect you to leave the man who made you doubt me over a simple conversation with my sister. The way you looked at me… that wasn’t damage inflicted on you by your parents. It was more than that. I’m not him, baby, so don’t look at me with so much mistrust.”
How could there be a woman I don’t know about? This must either have happened before we met, or he managed to keep a relationship hidden both from me and his family. Something about the pain in his voice guts me.
“Stop hiding from me, okay?” He looks away and musses up his hair. “If you keep this up, we don’t stand a chance of convincing our families we’re in love.”
I blush and look away. It’s odd to be standing here with him in this situation. He’s the man I loved to hate, but it’s starting to look like that hatred was misplaced, and I don’t know what to make of it. “Understood,” I murmur, unsure of what else to say.
He smiles and brushes my hair out of my face tenderly. “Wait here,” he tells me, before walking away, leaving my heart pounding. This is part of the reason I’ve been staying away. He makes me feel weak and vulnerable, and I never want to feel that way again. It only leads to heartache.
Luca walks back holding a pair of pink soft fuzzy slippers, and he kneels in front of me. “I bought these for you. Wear them at home, Valentina. Don’t just walk around barefoot,” he tells me as he lifts my foot carefully and places the slipper on it. “The floor is cold, after all.”
I stare down at him in disbelief, unable to keep my heart from being unaffected. Why does he treat me this way, when our marriage was meant to be pure business? “I thought you hated pink?”
He laughs and looks away as he runs a hand through his hair, the gesture oddly… shy. “I do, but you love it.”
Luca turns back to the stove and switches it back on. “So you do know how to cook,” I murmur, a soft chuckle escaping my lips.
He looks over his shoulder and smiles at me sheepishly. I never thought Luca could be cute, yet that’s exactly what he is. “The chef had a day off, and I didn’t feel like ordering something. I can only make this one stew, to be honest. It’s extremely hard to mess it up, so don’t worry about me blowing up our kitchen.”
Our kitchen. He keeps saying and doing things that make my heart race. When we first got married, I was so certain I’d never fall in love again, that this marriage would be all business. If Luca had continued to treat me the way he used to, everything would’ve been fine, but he seems insistent on breaking down my walls, and I don’t know how to stop him. With each passing day, he’s winning over more parts of me that never should have been his for the taking.
“Have you heard from your mother?” he asks.
“No. I’ve called her a few times, but she’s refusing to take my calls. Usually, I’d go stay at home once a month or so. Do you… would you come with me? I wonder if seeing us together would put her mind at ease. My mother isn’t the easiest person to deal with, but I don’t want her to worry about me.”
Luca glances over his shoulder and nods. “Sure,” he says, before looking back at the pan in front of him. “Whatever you want, baby.”
I stare at him, unable to figure him out. Three years seemed like such a long time, but I’m starting to worry it won’t be nearly enough for me.
