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I was goading him, hoping he would change the subject or get angry and walk away. He simply sighed and said, “What did you want to do today?”
“Nothing.” I meant it. I was feeling incredibly tired.
It was emotionally draining worrying about the baby, worrying about myself, trying to stay one step ahead of Dario.
I didn’t even recognize my own emotions. Some days, I hated him, and other days, I found myself appreciating this life, appreciating that I didn’t have to work so hard for my survival.
Jason and I hadn’t had a lot of money as a couple, and growing up, I hadn’t either. I always wondered how the other half lived and now I was that other half.
It should have been like a fairytale for me, but I was married to a violent offender and having his baby. There was nothing about my life that was like a fairy tale.
No matter how upset I was, I knew that I had to keep the charade up. There were things he wasn’t telling me.
We were both keeping secrets, but I had a feeling mine would be a gamechanger. I couldn’t have him catching on.
“Well, let me know if you’d like to do something off the island. I don’t have any plans this evening.”
“No people to stab?” I couldn’t help but say. Something about his face changed, and I knew I had pushed too far.
He stood up and excused himself. I felt stupid. Wasn’t I trying not to alienate him? I had to do better. I had to find a way to gain back his trust.
After our brief conversation, he wasn’t around much that day. I didn’t see him in any of his usual places. And he hadn’t joined me for dinner.
Something was wrong.
I should have been happy to have the place to myself, but he was my only company when the rest of the staff left, which was usually right after dinner.
Where was he?
I found him in his office, dozing in a chair. For an unguarded moment, I stared at him. There were glasses next to his computer. I didn’t know he wore reading glasses.
I reached out to touch his shoulder, to wake him up, and his hand grabbed mine before I could, his eyes shooting open. Clearly, he was impossible to sneak up on, even while asleep.
“It’s just me,” I said pulling away.
Instantly, he let me go. He stood up and said, “You caught me off guard. Did I hurt you?” He took my hand in his and looked at it.
He rubbed my hand as he inspected it, sending chills down my spine at his simple touch. I didn’t pull away. In that unguarded moment, his concern seemed genuine.
Feeling manipulative, but knowing it had to be done, I wrapped my hand around his and squeezed it before saying, “I’m fine. I just thought you would be uncomfortable sleeping in that chair.”
It was the first time I’d taken his hand unprompted. I think he noticed, because he seemed to not want to let me go.
He didn’t in fact. He sat down in his office chair, and brought me down into his lap. He wrapped an arm around my waist. I resisted the urge to lean my body against his and inhale his scent.
“Did I miss dinner?”
I nodded. It felt odd to pretend that I was okay with this moment of easy affection between us, but it felt even odder to know it wasn’t fully pretend.
Maybe in a different time, in a different life…if he hadn’t been a Mafia kingpin who had bulldozed me into being his wife…maybe I would have cared about him and he would have truly cared about me.
Remembering that, I moved to stand up, but he stopped me. The look was back in his eyes, cold and calculating.
I didn’t like it when he was like this. I didn’t like it when he looked at me as if I were an object he possessed.
The look drove me crazy and made my skin crawl. It was as if he weren’t seeing me. He was just seeing something he wanted to control. I wanted to be more than that.
I pushed against him, and this time when I pulled away, he let me go. His face masked his anger at my need for space away from him.