Page 10 of Italian Weddings

O N THE DRIVE INTO town, they’d shared a companionable, thoughtful silence. On the drive back to the mansion, it was less companionable, and considerably pricklier. At least, it felt that way to Willow.

Her mind kept ticking over his comments, his obvious perception of her relationship with Tom, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that he was right.

Which only made her angrier. It wasn’t Francesco’s fault.

In fact, the part of her brain that was capable of rational, objective thought could even see that as a friend, he had a sort of obligation to be brutally honest with her about what he saw in their relationship.

But his comments had come out of nowhere, slamming into her like a freight train.

It probably had more to do with Meredith, and how wearing Willow found spending time with her stepmother.

While she’d developed a sort of game to handle Meredith’s judgmental attitudes, it hadn’t really helped with the hurt.

It had made it, on some level, more bearable, but at the end of the day, she had to live with the fact that she wasn’t—and never would be—accepted by the other woman. And her father didn’t care.

As they approached the wrought iron gates to her family’s estate, Francesco slowed down and pulled his car to the side of the road, then angled his broad, man-mountain body to face her. He took up so much of the car, suddenly she found it hard to breathe.

“Willow.” His voice was low and raspy, stern, like he was going to reprimand her. “Look at me.”

She dug her teeth into her lower lip, keeping her gaze belligerently ahead. “Why?”

“You’re angry. Or upset.”

She chewed her lip harder.

“And now you’re not even looking at me.”

She huffed out a breath then turned to face him.

And instantly regretted it. He was close.

Or maybe it was just that the car was so small-seeming.

She couldn’t say. But separated by only a few inches, with his startlingly beautiful eyes, all darkly rimmed and perceptive, his angular face, and full, sweeping mouth, her stomach dropped right down to her toes.

“What is it?” he pushed, his expression neutral, even as his eyes scanned her.

What could she say to that? Where could she even begin? “Nothing. I’m fine.”

His lip quirked to the side. “Clearly.”

She huffed out another breath. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

He reached up then, his hand touching her cheek, sending shockwaves of awareness through her.

Need. Or neediness? That awful, familiar desire for reassurance that stemmed from the black hole of feeling utterly and completely unloved and wanting someone—anyone—to clog it.

She swallowed hard, past the lump that had suddenly developed right at the base of her throat, like she’d got a lozenge stuck there or something.

“Your relationship with Tom is none of my business.” It was the worst thing he could have said. Worse than making her feel like Tom hadn’t loved her enough was Francesco acting like he didn’t care either.

She glanced away quickly, but his hand stayed where it was, lightly brushing her cheek. A moment later, it dropped to her shoulder, at the same time he let out a small breath. A sigh?

“You were right. I’m no expert in relationships.”

She ignored the familiar pang in her chest and tried to grab hold of that. Of anything that might anchor them back into the present, and the reality of who and what they were—old friends.

“Are you really admitting you don’t know everything, Francesco?” She tried to infuse a teasing note into her voice, and smiled, for good measure, glancing back at him.

And his beautiful face. His dark eyes, like gemstones in his too handsome face.

She pressed her teeth into her lip, harder now, willing the pain to take away from all the other emotions that were swirling through her.

She wanted him to kiss her.

She wanted to feel those lips on hers.

But it would be a mistake. It would be a kiss borne of her need for reassurance, an attempt to shovel something into the emptiness inside her chest. The black hole that could never, seemingly, be fixed.

And to try to fix it with Francesco would be the worst mistake she could make, because in a life that was somewhat emotionally barren, her friendship with Francesco was something real and important, a touchstone that mattered to her.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” she murmured, frowning a little.

“ Perche non? It’s true. My track record speaks for itself.”

“Why?”

His eyes ran over her face. “Because I’ve been with a lot of women.”

She willfully ignored the stretching feeling inside of her chest, the strangely elastic sensation of her ribs expanding to the point of no return.

“One could argue that makes you very knowledgeable about relationships.”

“Except we both know my relationships are intentionally short lived and shallow. Though no less satisfying for that, I’ll grant you.”

Now the sensation in her chest morphed into something else. Jealousy. Anger. Frustration. All of the rage she usually kept tamped way, way down, deep inside of her.

“Possibly even more so,” he added, unhelpfully.

She made a soft noise, a sound of disdain. Or want. She could hardly tell.

“You are annoyed again,” he murmured, momentarily unnerving Willow for how well he could read her.

She shook her head. His hand lifted back to her cheek and Willow’s eyes widened. “I’m curious,” she said softly. “How does it work?”

He was silent, waiting. Watchful.

“You meet a woman in a bar, take her back to your place? Or hers? And then, what?”

He arched a thick, dark brow, his lips quirking in a teasing, half-smile. “What do you think, cara ?”

Her cheeks flushed pink, and her heart did a funny little squishy thing at his repeated usage of the term of endearment.

“We enjoy one another.”

Her skin prickled all over. Her breath seemed to be coming too hard and fast. “Enjoy one other,” she repeated, just to feel the words in her mouth, to appreciate them to their fullest.

His response was a sort of growl. A throaty noise that indicated agreement. Her pulse leapt.

“Okay,” she said, though what she meant by that, she didn’t know.

“Have you never been with a man just because you wanted to, in that moment?”

She swallowed, that damned lozenge sensation in her throat getting stronger.

“It’s just sex, cara. Beautiful, addictive, fun, pleasurable sex.”

“You make it sound as simple as slipping on a pair of shoes.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s more than that,” she said, struggling for words. Struggling to understand her own feelings, then, because he was muddling her up so completely.

“Not if neither party wants it to be.”

She massaged the inside of her cheek, trying to calm her rioting nerves.

“So, you only fuck women who are as cavalier about this stuff as you are?” The curse was satisfying to throw at him in that moment. It cheapened the conversation, the concept of sex; it was crude and base, and it felt damn good.

“I only fuck women who know what I am offering,” he threw it right back to her though, and damn it if hearing the word in his accented voice didn’t make her stomach go all twisty and loopy.

“One night.”

“Two, three, four. Maybe a week.”

She let out a low whistle, hoping it sounded scathing, or sarcastic, or something that would conceal the way her insides were fluttering and heating.

“You think this is problematic?”

“It’s none of my business.”

“I never had you pegged as a prude.”

“I’m not a prude,” she retorted quickly, her insides flashing with something like pain and embarrassment.

Memories of high school, parties where boys tried to kiss her and she demurred, flooded Willow’s brain.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t been interested, but Meredith had made sure she knew how precious her reputation was.

Even then, she’d known she was expected to come home, meet the right sort of man and get married.

But she garnered a reputation as an ice queen, and those silly high school boys had loved to try to prove they had what it took to seduce her.

She blinked away. Francesco wasn’t one of those guys.

He wasn’t a jerk. He was her friend, and this conversation was entirely inappropriate.

She forced a smile, made herself look him in the eyes. “We should get back to the house now.”

But frustration was clearly visible on his face. It was written in the way his features tightened and his eyes darkened, in the way his lips pulled slightly to the side, and a muscle throbbed at the base of his jaw. It was a wave, rushing towards her, a tide she couldn’t outrun.

“You have a habit of doing that, you know.”

She didn’t know. She didn’t follow, at all. “Doing what?”

“Shutting things down when it gets too real.”

Her brows shot up. “I disagree.” Her eyes dropped to the console between them, more spaceship than car. “You know more about me than pretty much anyone.”

“Sure. I have an academic understanding of the things you are happy to share. But when it comes to actually getting in here, you push me away,” he said, tapping a finger to the side of her head before letting it drop a little lower, to her cheek.

She drew in a deep breath, as he moved it sideways, to her mouth, and let his fingertip just hover there. Goosebumps tingled over her spine.

“We’re friends,” she disputed, a little unevenly. “What do you want from me?”

An excellent question. And an excellent point.

They were friends, and he’d always been glad for that.

As for what he wanted from Willow? Well, that was both easy and hard to say.

Because he knew, on a physical level, that he wanted to drag her body against his and kiss her senseless.

But she wasn’t just some woman in a bar.

She wasn’t just someone he could kiss and flirt with a little, take to bed and make love to all night and then say goodbye to without a backwards glance.