Page 28 of Modern Romance December 2025 5-8

She clenched her hands in the folds of her robe, her heart warring with itself. How much of her whirling thoughts was the truth and how much was her self-preservation kicking in?

He had clearly admitted to wanting her, to wanting to make this marriage real. Would he be so cheap as to pursue another woman while she was recovering from childbirth?

At least she could have asked him to stay and keep her company on this first night away from their son. He had wanted her to ask him. She was sure of that too.

But her stubbornness, and the knee-jerk instinct to protect herself, had stopped her.

This marriage wasn’t about love or comfort or their individual needs.

It was a convenience, a practical solution to their complex situation. Already, the pregnancy and the delivery had made a maudlin fool out of her. But enough was enough.

Luca was getting stronger every day and would soon come home. It was better all around if she started planning her life separately from her husband’s. For that’s what they would lead.

And yet as she shed her robe and sank into the deliciously hot water, her heart ached desperately for him to hold her just one more time. To give herself into his capable arms completely. Her entire being yearned to make this marriage, their relationship, real on every level possible.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Renzo returned toa dark, silent penthouse barely an hour later.

He did have out-of-town investors to wine and dine, people he had fobbed on his two assistants in the past week because he hadn’t wanted to leave Luca or Mimi at the hospital.

Even if he had stolen away for an evening, he wouldn’t have been good company.

Tonight’s dinner was important.

And yet he had known he’d made the wrong choice the moment he’d stepped foot into their Hotel DiCarlo Palazzo, overlooking the Grand Canal.

His wife needed him but was too stubborn to admit it or ask him for anything. And he…was just as stubborn, wanting her to come to him, wanting her to seek something, anything, from him.Cristo, the woman could twist him up, inside out, without even trying.

Events of the last few months had been the most intense and draining experiences of his life. He couldn’t begin to imagine how much more it must have cost her. Losing her sister, deciding to keep the baby, taking care of herself and then standing up to him even as she married him.

There was no doubt that his wife was an exceptional woman. And strong-willed to the core.

But she was also young and fragile, despite her every effort to act the opposite of the latter.

He glared at the large empty bed in the master bedroom, then proceeded to the two guest bedrooms. Only darkness greeted him in both. Frowning, he pushed the heavy doors of his study open.

His chest gave a painful twinge as his eyes found her small form tucked deep into his heavy armchair, fast asleep. He switched on the desk lamp, his breath coming in rough exhales as he recognized the gray sweatshirt she’d draped over herself.

It was his.

With her hair in a braid and wisps framing her face, she looked small and innocent.

The sight of her sleeping form, her nose and chin tucked against the fabric, did things to him he didn’t understand. He roughly thrust a hand through his hair, a wave of tenderness shaking him from the inside.

Feeling things for her wasn’t in his equation for this marriage. And yet he didn’t know how to stop.

Bending, he gently scooped her into his arms and lifted her.

Instantly, she nuzzled her face into his neck as if they had taken part in this very same ritual a thousand nights before. Her trust in him, in such a vulnerable state, when she was such a prickly little thing usually, pacified some age-old instinct in him that only she called forth.

The lush rose scent, deepened by her skin, filled his lungs by the time he brought her to the bed in his bedroom. He had barely tucked her under the duvet, one knee by her side, when those beautiful brown eyes flickered open. In the moonlight filtering through the French windows, her lashes cast shadows against her cheeks, her skin smooth and gleaming.

Her fingers fisted his shirt, lush lips puffing out air. Slowly, she became aware of her surroundings. “Renzo?”

“Sleep, Mimi,” he said, pressing a quick kiss to her forehead.Dio mio, he couldn’t control the simplest urge around this woman. “The armchair in my study is hardly convenient for a night’s sleep.”

A soft, maybe even dreamy, smile curved her lips. “You can’t help chastising me, can you?”