Page 220 of Modern Romance October 2025 5-8

‘You’ve turned to stone again,’ she snapped and pulled her hand free.

‘I’m not stone,’ he muttered.

‘You’re acting like it.’

He moved closer to her, putting his hands on her hips, staring down at her with all of the frustration that had taken up residence in his body. ‘I am more than happy to demonstrate how wrong you are,’ he said. Suddenly, all he could think about was the physical side of this and how everything made sense when they were together. How if they made love, he wouldn’t have to think about the confusion inside of him. Because when they were in bed, he was back in control, driving her wild, mastering her completely.

‘Oh yeah?’ she asked, still angry, but also, breathlessly. The same tug that dominated Dante was clearly throbbing through her, too.

His response was to stare down at her, his eyes probing hers, until her lips parted and her cheeks were flushed.

‘Fine,’ she muttered. ‘Show me.’

He didn’t need to be asked twice. He leaned down and lifted her around the waist, throwing her over his shoulder, ignoring her sound of surprise. Suddenly, he was all neolithic cave man, and she was his conquest. Nothing mattered but this.

Afterwards, he’d face the music, whatever it might be, but for now, he just wanted to be with her and make the rest of the world, his questions, doubts, uncertainty, be utterly, completely silenced.

Chapter Eleven

Charlotte was outof breath and out of fucks to give. She really was.

She’d been fuming mad after their dinner with Allegra, but it hadn’t even been Dante’s fault. Sure, he’d sat through the meal like an inert lump, for much of the time speaking only when spoken to and hardly evincing a loved-up fiancé vibe. But it was how much Charlottenoticed—how much shecared—that had really gotten under her skin.

She had genuinely enjoyed getting to know his grandmother—a woman with whom she had a great number of overlapping interests, in fact. But all night, half of her brain had been focused on Dante. Wondering about him, worrying about him, stressing that this whole fake engagement had been too much to ask of the man.

A man who clearly had a saviour complex, who’d seen a woman in distress, in need of ‘rescuing’, even though that was the very last thing she’d ever knowingly convey. Even though it was the last thing she wanted to feel or need. Had she guilted him into this? She’d known just which buttons to press—his worry for his grandmother—and she’d used that to her advantage. His first instinct had been to run a mile. Had it been the correct one?

But then, what about this?

Beside her, Dante lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, his cheeks flushed, his chest moving with each breath he took and expelled.Thiswas something neither had wanted to step away from, just yet. They hadn’t been ready.

Another thing that terrified her.

Dante turned at that moment and caught her looking at him. He didn’t smile. His face remained as it had before. Stony. Cold.

In contrast to the white hot way he’d just made love to her. Hard, fast, desperate, passionate, as though she was the beginning and end of his universe. As though he craved her with an almost life-sustaining passion.

Only, no, she was wrong. He wasn’t completely cold. She knew that now. She’d probably known it for a long time, but seeing him with his grandmother, and here in Tuscany, it was impossible to pretend any longer. He might have acted like an emotional automaton but, beneath the surface, he did have a heart. And she suspected he knew how to use it. He would never use it with her, but it was there, beating and warm.

So he wasn’t cold, so much as confused or distracted. Like something was weighing on his mind. As it was on hers. But the problem was, Charlotte didn’t want to talk about it, because her gut instinct was that talking about it would make everything so much worse.

And yet...that damned part of her, that was constantly at war with common sense, was banging into her brain, pushing against what she knew she should say and do and what shewantedto ask.

She bit into her lip, as if to physically stop herself from asking him anything.

But Dante was moving, shifting onto his elbow, so he was facing her and looking at her with an expression that was half grim, half accepting.

‘I need to tell you about my wife.’

Something tightened in the very centre of Charlotte’s chest, as if a vice had been applied to her organs. She shook her head, but no other denial came out.

‘Partly, because you deserve to know. Partly because it will make this easier. And partly, because I just...want to tell you.’

Her lips parted at that last sentence. It seemed to Charlotte that Dante had been waging the exact same war she had—a battle between good intentions and wants.

She pressed a finger to his lips. ‘I don’t need to know.’

‘Why are you fighting this?’ he pushed. ‘Do you think that knowing this about me will fundamentally change what we are?’ His eyes scanned hers.