Page 45 of The Temptation

His eyes narrow as he storms in my direction and snatches the remote out of my hand, turning the television off.

“Hey, I was watching that!”

“And now you’re not. And for the record, I didn’t kidnap you, and I definitely don’t want you to fall in love with me.”

I stare at him, lips parted, with the words I want to say hanging thick like smoke between us.Too late for that.

He remains silent as he stands there with the remote clenched in his hand, as if it personally offended him. His jaw twitches, it’s the same tic he uses when he’s trying not to say something hurtful or reckless.

“You don’t get to decide that,” I say softly as I clamber off the lounge. He’s so much taller than me that I have to crane my neck to make eye contact when I come to a stop in front of him. “What if I said I didn’t need three hundred and sixty-five days?”

My words have him faltering for a second as he lets them settle in. Once they do, he shakes his head, half laughing like I’ve told him a joke he doesn’t find funny.

“You’re confusing obsession with love.”

“And you’re confusing fear with control.”

Those words land like a slap. I see it in the way his eyes flicker, hopefully putting another crack in all that carefully constructed armour of his.

The air around us is charged; it crackles with every unspoken word. Everything we’re not saying presses down on us, thick and suffocating.

He falters for a moment, and a thrill shoots through me when I think he’s about to close the distance and say or do something tangible for once. To stop hiding behind the truth, but my whole body deflates when he turns his back on me instead.

I blow out a puff of frustrated air as red-hot tears burn the back of my eyes. I’m tired of him running every time things get hard.

“I never pictured you as a coward, De Luca.”

“I’m not a coward, Lucia,” he says, his voice rough but dangerously quiet.

His back is still to me, and in a way, I’m glad, because if it weren’t, he’d be able to see the unshed tears that are now pooling in my stupid eyes.

“I just don’t want to hurt you.”

“Too late for that. You’re already hurting me, Romeo,” I say softly, the truth slipping out before I can stop it.

He remains rigid and unmoving, and the silence that follows is suffocating, pressing in from all sides.

It’s at that very moment I’m hit with the cold realisation I’m already in way too deep with this man. And he’s not going to break my heart someday, because he already has.

Chapter 10

Romeo

Islip out the front door and jog down the driveway when one of my men pulls up out front. Lucia has locked herself away again, but I can’t blame her for wanting to put distance between us. I’m constantly raining on her parade and ruining any semblance of happiness she seems to find while we’re stuck here, and I hate myself for it.

This woman has me tied up in so many knots I can’t fucking see straight. My irrational behaviour when it comes to her isn’t about control or anger … it’s fear. Fear of losing her, of not being enough, of messing up something I don’t know how to handle, because I’ve never felt anything this real before. I don’t know how to love her right, and it’s killing me.

I feel like an absolute cunt for what I did to her yesterday, especially after she stood up for me with my mum. No one’s ever done that for me before, not like that. And I can’t even find the right words for what it meant.

She didn’t flinch. Didn’t hesitate. Just stepped in like it was the most natural thing in the world. For a moment, it felt like I wasn’t in this alone. Like someone actually had my back.

And then I ruined it.

I had no right to stop her from watching that movie, and to make it worse, I didn’t just leave the room. I took the remote with me and hid it like a child. I tried to justify my reasoning in my head, but the truth is, I was jealous.

Not just irritated or annoyed, I was fuckingjealous.

Of a damn movie.