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“Can I see your children?”
Cassio’s brows furrowed. “The dog stays here, and we have to be quiet. I don’t want them to wake.”
“Where should I put Loulou?”
“We lock it in a room because the thing can’t behave itself.”
I pressed my lips together, following Cassio as he led me into the lobby and motioned at a door.
I pushed it open and my heart clenched. It must have been a storage room before, judging by the small window and shelves lining the walls. A torn apart basket, a litter box, and two empty bowls were the only indication that a dog lived here. There were no toys. I picked up one of the bowls and handed it to Cassio. “Can you fill it with water?”
Cassio regarded the bowl, then me.
“Please.” Loulou’s living arrangements had to change, and they would change, but today was only my first day. I’d have to be clever about my battle against my husband. He took the bowl and disappeared. I headed over to the torn apart basket and set Loulou down. She curled into herself. She must have let out her frustration on her basket if its destroyed state was an indication. No wonder considering she’d probably spent most of her days alone in this room. What had happened in this house? I stroked her head when Cassio walked back in with the water bowl. He set it down, and the moment he stepped back, Loulou trotted over to it and drank.
I straightened. I couldn’t hold back anymore. “How long has she been locked inside this room?”
Cassio’s expression tightened. “The dog’s out of control. I won’t have it shit and pee everywhere, not to mention snap at my children and everyone else.”
“How can you expect Loulou to behave if nobody takes care of her? She isn’t a machine, she’s a living being, and from what I see she hasn’t been treated the way she was supposed to. If you have an animal, you have to take care of it and not treat it like a thing you can put in a corner and take out when you feel like it.”
“I didn’t want the dog! Gaia did, and then I was left to deal with it like everything else.” He snapped his mouth shut as if he’d said more than he wanted, breathing harshly. Loulou hid in her basket at his outburst.
I stood my ground. “Then why didn’t you give Loulou to people who want her?” I kept my voice calm. Meeting Cassio’s anger with my own seemed like an unwise choice.
Cassio shook his head. “Let’s go upstairs. I have a busy day tomorrow.”
“Why?” I touched his forearm.
“Because Daniele lost his mother. He doesn’t need to lose this too!”
“I thought Loulou snaps at him.”
“She does,” Cassio said. “And she’s not allowed near him.”
“Then why—”
“Enough.” Cassio’s voice could have cut steel. He nodded toward the door. I walked out of the small room. Cassio closed it, locking Loulou in once more.
“Does Sybil walk her?”
Cassio gritted his teeth as he led me up the stairs. “No. It’s got that cat box in the room.”
“It needs to be walked. It’s not a cat.”
Cassio sent me a look that made it clear he expected me to shut up right this moment.
“I’ll walk it, then. You have a leash, right?”
He stopped on the second-floor landing, a vein in his temple throbbing. “You don’t have time to walk the dog. You’ve got my kids to take care of.”
His kids. He made it sound like I was his nanny—with the added bonus of sleeping with him.
“Kids need fresh air too.”
He gave me a condescending look as if I was a delusional child in need of reprimand. He didn’t think I’d be able to handle his children, much less a dog on top of it.
Maybe he was right, but one of us had to try. I had a feeling that no matter how in control of his soldiers, his city, and his life Cassio seemed, his own home and his family had slipped out of his hands. He was incapable of fixing it; maybe he’d even given up hope that it could be fixed. And now here I was, without the hint of knowledge about dogs or kids that went beyond what I’d read in books, supposed to deal with all this.
In the months since our engagement, I’d dreaded our wedding night. Now it seemed naïve that the simple act of sex had held so much trepidation for me. Sharing a bed with Cassio was the least of my battles. Fixing this family, making it somehow into my family, that was the most daunting challenge I could imagine.
Looking up into Cassio’s exhausted and wary eyes, I promised myself to master it.
Annoyance hummed under my skin. Giulia peered up at me calmly, thinking she knew everything. It was the advantage of youth—believing you knew how the world ran and convinced you could shape it to your ideals. She’d soon realize that ideals were just teenage foolishness.
