His teasing mood disappeared behind a frown, his brow furrowing. “I remember your hand on my cock, stroking me while I fed you that pasta. It’s more sensory memory than a vivid visual, but it absolutely happened. Yet I can’t recall anything about Brazil.”
“Maybe it’s because we’re here and not there,” Leela suggested.
He considered that for a moment. “Perhaps.” His tone implied he didn’t believe that at all.
She took another bite of her food while he continued to think.
He’d ordered a dish with wine sauce as the base. After she finished swallowing, she reached across to steal one of his penne noodles. His irises swirled with admiration as he observed her. Then he mimed her actions by taking some of her pasta for himself as well.
It was warmly intimate.
Just like that night.
And all the others, her soul whispered. She tried to chase the memories, to define them, to determine if they were truly real or some sort of figment spell meant to distract her from something obvious.
“The events of Brazil are rather dull in my head,” Balthazar said, interrupting her inner musings. “They hold no real importance, meaning there’s nothing about those memories that would make me even think of them at all. It was just another experience, one I’d probably never consider again because nothing about it calls to me.”
His words struck her right in the heart, immediately killing her appetite.
Because that weekend… that weekend had been one of the most memorable weekends of her life.
And he’d just called itdull.
Which wasn’t his fault. She’d asked Vera to remove his memories. She’d known the consequences and had agreed to pay the price for them.
But to hear him speak about their profound connection as though it didn’t matter at all truly put the pain into proper perspective.
That weekend meant nothing to him at all. He’d never considered it again afterward—and would never think of it again—while she’d spent the last few months constantly reminiscing about their intimate connection.
He reached across the table to take control of her fork, his strong fingers twirling it around some pasta before bringing it to her lips. “We’ll make new memories, Lee,” he promised her. “Now open that pretty mouth and swallow for me. I want to see how much you can take.”
If he remembered Brazil, he’d already know.
His eyes narrowed. “Stop punishing yourself and swallow.”
“Some might argue that’s an ideal punishment for the crime,” she replied, infusing a double meaning to her words.
He grinned. “An idea for after you crawl, perhaps.” He pressed the fork to her lips. “Open for me, baby.”
She did, only because she wanted to obey, and she appreciated what he was doing—distracting her with sexual puns and lighter thoughts.
But that didn’t erase the guilt consuming her inside for what she’d done.
Maybe not guilt so much as sadness.
She wanted him to remember, to understand the beauty of that weekend. Just as she wanted to remember whatever this was in Venice, whatever memory they were chasing.
“That’s the interesting part,” Balthazar murmured as he prepared another bite for her. “I have this deep sense of understanding and familiarity of our time together here. Yet I feel nothing about Brazil. We know Vera took my memories there. But whoever stole my recollection of our time in Venice clearly wasn’t as thorough.”
She frowned as she chewed the pasta he’d just slid into her mouth.
“It feels too different to be the same person,” he continued. “So either someone else tampered with my memories here, or it’s someone weaving a very powerful enchantment between us for an unknown benefit.”
Leela swallowed as he took a bite for himself out of her meal. “I don’t know of a power that can weave an enchantment like this. Some sort of Cupid type, maybe? But that’s my line of existence—fertility—and none of us have powers that facilitate this sort of hallucination trip.”
He set her fork back down and took a sip of his wine. “Then it’s more likely the former, that someone other than Vera altered our memories.”
She enjoyed her own healthy gulp of alcohol while she considered that possibility. “There’s a whole line of memory manipulators, but aside from Vera’s mother, she’s the best.”
