“No. I did everything you asked of me. Now, let me choose the one thing in my life I still can choose.” Leo stood and then got down on one knee, a small box open in his hands, a fucking ring inside it. “Angelina Maria Baldi, you’re the love of my life. I promise I’ll always protect, love and take care of you. Will you—”
Blood filled his mouth instead of the outrageous shit he was saying.
Yeah, I punched the motherfucker silent.
5. Tino
She hadn’t said a word all the way home, and once we arrived, she stalked away with her violin case into the gardens.
“Where are you going?” I yelled after her.
“The greenhouse! Don’t follow me!”
I rolled my eyes and waved for Michele to go after her. After I’d left Leo with a bloody face at the restaurant with the useless bodyguards who had failed to stop him from following Angel to the movies before, he might show up uninvited to cause more damage.
A fucking proposal.Ma a che cazzo sta pensando, Leo?
“Tino, can I have a word?” Nicole asked.
“Not now, Nicole. Go to bed. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“I’ll have to wait for Lina.”
“No.”I’ll be waiting for her.“Don’t talk to her tonight. Tomorrow the three of us will sit together and say everything that needs to be said.”
She sighed and nodded reluctantly. “I don’t mean to interfere between you and your son, but punching him like that in front of Lina…”
What the fuck was I supposed to do? Give him my fucking blessing or wait for her to say yes? “You shouldn’t interfere,” I warned.
She blinked, startled for a second. I never spoke to her harshly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Just for the record, she wouldn’t have said yes.”
“She didn’t exactly say no, did she? She accepted his gift, his love declaration. She stood there, tears in her eyes, gasping and emotional while he got down on one knee.” Fire gnashed through my whole body. “She did absolutely nothing to stop him. She fucking led him on.”
“Tino—”
“Buonanotte, Nicole.”
I made sure she went to her room before I let myself in Angel’s. I thought about drugging Nicole like that night with the thunderstorm, but that was a one-time thing so that Angel couldn’t have slept with her. Tonight was different. I wasn’t going to watch Angel in her sleep while I lay in her bed.
I was staying the night. Under the bed.
Wasn’t that where I was supposed to be? I was the monster under her bed.
Prowling through the room, I made my way over to her bedside. I took off my shoes and hid them under the bed. Then I sat, filling my nostrils with her lingering scent in the sheets, and cursed my cock for wanting her so badly.
After the death of my wife, whenever I felt the need to fuck, I’d go through a long list of women who had no problem throwing themselves at the most eligible bachelor in town hoping and trying for something that would never happen.
But now… The thought of being inside any woman other than Angel was hideous. Useless.
Yes, she was fucking seventeen. Yes, I shouldn’t think of her that way. Not yet. But I did. And so did Leo. He fucking proposed to her. If she’d said yes, he could have been her husband in a week, sinking his cock in her virgin pussy that was mine.
The thought alone made me want to flay someone alive. Angel was mine, and she’d continue to be mine. I’d make her mine in every way humanly possible.
Me. Not Leo. There was only room for one monster in her world.
Footsteps echoed outside the room. Hers. Quickly, I dropped to my knees and then flattened myself against the carpet. It took some maneuvering, but I managed to slide myself under the bed. Once I was comfortable, my face pointed to the mattress, I relaxed. She’d stopped looking under her bed for months now. She wouldn’t look for me. And with being her free self without knowing I was watching, with her right where I heard her every move, her every tear and breath, I could close my eyes and sleep forever.
Click!
