I choked down the panic, but the fear remained as I watched her step into the water. Visceral dread washed through me. And for a moment I was rooted to the stone terrace, unable to move, unable to think.
Was she intending to kill herself to escape me? The way my mother had, to escape him…?
Had I done that to her? Had I caused this by my actions? Of course I had. Because I had made her feel she was worthless, that she meant nothing to me, in order to protect myself.
Adrenaline coursed through my body on a wave of pain, propelling me to the steps to stop her. But as I charged down them two at a time, a wave of terror and regret rose up my throat to choke me.
Mia
‘Fermati, Mia!’
I swung round to see Vito running across the sand towards me. The way he had so many weeks ago now.
I’d come to the cove to feel the sea on my body, to cool the burning pain in my heart and to figure out how to go on from here. I had watched Vito leave the villa an hour ago from our bedroom window on a motorbike, a gun holstered under his arm.
But when he reached me this time, instead of the fury from weeks ago or the cold resentment from this morning, all I saw was fear.
He sank to his knees in front of me and wrapped his arms around my legs, rubbing his cheek against my belly, holding me so tightly I could feel his stubble through the cotton negligée.
‘Do not do it. Do not leave me. I didn’t kill him. I couldn’t.’
‘Vito!’ I thrust shaking fingers into his hair to pull his head back, hearing the anguish in his voice even as my heart lifted and rammed my chest wall.
His blue eyes looked pale in the moonlight, and wild with grief.
‘Y-you didn’t kill your brother?’
He shook his head. ‘The men have beaten him, which is what he deserves,’ he said with venom. But then he grasped my bottom to press his face even harder into my belly, his voice muffled when he added, ‘And he will remain a prisoner here—until I decide what to do with him. But no, I did not kill him.’
I stroked his hair, the short, silky spikes damp with sweat, my heart so light it felt as if it might fly off into the starry night above us. The night which had seemed so dark and forbidding only moments before.
‘I’m glad,’ I murmured, then swallowed down the searing hope, not wanting to let it overwhelm me too soon. ‘But why did you spare him?’
He let out a heavy sigh, then drew his head back so he could look into my eyes.
‘Because you were right,’ he said, his voice a growl of regret. ‘Dante was the only person I ever truly cared for, until I met you… He was my brother, and I made myself hate him. I thought this made me strong, invincible. But then you came into my life and made me want things I did not understand.’ He blinked, his own eyes shimmering with tears now too, tears I knew he would never shed for anyone but me. ‘I thought if I had feelings for you, they would make me weak. I thought I could control them if I controlled you. But then I fell in love with you anyway… And I could not control any of it.’
I jolted, shocked by the pain in his voice and the joy surging into my heart.
‘And it terrified you?’ I murmured, but I already knew the answer to that. Because our love had terrified me too.
He nodded, then climbed to his feet to draw me against him, to press his lips to my hair. He held me so tightly, I could feel his voice reverberating in his sternum as he spoke.
‘Yes, it did.Youterrify me, Mia. Your bravery, your trust, your passion. I have been scared to feel anything for so long. I never wanted to feel this way about anyone. But with you, I did not ever have a choice. This is ironic, no?’ He huffed. ‘When you once accused me of taking your choices away from you.’
I laughed. I couldn’t help it, he sounded so annoyed and dumbfounded.
He clasped my cheeks to tilt my head back and push my hair away from my face. He brushed his thumbs over my tear-streaked cheeks as the emotion of his declaration blindsided me again.
‘Don’t cry, Mia. It destroys me,’ he said, pressing his lips to my cheeks to kiss away the tears, even though they were happy tears now. ‘I’m so sorry for what I said, for what I did this morning. For treating you like a whore when you will always be a goddess to me. You must forgive me.’
I let out a jagged sigh, moved by the genuine agony in his voice—and the tenderness I knew he would only ever let me see.
I cradled his cheek, felt his jaw tense, and let my heart show in my eyes. ‘Okay, I’ll forgive you, but I think there has to be payback,’ I said, trying for flirtatious but getting overjoyed instead.
A sensual smile spread across his lips. Then he swung me into his arms to march towards the beach sofa he’d had installed weeks ago, after the first time we’d made love here on the sand.
‘Name it,’ he said. ‘Whatever penance you decide, I will pay it, and gladly.’
