I stared at him for a while, my heart swollen with emotion. “You’re all I want, so there is no choice—at least to me.” Our relationship had been relatively brief but had traveled at breakneck speed since the start. I felt like I’d already had this man in my life for years. Even a lifetime. After our first nighttogether, we were just…together. We only had one single date before we jumped into a serious relationship where we spent every night together. I cooked for him like he was my husband, and he kissed me like I was his wife whenever he came home. It made my father’s disapproval even more ridiculous. If only he knew…
Wolfe continued to stare at me across the table, his eyes smothering me with affection and possessiveness over the distance. “That means a lot to me.”
My eyes flicked down when the intimacy became too much. My heart was wounded from the trauma of loving this man. He didn’t let me hide my emotions. He demanded my presence in every moment, even when we weren’t in the same room together.
“I warned him that would happen, and I’m sure it pissed him off to be wrong.”
I looked at him again. “You did?”
“I told him you would never turn your back on me. That what we have is a lifetime commitment.”
My heart started to race so quickly I could feel the pulse in my neck like a drumbeat. It was harder to hold his stare because of how direct it was. His expression was blank, but his eyes could convey a complex weave of emotions in just a stare.
I’d been afraid to say those words to him because of the irrevocable bond it would create, but it looked as if that bond was already there. I hadn’t wanted a relationship when I met him, but I somehow jumped into a marriage without making a single vow. I knew exactly how difficult and deranged he could be, but it didn’t plant a seed of doubt in my heart. “I love?—”
“No.”
Every single muscle in my body flexed so hard that I felt myself flinch. He didn’t raise his voice and his tone didn’t suggest anger, but he was so direct whenever he spoke, it felt like a harsh provocation.
A slow smile moved over his lips to dampen his previous abruptness. “He told you.”
My pulse was loud in each ear, muffling my hearing slightly. My focus was honed like a knife that went from dull to razor- sharp. I felt so much adrenaline, it was as if I were on the verge of battle.
“That wasn’t how I wanted my future wife to hear it for the first time.”
Oh my god.A cold sweat broke out on my palms and on my neck. We were about to cross a line that could never be uncrossed. About to embark on a future that would be as beautiful as it would be tumultuous.
“So you don’t get to say it first.” His hand moved to his chest, where he pointed a single finger into one of his pecs a couple of times. “I do. Because when our kids ask about our story, I want to tell them that I loved you first. That I loved you the first moment I fucking looked at you. And that I told you when I knew you were ready to say it back.”
My life had irrevocably changed the moment Wolfe stepped onto my family’s vineyard. I still remembered the first time I saw him when he entered my father’s office. I’d thought he was the hottest hunk of man I’d ever laid eyes on, but I never expected him to be mine. Never expected to have the love we’d growntogether. Never expected I’d be lucky enough to spend my life with him.
He continued to stare at me across the table, and I was certain he hadn’t blinked in minutes. He had a focus I’d never witnessed anyone else execute. The way he stared at me… No one in my life had ever looked at me like that. “I love you, Francesca.”
The adrenaline reached a crescendo and burst before it started to recede. All the tension and the excitement and anxiety faded away, and then I felt a calmness I’d never known before. A tranquil peace, a beautiful serenity. In that instant, it made the falling-out with my father irrelevant. My life and my future were with this man across from me—and that was all that mattered now. “I love you too.”
A slow smile spread across his lips, and that concentrated look in his eyes started to soften. It was subtle and hardly noticeable to anyone who didn’t know him as well as I did, but I saw it. Saw the way my words meant the world to him, the way his meant the world to me.
17
FRANCESCA
I slept like a rock.
Slept like Warren hadn’t tried to steal me from my home a few nights ago. Slept like my father hadn’t taken away my inheritance when I didn’t comply with his demands. Slept like I didn’t have a care in the world.
When I woke up in the big, comfy bed, there was a gorgeous man beside me, and the first thing he did when he looked at me was smile. His big hand slid my shirt up and over my hip as he snuggled closer to me. His fingers grazed over my ass and gave it a squeeze before he brought his caress down my thigh. “Morning, baby.”
“Morning.” The drapes were closed, so the room was dark even though it was probably late morning outside. Hints of light came in through the gaps above the floor, so it was enough to see his handsome face next to mine.
“Want to take a trip?”
“To where?” I asked.
“Palermo. I can show you my place. Take you to all the hot spots.”
I’d been to Palermo before, but just for a weekend trip here and there. Hadn’t spent as much time there as I’d like.
“Wear a skimpy little bikini at the beach.” His wide grin was visible in the dark.
