Page 62 of Privilege

Her smile drifted away, then. Like she was seeing him all over again for the first time, but in a whole new way.

“Don’t say that,” she murmured. “You have worth. You’re worth something to them.”

He supposed.

He’d never really looked at it like that.

“And me, too,” she added quickly. “You’re worth something to me, too, Renzo.”

The words were barely out of her mouth before he was kissing her. A fast, hard kiss that he was sure took her breath away because it sure as fuck took his away, too. All he wanted to do was wrap his arms around her, keep her close, and hide this girl away from the rest of the world. She couldn’t possibly be real, right? All the shit he thought he knew about Lucia, she kept blowing right out of the water.

It was bad for him.

It was good for him, too.

Renzo found their kiss was like a familiar dance, now. Teasing lips gliding over his, and a tongue that always needed to seek out just a taste. Her hands fisted into his jacket, and she kept him close even as he forced himself to break away.

“Lucia, is you gonna come have spaghetti with us?” Diego asked, pushing in between the two like he didn’t know what was going on. He probably didn’t—poor kid. Peering up at them both, Diego smiled. “She is, right?”

Lucia wet her lips, meeting Renzo’s gaze. “Spaghetti, huh?”

“Yeah, his favorite.”

“Mine, too.”

“You don’t want to miss out, do you?” he asked.

Strangely, he found himself wishing she would say no as much as he wanted her to say yes. He wished she would say no because no matter what, there was still a part of him that felt like they just didn’t fit. Oil and water at the end of it all. His world was not hers, and her life was not meant for people like him.

And yet, he needed her to say yes because he wanted her.

Renzo had never wanted someone before.

Not like he wanted Lucia Marcello.

“Definitely not missing out,” she said, leaning up to catch his mouth in a kiss again. “But I’m making the sauce. We’ll stop at a store. They’ll have what I need.”

Renzo laughed.

What else could he do?

“Whatever you want, babe.”

ELEVEN

“Kindergarten is gonna be awesome,” Diego crowed, stuffing a whole meatball into his mouth as soon as he finished.

Lucia pressed her lips together to keep from laughing at the kid. “Oh?”

Diego nodded, and sauce dripped down from his mouth over his chin. It went right down to the collar of his yellow T-shirt, and made a mess there, too. Not that Diego seemed to mind at all. “Yep!”

“Jesus.” Renzo chuckled as he reached for napkins that Lucia already had ready for him to take from her outstretched hand. He made quick work of wiping the mess up, but as Lucia suspected, a stain remained on Diego’s shirt. “Well, that’s done with.”

The kid paid his older brother no mind. He was too busy regaling Lucia with all his stories about kindergarten, how he’d met his teacher, and all the things he was going to get to do next year when he attended. Lucia couldn’t help but notice how Renzo sat quietly through his little brother’s stories. At the small kitchen table—it only had three chairs to fit around it—the three were quite cozy in the tiny kitchen, but she liked that. Usually, she sat at tables so large for family dinners that people had to get up and bring food down to somebody if they wanted something.

The smell of spices clung to the air. There was no way in hell Lucia was having spaghetti without adding all the secret spices her grandmother used to make the meatballs and sauce something more than just food to put in your mouth. With a little extra love, regular spaghetti became an experience.

“And how do you feel about that?” Lucia asked.