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She painted such a clear and pretty picture I can see it perfectly in my mind, her becoming round with my baby, holding our child in her arms, her smiling face as she runs around with our little one at the park, flour smudged on her and our kids’ faces. And for the first time in my life, I know without a shadow of a doubt what I want in my life.
Her. And her dreams. They’re my dreams too, only I never knew I wanted those things.
“Is that why you were so unhappy in your marriage? You wanted a baby and he didn’t?” I prompt, forcing myself to tamp down the jealousy even the thought of her carrying another man’s child brings forth.
“Heavens no.” She shakes her head, her hair tickling my nipple. “That’s all I was good for to Ferro—to give him an heir. But you wanna know a secret?” she asks in a whisper, a little devilish gleam in her beautiful eyes, and she lifts an eyebrow and smirks conspiratorially.
I can’t help but grin. I love this new, playful side of her. “I want to know all your secrets, piccolina.”
She does a little dance with her shoulders as she singsongs, “I was on the piiill.”
My own brow rises at that. “You were on birth control? Why? How?”
She turns back on her side to face me fully, bringing her hands up to rest beneath her cheek. “Fertility specialist. I was lucky enough not to get pregnant the first couple of months after we got married, and he sent me to Dr. Lizith Stein, because she and her husband are on The Ruin’s approved list. As I imagine you are, doctor.” She practically purrs my title, and it immediately sends images of us playing doctor and patient in bed—something that’s never crossed my mind before, being an oncologist. A gynecologist—maybe. A chiropractor—for sure. But a cancer doctor—not so much.
“You got birth control… from a fertility doctor?” I prompt, not making the connections of how that would’ve taken place.
She shrugs against me. “She’s still a gynecologist. She just specializes in making babies. And I took a chance. Desperate times called for desperate measures, and I had to just trust the girl code—that she wouldn’t throw me under the bus and tell my husband I didn’t want to have his baby. I told her what my life was like, which didn’t surprise her, being in The Ruin herself, and she took pity on me and started sneaking me birth control pills. I mean, she’s no saint or anything. I have to pay a fortune for the lack of paper trail and to keep her mouth shut, but she is an ally, one of my only ones. Hell, maybe the only one.”
My brow furrows at this. “Not anymore, Bella. That may have been true before, but no longer are you alone in this fucked-up world. You have me now, and there’s no one who would fight for you harder than I will.”
Her face softens, and her eyes grow misty, but she smiles through the unshed tears. “I’m truly starting to believe that, DeLuca. Going to my father… I don’t think there’s anything else you could’ve done to prove how much you are on my side and actually… care about me. Which is just crazy, because we only met a few days ago. This is all so fast and—”
“It’s no more crazy or fast than being betrothed to someone at birth. It’s less wild than marrying someone just to solidify family business. While I’ve never been in love before, I find the notion of marrying someone because of that emotion far more adequate a reason. Business dealings, making people pawns of manipulation, that has nothing to do with God and joining two lives together in holy matrimony,” I tell her, speaking openly like I never have with a woman before, or anyone for that matter.
“Are you a religious man, darling? I thought doctors leaned more on the side of science than God.”
Darling. The way she said it… almost lovingly, in no way mocking, made my heart feel heavier in my chest. No one had ever called me something endearing like that before.
“I’m not exactly religious, more spiritual, I’d say. I believe science proves God is real every day. In my line of work, I see miracles happen, completely unexplainable recoveries, people with Stage 4 cancers who suddenly go into remission when it seemed like no treatments were working and all hope was lost. Plus, there are quantum scientists out there who claim they can prove humans have souls. Yet a soul is a purely spiritual thing. It’s something I choose to believe in, if not because I think it’s true, then because it hurts to think something like that doesn’t exist.”
“What do you mean?” she asks, watching my lips as I speak.
