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"No." I pulled my legs onto the bed, crawling away to stand on the other side and go to the closet. He seemed frozen; stuck to the spot I'd left him. I hurried to shove some things back into the suitcase I'd brought with me. I knew when he kissed me that it could only end in disaster. I just hadn’t expected how soon that disaster would burn everything to the ground.
"No?" he asked finally, and I looked through the closet door to see him unfurling his long, lean muscles to standing. Something in his posture gave me pause, somehow made him seem so much larger than he normally was with all his swagger.
"No," I repeated in a whisper, zipping my bag closed and going into the bedroom. I had to pass through to get to my phone downstairs so I could call Yavin to pick me up.
He sidestepped into the doorway to block me in, his dark eyes glittering dangerously.
My heart stuttered in my chest, pulsing like a warning.
Danger.
Danger.
It seemed to throb with every beat, and I backed away a step when he took one step toward me. "I do not recall asking," he said slowly.
"You don't just get to decide we're getting married! I am never getting married again," I hissed. "I've been divorced for three days!"
His gaze darkened, his lips twisting in the beginning of a snarl as savagery took over his face. "That wasn't a real marriage. No man treats his wife the way he hurt you."
My voice was barely a whisper when I risked everything to stand my ground. He'd lost his damn mind. "Neither is this."
He took another step toward me, nostrils flaring when his chest and torso pressed against mine. I dared to glare up at him when he cupped my cheek gently. It gave me a moment of comfort, a moment of reassurance that my sweet Lino was still in there. Somewhere. "You will get dressed. We will go to Matteo’s where the priest is waiting for us, and when we get there you will put on the fucking dress, Samara."
"Or what?" I ground out. Something inside me needed to rebel, needed to know just how far he would take this. I didn't know if it was that part of me he'd broken by admitting our wedding would be for my safety, or it had merely stoked the flame of whatever Connor created when he betrayed me.
"You will not leave this house. You won't return to work. I will keep you locked up in a gilded cage where only I can hear you sing, Little Dove. I will not risk you, even if it means I have to make you hate me to keep you safe."
I huffed out a breath in surprise as I stared up at him in shock, my bottom lip trembling as tears burned the back of my throat. His thumb caressed my cheekbone, as if he could feel how that break inside me cracked even larger.
Like a fault line, snapping my world in two.
The two sides of the lin
e warred within me, the one pleading me to take it for what it was. Lino would be mine, my husband.
But the other side clung to reality. That it wasn't real, and it never would be.
“Then you’re no better than him!” I hissed. “Trapping me in a marriage that I don’t want like this.” His face contorted in pain, and I immediately regretted the words. I knew he was different to the depths of my soul, but I wouldn’t let another man make me a prisoner in my own life.
His eyes darkened as he stared down at me, his jaw clenching in his anger. “I am nothing like him. Everything I do is to keep you safe. Everything. Even this.”
"You wouldn't do this to me," I whispered, but the tear that wet Lino's thumb said otherwise. He would. I knew Lino meant every word he ever said to me. It turned out he'd even meant it when he said he would marry me one day, though he couldn't have known it at the time.
"When have you ever known me to say I'll do something and not follow through?" His voice turned sad, melancholy, as if he could sense just how close to the breaking point I hovered. "Let me keep you safe, vita mia."
I shuddered out a breath, feeling my nostrils flare as I tried to find the words for what I needed to say. "If I do this, you'll let me leave? Go to work?"
Ever the most honest person I knew, he gave me an answer he knew I wouldn't want. "You'll have your own security, but yes. You'll be allowed to come and go as needed."
I swallowed before nodding. I knew that after what had happened to Ivory, Lino wouldn't take any chances with my safety. The wife of a Bellandi was a valuable commodity, even one who wasn't a true wife. No Bellandi would tolerate the insult that came with taking something of theirs away. "I'll never forgive you for this," I whispered. I knew the words were true. The sting of betrayal coursed through me that he would force me to do something I didn't want to do. Something I thought he would never do to me, even if it was for my own safety.
I trusted him, and he'd broken that.
"You will. It may take time, but there's no divorce for Bellandi's. We have a lifetime together." His lips touched my forehead briefly before he withdrew. He grabbed the dress off the bed, snagging one of his suits from the closet and made for the door.
“Lino!” I protested, trailing after him in a flurry of movement. “So put a guard on me. I don’t have to be your wife to be protected. I’ll do whatever you say to stay safe. I promise. Just please, don’t make me do this,” I sobbed.
He spun back to look at me, the savage look in his eyes making me flinch back a step-in self-preservation. “Get dressed,” he growled, striding out the door without another word. “We’re leaving in ten minutes. Ivory will help you with your makeup when we get there.”
