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‘Our marriage is immune from this.’
Scepticism showed in her expression. ‘So you’re telling me I can walk away from you without consequence? That you’ll let me go and not set out to destroy Carlo?’
He ground his teeth as he processed her request and finally shook his head. ‘No. The only thing stopping me from eviscerating him is you.’
‘No, not me,’ she said flatly. ‘The fact I’m willing to go along with this charade.’
‘You just said you love me,’ he responded tautly, ignoring the throbbing deep in his chest. ‘How can you then call our marriage a charade?’
‘Because love doesn’t exist in a black hole. My love means nothing without yours in return.’
His eyes sparked with hers but he didn’t give her what she needed—and his words would have been meaningless, in any event. Meaningless when he was showing her with his actions how little he cared for her.
Sadness for the path he was set upon curdled her blood. ‘Can’t you see that you’re pursuing revenge even when it’s destroying your life? You are letting this feud become the whale to your Ahab.’
His eyes locked to hers and his chest felt as though a slab of bricks had been laid over it. ‘I am doing what is needed.’
She hissed like a cat in an alley. ‘Don’t be ridiculous! To what? Avenge your father? I’m sorry, Antonio, but he’s dead.’ She winced apologetically. ‘And I don’t think he’d want you to use his death as an excuse to ruin your life. I don’t think he’d want you to destroy your marriage in his name.’
He straightened his shoulders, staring at her down the bridge of his nose, nostrils flaring with his attempt to stay calm. She was his wife, but now she was taking it too far. ‘You do not know anything about him.’
‘I know that he was a man who took you to the park on weekends. Who cleared his schedule to read you books, to play with you. I know that he was a man who loved you and wanted you to be happy. Don’t you owe it to him to try to move on from this?’
A beat of silence passed, heavy with her words, her hopes, his darkness. And then he spoke clearly, coldly and with finality. ‘I am doing this for my father. I promised myself I would make Carlo pay for what he did and now I have the means of doing so. Do you think this won’t make me happy?’
She took a step back, her expression like a wounded animal.
‘Even when that means I’ll leave?’
He stared at her, his eyes roaming her face, and then he shrugged—he appeared so cold, so measured, when his insides were shredding. ‘If you truly love me, then you will understand what motivates me. You will accept this anger is a part of me, and you won’t seek to change me.’
‘I want to help you!’ she denied hotly. ‘No one should
live their life with so much hatred. This is so pointless! So futile! I’m not saying you and Carlo should become best friends, heaven forbid, but can’t you at least try to put the past in the past?’
‘It is a part of who I am,’ he said simply. ‘As sure as I have two arms and legs, hating him is in my soul.’
‘And loving him is in mine. I won’t have my child be torn between us—feeling as though he’s betraying you because he adores his uncle.’
‘I’ve told you, I have no intention of letting our child be caught up in this.’
‘How can you possibly prevent it?’ She didn’t wait for an answer . ‘And what of me? You said last night you’d never do anything that would upset me. Can’t you see how this is pulling me apart?’
A muscle spasmed low in his jaw. ‘Have I spoken to you of your brother since we married? Have I brought up our feud, even once?’
She blinked, her expression one of bafflement. ‘You haven’t needed to! It’s been in every conversation with us, every day! Why do you think I never speak of them?’
‘Because they are nothing to us!’
She ground her teeth together. ‘It’s my father. He took me in when I was completely alone—’
‘And you were miserable with him! That’s why you hid away in that tiny village...’
‘Yes, I wanted a different life, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love them!’ She closed her eyes for a moment, sucked in a breath, hoping it would breathe strength into her. ‘It doesn’t mean I’ll let you destroy them.’
His eyes narrowed and the threat she was making struck something in his chest, like a match to petrol. ‘I don’t need your permission.’
‘You need my shares,’ she pointed out.
