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Not want.
Sheneededme to do this. And we both knew that I would.
PUSHED TOO FAR
DOVE
Idrove away, my heart bleeding out in his hands and he didn’t even realize it. Dominic DeLuca was convinced this was some sort of game that I was playing. I had seen it in his dark eyes—the questioning, the hesitation, the uncertainty of what I was asking him to do without telling him why.
But Dominic, of all people, should have realized that if I was leaving information out, there was a damn good reason for it. I couldn’t tell him anything without Trevor finding out about it and doing what he’d threatened. I’d promised that I’d marry him, be a good little wife, and play the part for as long as I had to. I was determined to eventually find a way out of this charade. But for now, it was the only way to keep my dad from going to prison. I knew what people in jail did to the cops who ended up there. If there was any way I could stop that from happening, I had to do it.
Being in Dominic’s presence, sharing the same air, had almost made me pass out. It was unnatural to be that close to him and not touch him. My body wanted to move to its rightful place—in his arms—but my brain refused to allow it. I had to be strong. He had known what he was doing when he came to meet me—dressed in my favorite navy-blue suit, looking stunning with his dark hair gelled back to perfection and the beard on his face perfectly trimmed.
I’d loved that man my whole life. How was I supposed to live without him?
Dominic and I had a history of pushing too far. We’d tested limits and boundaries, all in the name of love, asking some pretty questionable things of the other. All of that was mostly in the past though. We had been young when we first fell in love, first became each other’s everything, and realized that this was what books, movies, and TV shows always talked about. Other halves. People you couldn’t live without. A partner who would fight through the pits of hell to be by your side and never let go.
I believed in soul mates because I’d found mine. And I had constantly made him prove it. I was insecure in the beginning, unsure that a guy as cool and confident as Dominic could feel for me the way I felt for him, so my asks usually involved other girls. They wanted him. He was mine. He let them know they’d never have a chance in the most humiliating way possible. I asked him for cruelty. He delivered.
I could be petty and immature. Dominic never scolded me for it though. Not the way I did to myself when I was alone at night, torn between feeling elated that he could wield such harshness in my honor and hating myself for asking him to do it.
I knew for a fact that there was no other soul on earth who would do the things that Dominic did for me. And in return, when he asked me for the same proof of loyalty, I never hesitated. We were always making each other walk through fire.
We both knew how screwed up we were acting back in those days, actually talked about it a lot, but we couldn’t seem to help ourselves. I’d grown addicted to making him jump through hoops to prove his devotion. I craved his attention, needed it to survive at times.
And Dominic… he would do anything I asked, just to keep me happy… andhis. He wanted something that belonged to him, something he didn’t ever have to share with anyone else, and I was all too willing to be exactly that.
Growing up in a household filled with betrayal and lies did that to a person. Once Dominic was old enough to figure out how the political games worked, he started questioning every single thing he’d ever been told. Where did the spinning of stories end? Not in the sanctity of home, like I had naively told him one time when we were younger. No, a story got spun twenty-four hours a day, three hundred sixty-five days a year if that was what needed to happen. It didn’t matter who was lied to. All that mattered was that the right people believed the lies. And then did what they were told. Not to mention, kept their mouths shut.
It didn’t occur to me that the people you were supposed to trust the most, like parents, could be the biggest deceivers. That fact only further cemented my and Dominic’s connection. He couldn’t trust anyone, except me. He was growing up in a house where he felt like a pawn in a game he didn’t want to play. His parents both tried to mold him into the perfect future politician even though he didn’t want it. Every time he tried to rebel, he was punished and told it was for his own good.
He’d made me promise that I’d never lie to him and never leave him.
I always did as he’d asked… until today.
My dad, on the other hand, was one of the good guys. Or at least, he tried to be.
I’d overheard someone in our home one night during my freshman year of high school, offering my dad a bribe of some kind. I didn’t really get what they were asking, but I understood what they wanted my father to do. He needed to look the other way and arrive late to a call, giving the man enough time to get away without being caught. Being the chief of police who respected the badge and a stand-up guy with integrity, he told them no. At first.
Then, I heard the man mention my name.
And then say something about my mom.
She’d died when I was just a toddler. An unfortunate car accident—or so I’d been told. I had even been in the car at the time but was somehow spared. I started wondering if it hadn’t been anaccidentat all and hoped that wasn’t the case even though I’d heard rumors to the contrary over the years, mentioning the Firenzi family.
My dad’s voice rose, his tone angry. He didn’t like being blackmailed, and he said as much, his fist punching the wood table in frustration.
He gave in that night, telling the man that this wouldn’t become a habit—the asking for favors by threatening what he held dear.
Once he opens that door, how the hell is he ever supposed to close it again?I wondered, and Dominic asked the same thing after I told him what happened.
I watched my dad take an envelope filled with money before tossing it on the floor, the bills spilling out. And I knew he’d only done it to protect me because I’d been threatened somehow. He tried so hard to be good, but even a righteous man caved when the people he loved were on the line.
Even as a teenager, I understood his betrayal in that moment and didn’t hate him for it. I couldn’t. I loved my dad and knew that he’d do anything to keep me safe. But that night, something inside me had shifted ever so slightly. I never looked at people quite the same way again.
When someone you trusted implicitly could do the wrong thing, no matter the reasoning, it changed the way you saw the world. And knowing that others would use and manipulate for their own personal gain scared me in a way I’d never really considered before. It was one thing when Dominic talked about it, but it was another to witness it firsthand. But the most shocking realization for me was recognizing where my own weaknesses lay if the tables were ever turned against me.
After that evening, Dominic and I had created a world where only the two of us existed. A secret fantasy of a place, where we were never let down, lied to, or betrayed in any way. There was only love. Which was how I’d gotten into this mess in the first place. It was so obvious now. When you lived your life blind to anyone else in it, it was easy to get stabbed in the back. You never saw it coming until it was too late and the damage had been done.
