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“Why don’t you come to bed?”
“It would be best if I left you alone.”
“Don’t you think I should be the one to decide that?”
“No, tesoro, I don’t. I think that my feelings on the matter should come into play.”
“We’re having a baby, Diego. It’s not supposed to be an upsetting thing.”
“You say that as if you don’t understand why I have concerns.”
“I do understand,” she said. “I went through my own feelings when I first thought that I might be pregnant. Whether or not I was afraid about my safety. But I’m not.”
“That’s because you don’t remember loss.” He took another sip of vodka. “I remember it far too well. More than one.”
“But you wanted a child. You wanted to be a father.”
“I did,” he said, his voice hard. “Because for a moment in time I thought that maybe it could change things. But it didn’t.”
“You had a tragedy. It wasn’t your fault.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
“Come to bed, Diego.”
“No,” he said.
“You’re going to just stay out here and get drunk? What a fine solution to what you apparently see as a terrible problem.”
“Do not force the issue, Liliana,” he said. “Do not try to talk to me about something you don’t understand.”
Liliana drew back as if she had been slapped, and he felt a rising tide of guilt. It all felt far too much like his first marriage. Mistakes. His inability to respond correctly at a given moment. He had never felt wrong with Liliana. Even when he had been, taking her from her window. All of it had felt justified. But this felt wrong, and he didn’t know what he could possibly do about it.
“Good night,” he said.
She nodded slowly, and then turned away from him. And he felt as if she had taken a part of him with her. Peace. A slow-growing peace he hadn’t realized had begun to take root inside of him. Gone now that she had turned her back on him.
And so, in the absence of Liliana, in the absence of that peace, he would get drunk.
He didn’t know what else to do.
If he was the dark brother, the debauched one, then that was where he would retreat to now.
He didn’t know another alternative.
* * *
Liliana kept waiting for things to get better. For Diego’s smile to return. But there didn’t seem to be anything she could do to fix the mood he had fallen into since she’d given him the news of her pregnancy.
He acted as if he was afraid to touch her. Afraid to have any kind of connection with her whatsoever. She felt... She felt defeated.
She had been happy, happy making her life all about finding ways to inject his with hope. With happiness.
Why wasn’t that enough? She just wanted to give to him. She didn’t understand. Couldn’t comprehend why he wouldn’t take it. And here they were, back in that same penthouse that had been the source of that hideous fight where they had decided that they were going to make things work between them. Where she had told him that she loved him, and he had said nothing. But it had made him happy—she had been able to see that. She had known it.
Now... Nothing seemed to make him happy at all. His mood was black, and there was no way she could penetrate it.
He had left her alone in the penthouse for the entire day, off to see to some work, he had said. Meanwhile she had set about hatching a plan she’d come up with recently. It had involved no small amount of skulduggery. She had gotten into his things, and thankfully, he had gotten lax, because she was able to get hold of a contact who made deliveries to the island.
And she was able to procure her wedding gown, which she had left back at their house.
With that done, she had set about to collecting all of Diego’s favorite foods. She knew what they were, as she had spent the past few weeks grilling him on everything he liked. From music to movies to food. She was determined that her fact-finding mission would pay off.
He hadn’t touched her in the days since they’d found out about the baby, and she was suffering for it greatly. She knew he was too. He needed that closeness. That intimacy.
He needed her. She knew he did.
If they could just get back to where they were then things would be better. She could make him happy again.
She could be what he needed. If only he would let her.
Now she had everything arranged. A dinner table with ham, mashed potatoes and a pasta salad. She had fresh baked rolls and a date cake, all of which she had procured in the city. And she was wearing her gown. He had said that he’d fantasized about tearing it off her, but he hadn’t done it.
Perhaps tonight she could bait him into it. Perhaps tonight, they could find their way back to what they’d had.
When the doors to the hotel room opened, she held her breath and stood there, waiting. He walked inside, and his handsome expression froze as he took in the scene that was set before him.
She’d made use of her name as a Navarro and had gotten the hotel concierge to aid her in setting a banquet, a table and two chairs brought up, the table now laden with the food she had gotten.
There were candles, everywhere. It was an extremely romantic scene, if she did say so herself.
But Diego did not look charmed. Not in any way.
“What is this?”
“Dinner,” she said, shifting, purposefully moving her hips so that the skirt on the wedding gown swayed.
“How did you get that?”
“Your security is not as tight as it once was,” she said dryly.
“I have work to do,” he said, breezing past her and heading toward the room he’d been using as an office.
“Don’t walk away from me,” she said, stamping her foot. “I made dinner for you. Well, I acquired dinner for you. And I expect you to sit with me.”
“My apologies, princesita. I didn’t realize that you were in the position to make demands now.”
“You know that I am,” she said, walking up to him slowly. She touched his face, sliding her fingertips down, gripping his chin between her thumb and forefinger. “I know you want me. No matter that you’re avoiding me now. You can’t pretend that you suddenly don’t.”
“Is that what’s bothering you? That I haven’t had sex with you?”
“That’s just a symptom.”
“Perhaps I’m not hungry,” he said, his voice cold. “In any of the ways that word might apply.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“That is fine,” he said.
Desperation kicked through her chest as he began to pull away from her. “No,” she said.
She flung herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him, his lips remaining firm and unresponsive.
She didn’t know what she would do if she couldn’t reach him. If he didn’t need her. She didn’t understand why she couldn’t make him happy. The man had kidnapped her from her bedroom window so that he could have her and now he was acting like he didn’t care at all. She had no idea how she could survive this. How she could endure it. She didn’t know what to do to fix it. She had tried. Had tried being everything to him, and he wouldn’t take it.
She traced the outline of his lips with her tongue, and he groaned. She felt the exact moment she had breached his control.
“Now’s your chance,” she whispered against his lips. “Tear this dress off me. Do it like you wanted to then. On the floor. I’m not so fragile, Diego. Do what you need to.”
She knew then that she had done it. Because he growled, his hold on her suddenly strong. And then, he grabbed the bodice of her dress and ripped it down violently, the fabric wrenching apart, a glitter of beads spraying everywhere, scattering all over the floor. Leaving her bare, leaving her exposed. Exposing him too. His movements were dar
k and rough, and he reduced the dress to nothing but delicate tatters that shimmered like diamonds on the floor.
It felt far too close to how she felt in her soul. Torn, but still hopeful.
His lips were rough on her breasts, his teeth, his whiskers abrading her delicate skin. He gripped her tightly, so tightly she was sure he would leave a bruise. But she didn’t mind. She wanted him to. If this was what he needed, she wanted him to expend all of that darkness, in her.
He was hers. It was her job to make him happy. She would do whatever it took. Anything.
If she couldn’t do that, then he wouldn’t need her. And if Diego didn’t need her...
She cried out as he sucked one nipple deep into his mouth, the sound an expression of the desire that was riding through her body, and of the desolation that was echoing in her soul. The very idea of him not needing her, period, of him sending her away.
She closed her eyes tightly, trying to keep the tears from escaping them. She hated this. This feeling of not being able to reach him. Of being separate. She needed him. Needed to connect.
Needed him to love her.
