“Just busy,” I lie, my voice husky.
He chuckles and lets go of me, eliciting a frustrated groan from me. “Oh,” he says, taking a step away. He leans against one of the counters and runs a hand through his hair, his cock clearly on display for me through his gray sweatpants. “My bad,” he adds. “I guess I got it wrong, huh?”
I blink in disbelief, disappointed he’d stop there. He looks into my eyes, his gaze provocative, almost as though he’s daring me to walk up to him and ask for more. I bite down on my lip and tear my gaze away, my eyes settling on his phone. I stare at it for a moment, unable to push aside the unease I’m feeling. He was definitely speaking to a woman earlier. I have access to his work phone, but not his personal phone, so there’s no way for me to figure out who it was.
He promised me fidelity, but I can’t enforce that. It wouldn’t be too late for him to regret marrying me and rectify his mistake. When it comes down to it, Natalia is better suited to him than I’d ever be.
Luca glances at his phone and chuckles as he picks it up. He stares at it for a moment and shakes his head before holding it out for me. “The code is my grandmother’s birthday, paired with my mother’s. It’s 327812.” I frown and shoot him a questioning look, but he merely smiles at me with the kind of patience he’s never shown me before. “Take it.”
“I… um… why would I—”
“Just do as I tell you to, Valentina.”
My hand trembles as I take his phone from him, my heart racing. I feel sick to my stomach at the thought of him with someone else.
“Check who my last call was to,” he says, his voice soft.
I look up sharply, but he merely tilts his head and looks at me, his eyes filled with something I can’t quite describe.
My fingers tremble as I put in his code and unlock his phone. Part of me doesn’t want to do this for fear of what I’ll find, but a larger part of me needs to know.
“Sierra,” I whisper, profound relief washing over me.
Luca takes a step closer to me and cups my face, tipping my head up toward his. “I don’t know what’s going through your mind, Valentina, but I can tell you this much: I will never, ever, cheat on you. I will never mistreat you or wrong you, you hear me? I know I fucked up in the past. I treated you harshly, and I went way too fucking far when you quit your job. I know, baby. But all of that? It was only because I didn’t want to lose you. I will never do anything that will make you want to walk away from me.”
I look into his eyes, taking in the fierce sincerity in them. “Why are you being like this?” I ask, my voice trembling. We agreed that we wouldn’t fall in love, so why is he looking at me that way?
His thumb brushes over my lips and he smiles, but his gaze is unfocused, as though he’s lost in a memory of his own. “Because I recognize the worries in the questions you refuse to ask. I recognize the damage of betrayal, Valentina. I don’t know who he was, and I don’t want to know either, but I’m not him. For as long as we’re married, there won’t be anybody but you.”
A different kind of jealousy settles deep in my stomach. “Who was she?”
Luca pulls his hand away and smiles humorlessly. “Someone who will stay in the past, which is exactly where I expect you to leave the man who made you doubt me over a simple conversation with my sister. The way you looked at me… that wasn’t damage inflicted on you by your parents. It was more than that. I’m not him, baby, so don’t look at me with so much mistrust.”
How could there be a woman I don’t know about? This must either have happened before we met, or he managed to keep a relationship hidden both from me and his family. Something about the pain in his voice guts me.
“Stop hiding from me, okay?” He looks away and musses up his hair. “If you keep this up, we don’t stand a chance of convincing our families we’re in love.”
I blush and look away. It’s odd to be standing here with him in this situation. He’s the man I loved to hate, but it’s starting to look like that hatred was misplaced, and I don’t know what to make of it. “Understood,” I murmur, unsure of what else to say.
He smiles and brushes my hair out of my face tenderly. “Wait here,” he tells me, before walking away, leaving my heart pounding. This is part of the reason I’ve been staying away. He makes me feel weak and vulnerable, and I never want to feel that way again. It only leads to heartache.
Luca walks back holding a pair of pink soft fuzzy slippers, and he kneels in front of me. “I bought these for you. Wear them at home, Valentina. Don’t just walk around barefoot,” he tells me as he lifts my foot carefully and places the slipper on it. “The floor is cold, after all.”
I stare down at him in disbelief, unable to keep my heart from being unaffected. Why does he treat me this way, when our marriage was meant to be pure business? “I thought you hated pink?”
He laughs and looks away as he runs a hand through his hair, the gesture oddly… shy. “I do, but you love it.”
Luca turns back to the stove and switches it back on. “So you do know how to cook,” I murmur, a soft chuckle escaping my lips.
He looks over his shoulder and smiles at me sheepishly. I never thought Luca could be cute, yet that’s exactly what he is. “The chef had a day off, and I didn’t feel like ordering something. I can only make this one stew, to be honest. It’s extremely hard to mess it up, so don’t worry about me blowing up our kitchen.”
Our kitchen. He keeps saying and doing things that make my heart race. When we first got married, I was so certain I’d never fall in love again, that this marriage would be all business. If Luca had continued to treat me the way he used to, everything would’ve been fine, but he seems insistent on breaking down my walls, and I don’t know how to stop him. With each passing day, he’s winning over more parts of me that never should have been his for the taking.
“Have you heard from your mother?” he asks.
“No. I’ve called her a few times, but she’s refusing to take my calls. Usually, I’d go stay at home once a month or so. Do you… would you come with me? I wonder if seeing us together would put her mind at ease. My mother isn’t the easiest person to deal with, but I don’t want her to worry about me.”
Luca glances over his shoulder and nods. “Sure,” he says, before looking back at the pan in front of him. “Whatever you want, baby.”
I stare at him, unable to figure him out. Three years seemed like such a long time, but I’m starting to worry it won’t be nearly enough for me.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Valentina
“How could you do this to me?” Sierra asks, her gaze filled with torment. “To both of us,” she adds, before elbowing Raven, who is seated next to her.
They showed up the moment Luca left for poker night, and I have a feeling I’m not leaving this living room until they’ve interrogated me to their satisfaction. Somehow, I was more ready for Grandma Anne than I was for this.
We’ve spoken in our group chat in the days since Raven’s fashion show, but other than congratulating me, they didn’t say much else. I thought they were letting it slide because they know how awkward I get when asked to speak about my private life, but it looks like I underestimated them. They were just waiting until they could corner me in person.