He turned to me, and his face was relaxed, sure of his decision.
Going for the door, he stopped in front of me, offering me his hand. I took it, standing, and our hands seemed to automatically strengthen against one another’s grip. He leaned in and kissed both of my cheeks, and I closed my eyes, a tear or two falling.
“You are beautiful when you cry. Your eyes are even more hypnotizing—as green as the forest after the rain.” He didn’t say this in a lascivious way. It was said as a father would offer a compliment to his daughter. “You are a good woman,” he repeated, which he rarely did. “I was wrong to disillusion my son’s desire for you. I am part man, after all, and known to be wrong from time to time. I am thankful that you were woman enough to sway my wrong with your love.”
With a soft tap to my chin, he left me with his lingering touch on my skin, and the answer to my request as fallen as the rose that gets trampled during a stampede in the dead of winter.
27
Brando
If I had owned a fucking castle, I would have locked my wife up in it.
All throughout our tour of the sheep farm in the snow-laden hills of Zermatt, we glared at each other when no one else looked.
One of the farmer’s daughters said something in German—heftig—to her sister, and they both stared at me. Violet understood the term. A while back she had taken multiple language courses to keep up with Scarlett’s national and international career. She had enlightened me.
Intense, the word meant.
If my stare was intense, it showed nothing of how I felt about my wife. The word was lame in fucking comparison.
“Social creature” could never be used to describe me, but when we were at odds, a constant clock in the back of my mind ticked, counting down to the time when we could be alone, and we could squash whatever it was between us. Even if that meant reminding her of how I felt buried deep inside of her, and she surrendered to every part of me—it made both of us more pliable toward peace.
Surrender was the last word on her mind. The only one on mine.
Squashing whatever came between us this time was going to be a challenge.
We were alone for the first time since leaving the chalet. Romeo and Juliette had taken Mia to see the horses. Scarlett wanted to take a few more pictures of the sheep in the barn.
“How about we get one of those horn blowers to announce your presence, so that Cesare knows exactly where to take his bait,” I said to her.
After a few seconds had gone by, long enough for the blatant sarcasm to make it to her mind, her eyes narrowed into slits, her cheeks turned a dangerous crimson, and her entire body vibrated with anger.
She moved so unexpectedly that the sheep she’d been standing next to, its face crusted with ice, bleated in fear. Her movement hadn’t startled the amiable creature, though. It was her intensity.
We matched there, but there had been nothing fierce in the tone of my voice. It had slid out in utter casualness, like I’d commented on the weather.
“How about we send Jane Jones to meet with Cesare so they can both take me out at once?”she hissed back.
Neither of us moved for a minute or two, me staring down at her, her staring up at me, her chest heaving, mine even calmer than the air around us.
Long beams of light broke through the wooden slats in the barn, gilding the hay particles and dust motes floating in the residual glow.
Clinging to the cold air was the slight tang of sheep, an undercurrent of sweetness from the fodder, but mostly, I smelled her, the subtle rose scent not so subtle at all to me. It had become a trigger, stirring up old memories and clinging to new ones.
“You want to take me here, tofuck me, don’t you?” she snapped. “You want me to be sorry for what I’d do for you. You want me to be sorry for what I’m doing to you. You want me to break—”
Before she could go any further with her taunts, I surged forward, carrying her with me. A domino effect of bleats rang out, sheep moving to keep from being trampled by my will and each other. Her back hit the wall and I slid my hands in her hair, taking hold, crushing her lips against mine, my tongue invading her mouth.
She moaned so loudly the vibration of it rattled my bones.
Shoving at my chest, panting for breath, her lips already swollen from my attack, she made sure to look me in the eye when she said defiantly, “I’ll never be sorry for loving you as much as I do—for keepingminesafe.”
I stared down at her, not able to respond. When she attacked me that way, with words I couldn’t protect myself from, she always hit something deep in my chest that stole my fucking breath.
“Stop looking at me that way,” she breathed out. “You’re breaking my heart, Brando.”
Coming in closer, I slid my nose along hers, set my mouth against her parted lips so she’d have to taste the truth and anguish of my words.
