“He’s just like his grandfather.” Scarlett touched his chest. She turned to me. “He’s just like his father.”
She came into my arms, kissing over my heart, then meeting my eye.
She hadn’t noticed, but I did. Luca had slid out of the room, discreet, the door not making a sound as he shut it behind himself.
Her words had almost made me squirm, but on the other hand, an irritation bubbled inside of me.
“You’re too fucking taken with him,” I said, but I said it while I moved her toward the door, kissing her after the words were out.
“I understand him,” she said.
I stopped, staring down at her. “You understandme.”
“To understand him is to understand you,mio marito. Even though there’s a gap between you and him. You’re you and he’s…Luca. But that hole in your soul?He fills it in. He completes the missing parts of you.”
She gasped when her back hit the door and I pressed in on her, demanding that she feel me. To say this woman could drive me mad was a fucking understatement.
She had long ago gotten under my skin, slipped into my blood stream, entered my heart, weaved herself in the fabric of my very being, and claimed my soul.
“Brando,” she barely got out, her voice breathless. “We’re going to be late. We can’t—”
“Fuck being late,” I said. “You obey me.”
“Oh, am I the only one who obeys?”
“No,” I breathed out, almost short of breath. “You rule me too, my wife.”
She moaned, a noise that wreaked havoc on my equilibrium. “I don’t want to cause—”
“Trouble?”
“Yes,” she breathed.
“I can be fast.”
“You can?”
I almost laughed at the complete transformation of her face. Almost.
“You flatter me too much,” I said. “You make me feel like a man who can conquer the world.”
“No, I speak the truth. You can conquer the world, Brando. You’re strong enough.”
“I’m going to prove to you what I can do,mia moglie.”
“Yes,” she said, her eyes closing. “Prove it,please.”
She was fifteen minutes late to dinner.Alla moda,fashionable, for a beautiful woman who knew how to make an entrance.
46
Brando
Days passed in a blur—event after event, suit after suit, dress after dress. Though each one seemed like a gift for me to unwrap, toward the end, all her dresses started to become a blur.
The day before the actual gala, it was a relief to find the day’s schedule seemed somewhat appealing. Poker. The women were gathering in another section of the palazzo with all the children. Scarlett mentioned tea or something.
If she and my kids were close, I could relax.
