I’d become numb to it, just like the pain.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about any of this.
I had a long and perilous road ahead of me.
My journey to find the Fausti family wasn’t for the faint of heart, and I knew that from the beginning, but my heart wasn’t weak.
It was just jealous.
When I thought about…what was her name?Elettraand Nazzareno together,it was like I was in hell, watching her body and Naz’s tangled in the sheets. It would play like some horror flick that went straight to DVD. In this case, though, it was played to torment the jealous.
I’d save that for later.
I’d face it when the time came.
Yeah.
When it was time to say goodbye.
I hadn’t given him my word on that. I hadn’t said yes or no to him. I hadn’t said anything, and I was proud of myself for not caving into the only man I’d probably ever love.
The only thing I’d silently vowed to him was surrender for the moment.
My head made the screech noise from a record when it’s turned in the opposite direction.
Love.
There’s a word.
It wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be, thinking about it as I was wrapped in a ruthless knight’s armor, who only had a soft, romantic spot for me. But love was not one-dimensional, and I had a feeling it was going to show all its sides as this love affair carried on.
Because I knew one thing for certain.
Love never leaves, no matter how much we want it to. It’s not like people, who leave whenever they want. Unfortunately, like kids who hadn’t asked to be brought into this world, it gets left behind, clinging to whoever still cares enough.
I ran my hands over Naz’s smooth, sculpted arms. He was so warm, I didn’t know if I could stand to be this close in the summer.
If we lasted until summer.
The winter months would have to preserve the time and love between us.
There was that word again.
It came so naturally.
So did thinking about all my problems without having a plan for each one, which was not the norm for me. I was a woman who was mostly alone in a concrete jungle, dealing with men who felt more comfortable meeting at night. Edna had taught me to try and see ten steps ahead of them.
Number one on my list of problems, and my only problem, besides the arranged marriage thing:
We didn’t use protection.
I know. I know. No need to lecture me, brain.
I’d had a pregnancy scare before, right after my first time. But it wasn’t a true pregnancy scare. I’d found out protection was not one hundred percent safe and had a slight freak out. I could have sworn I was pregnant, even though nothing had happened to give me the scare.
I’d stolen pregnancy tests for a month after. (I can’t remember exactly how old I was, but I was young enough to still depend on Sonny for money, even when I didn’t rely on him for anything else.) When my period came, I took one more because I’d read an article about a woman with a hormonal imbalance that spotted for three months into her pregnancy. She thought she had her period.
