“I’m sorry for pulling you into my mess but I?—”
I place my finger over her lips to silence her. Her eyes widen, and the moment I touch her, those familiar tingles return.
“Don’t apologize.” My voice is thick, weighted with emotion.
My palm finds her cheek—soft, cautious—and I turn her face so I can see the bruise he left on her. My thumb drags lightly over it.
“Does it hurt?”
“Not so much now.” The words escape her in breathless little pants. “It should fade within a few weeks. Just in time for…”
She doesn’t finish, and a pit settles in my stomach. I move my eyes to meet hers, but she looks away. I gently turn her face back to mine.
“In time for what?”
“My… my rehearsal dinner.”
“You’re kidding, right?” When she makes no move to correct me, everything in me hardens. “You cannot be serious, Beatrice.”
She looks down at her lap, fingers twisting the ring on her left hand. I hate that thing. It’s more like a shackle.
“You can’t still be considering marrying him after he did this to you, Beatrice?”
“I said it was an accident. And I don’t have a choice.” She lifts her head slowly, eyes hollowed by truth. “I don’t have the luxury of freedom or choice, Matteo. Even tonight… will have its consequences.”
“Yes, tonight should have its consequences—you leaving him.” My voice is hard as steel. “You can’t stay in a union like this anymore, Beatrice. Today he hurt you by accident. Tomorrow it won’t be an accident.”
I don’t wantto hurt her or cause her any more distress. But she can’t be naïve enough to think this won’t continue—that a demon like Giacomo won’t drag her to the very edge of death with him.
“I… I can’t.”
“Can’t orwon’t? Choose you, for you, bella.”
She rips my hand from her face and moves away from me on the bed.
“You don’t get to judge me, Matteo. You have no idea what this man has over me.”
It’sthe first time since I picked her up that I hear her true voice.
“Then help me understand, Beatrice. Because I have been fighting the urge to go out and kill him for what he’s done to you.” The bloodlust claws at my sanity. “Tell me.”
She bites down on her lip and looks away. “You won’t understand.”
“Try me.”
Her head snaps toward me. “If I don’t do what he says—if I don’t become his wife within the next three months—then he takeseverythingfrom my family. My father will be ruined, and we’ll be left destitute. He paid for my mother’s surgery that saved her life, and he pays for her aftercare now. If his funding stops, then she dies.”
She barely gets the last sentence out. Her shoulders slump, the fight draining from her eyes.
“Matteo… this isn’t something I get to walk away from.”
The crack in her voice lands square in my chest.
Tears gather on her lashes. “You think I don’t know what kind of life this is? You think I don’t feel trapped in ways I can’t even say out loud?”
She lifts her left hand, the ring catching the light like something cruel.
“I don’t have a choice here. I’m stuck.”
