My uncles kiss my cheeks, murmuring blessings.
Ella squeezes my hands. “I love this for you,” she whispers.
Then they are gone, petals underfoot, laughter fading into the night.
Only us.
The terrace glows with candlelight.
Caterina has left food laid out like an offering, and Giovanni pulls me into a chair, feeding me with his own hands as if this, too, is a vow.
“Eat,” he murmurs.
“I’m not hungry,” I lie automatically.
His brow lifts. “Lucia.”
I open my mouth obediently, and his mouth curves with satisfaction. When the plates are cleared, he holds out his hand. “Dance with me.”
I blink. “You dance?”
“I do everything,” he replies, and draws me close. “You should know this by now, but I’m happy to refresh your memory.”
We sway beneath the lanterns, my cheek against his chest where the scar lives, where his heart beats steady and stubborn.
For a long moment, there’s no war. No running. Just the quiet aftermath of choosing.
“I love you,” he says gruffly, as if the words scrape on the way out.
My breath catches. “I love you too.”
His arms tighten. Then, without warning, he swings me up into his arms.
I gasp, laughing. “Giovanni!”
“Enough,” he mutters against my throat. “I’ve waited long enough. I need to be inside you more than I want air.”
He carries me upstairs, through halls that no longer feel like a prison of my first weeks here, into our suite where candlelight flickers low.
There, he sets me down gently, as if I am something sacred.
His hands frame my face. “This time,” he murmurs, “no silence. No distance. Just us.”
His kiss is slower now, reverent, unhurried, and when he draws me into bed it is with tenderness that feels almost unbearable after everything.
He peels my dress off, kissing down my body, anointing me with his love and devotion. And when I’m naked and beneathhim, when he’s thrusting inside me like I’m the last true pleasure in this wide world, I let the tears fall. Cry through my climax and his.
Sob quietly in the aftermath and rebirth of our love.
Later still, when the candles have burned low and the estate is quiet again, he turns to me with a gleam in his eyes. “What are you thinking,amuri?”
I snort softly, exhausted and full. “I’m thinking we’re going to be so fucking nauseatingly happy, the world will throw up when it sees us coming.”
His laugh is warm, unguarded.
He pulls me closer.
This runaway wife is back exactly where she belongs.
