His mouth twitches. “I think I have plenty of that.”
I glare up at him, not finding his joke funny at all. “Have you finished it?”
The question slips out before I can stop it. All those years ago, we never did finish it.
For a second, I expect him to mock me. To make a joke. To turn it into something cruel and clever.
Instead, his gaze drops to the book again, and the air in the room shifts.
He leans back in the chair, fingers steepling for a moment like he’s deciding what version of himself he’s willing to show me. Then his jaw tightens.
“Many times,” he mutters under his breath.
I blink.
He’s showing a part of himself to me.
The most ordinary thing he’s offered me since the wedding, and my brain doesn’t know what to do with it.
“How many?” I ask, slower now, voice softer despite myself.
Lorenzo’s eyes lift—sharp, direct—and hold mine.
“Too many to count.”
The words hang in the room like a large weight.
A raw admission that he doesn’t dress up or pretend is something else.
It lands.
Hard.
Right in my chest.
My throat tightens in a way I hate. “That’s . . . depressing.”
His mouth curves, but it isn’t amused this time. It’s bitter. Almost tired.
“Depressing is the point.” He taps two fingers on the arm of the chair. “It’s a love story about obsession. Ruin. People who mistake destruction for devotion.”
My fingers curl around the pages. “You read it for fun?”
His gaze slides over me, slow and assessing. “I read it because it’s honest.”
I swallow. “Honest?”
Lorenzo’s eyes flick down to the book again, then back up. His voice stays quiet, but there’s steel underneath it . . . something personal.
“It doesn’t pretend love is gentle,” he tells me. “It doesn’t pretend that longing makes you noble. It admits what people really do when they want something they can’t have.”
A shiver runs down my spine.
All these years ago, we joked about the book and us, but now more than ever, it feels real. No longer a coincidence.
I try to smother it with sarcasm. “Do you keep it around as inspiration?”
His eyes narrow slightly. “Inspiration?” he repeats. “No. It’s a reminder.”
