“Well fuck, after everything that girl has been through, it’s a wonder she can sleep at all.”
I send a silent apology to my girl and hope she forgives me for telling Dad more than I maybe should. “She doesn’t always sleep well. The memory acts as a recurring dream sometimes. And she has times when she shuts down. Lil dubbed them hoodie days, and you’ll know one when you see one.”
“So when did you find out about her almost dying?”
“A little over two weeks ago.”
“What did you do when you found out?”
“I cried, drank too much whiskey with Marco, told her I loved her no matter what, and proposed to her the next day.”
“And when you first saw her scars?”
“What’s up with the incredibly personal questions, Dad?”
“Just making sure you’re deserving of that girl. Your mother and I screwed up in a lot of ways raising you.”
“I don’t deserve her. I’ll never deserve her. But I try to be worthy of her every day. The first time she showed me her scars was the night I proposed. I kissed every single one of them, told her how fucking strong, brave, and beautiful she is, then declared my undying love for her again. She hasn’t hidden them from me since then.” We obviously have a sex life. He doesn’t need to know the details of it.
He nods. “Good. You just might be worthy of her one day.”
“You’remydad, you know. Aren’t you supposed to be on my side of things?” I can’t hold back my grin.
He laughs and claps me on the back. “That girl made yousmile when you hardly ever smiled. You laugh now, Luca. A sound I hadn’t heard in a decade. You were a miserable young man, and the fact that Ariana brought you out of that means she’s worthy of you.”
“Unless you have any more awkward and personal questions, I’d like to go find her.”
“I’m sure I have more, but I’ll hold them for now.”
I find her in the kitchen, finishing off a second cup of coffee. Well, I guess it could be a third or fourth cup at this point. Coming up behind her, I lick a drop of saltwater from her neck. She shudders and moans. “Stop that, we’re in the kitchen,” she whispers.
“I fucked you in this kitchen less than a week ago,” I whisper back, right against her ear, and am rewarded with another shudder.
“I’m going to go take a shower,” she purrs, glancing at me over her shoulder and biting her lip.
She shrieks when I toss her over my shoulder and head for the stairs.
Chapter 77
Just a couple of assholes
Ariana
Cramps hit me halfway through Monday. Luca sits with me on the couch, watching TV, grabbing chocolate and Midol, and letting me nap on him like he’s my own personal pillow. Other than when he goes to the gym to work out and train, he’s with me for the entire two and a half days I feel like absolute crap. As usual, Lil spends most of her time with us, too.
It’s a good thing we have a big ass couch in our living room because Anthony shows up a lot. He’s helping Dad and Parker go through all the video footage from around the house, which is a fuck ton because there’s like fifty cameras. No one has mentioned seeing me and Lil sneaking out the night of Luca’s first fight a few weeks ago. Maybe they started with the newest stuff first… There’s no way we weren’t caught by at least three of those cameras.
Dad probably doesn’t realize we know about the secret tunnel leading from the basement armory to the shed and then continues on to a door on the back side of the wall around the estate. He has no idea that I know the code for it or that I have a set of the fourkeys needed to unlock it. He definitely doesn’t know about the motorcycle I have hidden behind some shrubs down the road. But he’s also absolutely going to find out about all of that once they get to the footage from that night.
To be fair, I was trying to pretend my psycho bio dad wasn’t after me again back then otherwise I don’t think we would have chanced sneaking out to drive Bruce. Lil would have talked me out of it if she’d known about even a single instance of me feeling ice neck. Neither of us is looking forward to anyone realizing we snuck out. We might be adults, but it was a stupid thing to do.
Chilling on the couch for so long gives me way too much time to think, and I can’t focus on looking at paint colors or new bedding, so redecorating isn’t going well. I should warn Luca about the probable video, but I can’t bring myself to do it yet.
I can shoot a man from hundreds of feet away, but I can’t come clean about sneaking out to my husband or father. Being an adult is weird.
When DeVille business comes up on Wednesday night, Luca is itching to join Dad and Anthony.
“Go. We don’t all need to be trapped in this house all the damn time,” I tell them.
