Because it’s hers.
She’s everywhere I look. In the dresses hanging off the wardrobe door. Her cosmetics stacked neatly on the dressing table. Her laptop closed on the desk. A glossy fashion mag hooked over the arm of the wingback chair. And her nightwear, folded at the foot of a very familiar-looking bed…
And just like that, I’m reliving last night: her wrists bound, her body arched, the sound of her begging me to?—
‘Axel?’
Her voice jolts me like a live wire. ‘Yup.’
Shit.Did I really just sayyup?
Her brows pull together, one corner of her kicking up. ‘You okay?’
I thrust a hand through my hair. ‘Sure. What is it?’
‘Can you see if Dino’s hiding somewhere? He’s not on Lottie’s bed.’
‘Gwanny sed she bwung it,’ I hear Lottie’s sleepy mumble from behind her.
I nod and she ducks back inside while I scour the room,looking for a flash of green. I find him next to the door, buried with a pile of Lottie’s books.
‘Got him!’ I holler.
‘Thank God.’ The door swings open and Tay’s there, face flushed, eyes wide with relief. ‘Crisis averted!’
She grabs it from me with a hurried, ‘Thank you,’ and vanishes just as quick.
‘No problem,’ I murmur to the empty room, striding for the drinks table and snatching up the nearest bottle. Grappa. Perfect. I pour and knock it back. The burn’s immediate. Fierce too. But it’s got nothing on the remnants of her.
A tap turns on, her low voice drifting over the running water, and I step out onto the balcony, letting the night air hit me hard.
Just who’s running now?
I drag a hand down my face and tune into the night. The moonlit landscape stretches out before me, Tuscan hills rolling into the dark, a yacht bobbing on the black water beyond. The faint hum of music and laughter drifts up from the beach, the waves and the crickets mixing with it.
Calm. Tranquil.
Yeah, right.
I lean against the railing, glass dangling from my fingers…
What’s she gonna say when she comes out? Is this where she calls it off, says she made a mistake in choosing me? That she wants to go to a clinic after all. Pick some faceless man to…
I clench my jaw tight, sickness rolling through me?—
No.
No, I don’t want that.
Can’t even bear the thought of it.
Which means… I want this.
Iwanther to have my baby.
I don’t want to be a dad, no.
But I want her to have that.
