“Nat?”
“I’m thinking.”
So I let her think.
Every instinct I have wants to fill the silence—soften it, say something stupid, make her laugh, drag us both back to thirty seconds ago. But I owe her this.
I keep my mouth shut, watching her process the one piece of truth I gave her while everything else I’m holding back sits in my gut like something already starting to rot.
“Will you go find them now?” Her voice is searching. “Your family. Now that you’re starting to remember.”
She crosses her arms to hold the sheet up. But her shoulders have pulled in too, just slightly, and her eyes are still on the window, not me. Like she’s already preparing herself for an answer she doesn’t want.
And it hits me that this was never about whether I’m dangerous. She already made peace with that.
She’s watching me remember who I was. And she’s waiting to find out if that guy is going to want to come back.
“No,” I say.
She looks at me.
“No.” I reach over and thread my fingers through hers, pulling her hand loose from where it’s gripping her own arm. Her eyes drop to our hands, then come back up to mine. “What I remember is blood and violence and a man I don’t want to be anymore.” The words come out raw. “I want to stay here. With you. Figure the rest out later.”
She holds my gaze for a long moment, eyes searching. Her guard is down, and I see it all pass across her face—the reality of her situation, the engagement, the temporary nature of this whole damn thing. But she doesn’t say it. And I don’t either.
Instead, she just nods. A small, almost imperceptible movement.
“Okay,” she says quietly.
Just that. But the way she turns her hand over and holds mine back says the rest.
The knot at the base of my throat loosens. Not all the way. I’m not stupid enough to think one “okay” fixes everything we just stepped into, or everything I’m still not saying. But enough that I can swallow again.
I pull her hand to my mouth and press my lips to her knuckles.
She looks at our joined hands for a moment. Then she looks up at me, and the corner of her mouth curves.
I lean in and kiss her, slow and easy, and she makes a soft sound against my mouth and lets me pull her back down onto the mattress. Her fingers curl into my hair. I roll toward her, and she tips her chin up, and for a minute the whole conversation dissolves, and there’s just her mouth and her hands and the feel of her in my arms.
“Luca,” she murmurs against me.
I could get addicted to hearing that. Might already be.
She pulls me closer, her fingers sliding into my hair, and the kiss shifts. Deepens. Her back arches just enough to press her body against mine, and the sheet between us is suddenly very much in the way. My hand finds her hip, her waist, the dip of her ribs, and she makes a sound against my mouth that has me seriously reconsidering the concept of a refractory period.
I drag my lips down her jaw. Her throat. The hollow at the base of it where her pulse is hammering.
“I could get used to Sundays like this,” I murmur against her skin.
She freezes beneath me.
“Shit.” Her hand presses flat against my chest. “It’s Sunday.”
I lift my head. “That’s what I just said.”
“No, I mean it’sSunday. I completely forgot.”
“Sunday means…?”
