Page 110 of Lovely Venom

He thinks I'm ready now, but he's wrong. And as everything finally sinks in, the crushing weight of that becomes all too clear.

There was a part of me that wanted it to be him, and I was relieved when it was. But it changes nothing. The reasons we could never work still exist. He doesn't know who I really am, or how much that could complicate his life.

This is why he was supposed to marry someone like Jolie.

"Cristian, we can’t do this⁠—"

Before I can make my escape, he rolls over on top of me, caging me in with his arms.

"You aren't running away from me again." He brushes my hair back with a tenderness I don't deserve.

"This is a terrible idea," I choke out. "You have to know that."

"Enlighten me.”

I don’t know how to adequately express the gravity of this situation without revealing my identity, so I begin with the most obvious reason.

"We both know you're going to marry Jolie. I don't want to be your last whatever before you walk down the aisle."

"I'm not marrying her,” he says, as if the answer is just that simple.

"I saw you with her. She was all over you."

"Did you see me stop her?"

"No." I push the word past my dry lips.

"Well, I did. And have you heard confirmation of an engagement?"

"No," I admit.

"That's because there isn't one.”

"Okay, well it doesn't matter anyway," I tell him. "I don't do serious relationships⁠—"

"You just let me come inside you," he reminds me. "That's practically a marriage contract in my world."

My stomach somersaults, and for one fleeting moment, I find myself imagining what that life would look like.

In that fantasy, my very dominant, hot-as-sin, protector of a husband wouldn’t care who I really was. This insane attraction would be enough to overcome that hurdle, and he’d spend every night inside me until we had an entire brood of children.

God, I would let this man put so many babies into me.

But reality isn’t that simple, and it’s not just because of the blood that runs through my veins.

“Everywhere you go, women want you,” I point out. “I could never trust you.”

A dry sound of amusement pulls from his chest as he shakes his head.

“Why is that funny?”

“You think I can’t control myself around other women?”

“I don’t know.” I swallow. “That’s the Mafia culture, isn’t it? A wife at home and a side piece when it suits you.”

“That would be convenient for you to write this off,” he says. “If you believed it.”

“So what?” I argue. “You’re the exception?”