Page 47 of A Sinner's Virtue
“I’ll see you then—oh, and say hi to lover boy for me,” she replies with a smirk.
I nod, get out of the car, and grab my bag from the trunk. I have no intentions of seeing Marcel yet. I didn’t exactly tell him I was coming home today. I don’t know why. I just didn’t.
I think I want time to settle back into life here before facing him. I also want to see him so much, and like I said to Mikhail, that’s a problem. I’m in too deep, and it’s only going to get me hurt in the long run.
A few minutes later, I’m walking into my apartment. I drop my bag in the entrance hall and head straight for the bathroom. I need to rinse off the full day’s travel and sleep for a decade. Then I’ll call Marcel and let him know I’m back.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ishould wake her up. Let her know I’m here. Instead, I’m watching my girlfriend sleep. Like a fucking creeper. I’ve been hanging out with Dom too fucking much. Clearly, his stalkerish ways are rubbing off on me.
My girlfriend.
I’m fairly new to the whole girlfriend thing, but I’m pretty sure if you’re dating someone and you’ve been away for a month, you’d tell them you were coming home, right? Well, apparently, my girlfriend didn’t feel the need to let me know she was home. So here I am, watching her sleep.
I considered climbing into the bed with her. But I didn’t want to scare her. That’s the only reason my ass is staying firmly planted in this chair. I’ve been waiting weeks to see her again. It was harder than I thought it would be. I was close to flying over to New York, just to see her. That was before my brother got pinched. And now I’m picking up the fucking pieces, working my ass off to help Gio run the businesses. It’s kept me busy, kept my mind preoccupied. So much so that I had to find out from an alert on my phone that someone had entered Zoe’s apartment.
I might have put some cameras in here while she was gone, so when the motion detectors went off, the first thing I did was log in. The second thing I did was a double-take when I saw who set them off. If I wasn’t knee-deep in some fucker’s guts, I would have been here an hour ago. And I mean literally knee-deep. Gio had me gut some motherfucker like a fish. He was a manager at one of our strip clubs. The stupid son of a bitch thought we wouldn’t notice him stealing from us.
I wonder why she didn’t feel the need to tell me she was coming home. I would have picked her up from the airport. I could have given her some welcome home orgasms on the way back to her apartment.
My dick hardens at the thought of sinking inside her again. A month of only my hand has been damn near torture. And I know torture. Trust me. I don’t know how people go so fucking long without sex. I don’t plan to ever do it again. Wherever Zoe and her vagina go, I’m going with them.
I need to wake her up. But she looks so damn peaceful. I wonder how she slept in New York. Did she have nightmares?
When she turns over, I get a better view of her face. Her beauty is unlike anything I’ve seen before. I push up from the chair and walk closer. I can’t wait any longer to touch her.
I kneel down next to the edge of the bed as my fingers trail through her hair, pushing the loose strands away from her face. “Zoe, babe, wake up.”
She swats an arm out and pulls the blanket up to her chin. “No,” she groans. “Go away.”
I press my lips to her forehead. “Zoe, wake up,” I repeat before leaning on my haunches.
Her eyes snap open, and she stares at me. “Marcel?”
“In the flesh, babe.”
“What are you doing here?” she asks.
“I think the better question here is why didn’t you tell me you were coming home?” I raise an eyebrow at her.
“I was going to…”
“Yeah? When?” My tone is firmer. I can hear it. But, fuck, I’m little annoyed she didn’t fucking tell me. And, honestly, a lot fucking pissed off.
“When I woke up,” she snaps back at me, and then her mouth falls open as she scoots back across the bed. As far away from me as she can get. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean to… I’m sorry.”
“Zoe, if you want to yell at me, yell at me. I can handle it. If you want to chew my ass out for whatever reason, do it. I don’t care. I will take you any way you come. Don’t think I’m going to break just because you get a little feisty. I’m not that person.”
She should know this about me already. But then, I have to remind myself that it’s not her fault. The shit she went through messes with her head. As it would with anyone’s.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Zoe, stop apologising. You haven’t done anything wrong.” I fucking hate seeing the fear on her face. I hate that she has to second-guess her actions or her words. I want the completely unfiltered version of her. I don’t want the person she thinks she has to be.
“I should have told you I was coming home. I don’t know why I didn’t,” she admits.
“Did you not want to see me?” I’m eighty percent sure that she does want to see me, but there’s that twenty percent that has me holding my breath, waiting for her answer.
