Page 186 of Modern Romance Collection May 2024 Books 1-4

‘I don’t...’ Rae began, before falling silent beneath the quelling look Domenico dealt her. She looked instead to Alessandra. ‘What time is the reading tomorrow?’

‘Ten a.m. Here at the palazzo.’

She nodded her understanding, her throat tight with the thought of being such a patently unwanted guest at such a personal event. But she could hardly challenge it now, even if that was what she desperately wanted to do. ‘I will see you both tomorrow then.’

Alessandra smiled at her and slipped away and Rae decided it was past time she did the same. The encounter with Domenico had left her feeling off-balance and drained and in need of a long shower and then a soft bed.

‘Where do you think you are going?’ Domenico queried as she took her first steps towards the door.

‘Back to my hotel.’

‘I don’t think so. You’ll stay here.’

Rae’s heart slammed into her ribs at the thought of remaining in the palazzo, where memoires lurked around every corner, memories that were so incredibly potent. Walking through the front doors earlier and remembering how Domenico had once carried her through them had blocked her throat and brought her close to tears. As she’d climbed the staircase, with each step she had recalled all the times Domenico had led her up them, her hand in his, promise in his eyes whenever he’d looked back at her.

‘That’s not necessary. I have a...’

Domenico’s face darkened. ‘Don’t test me, Rae. Not today. I don’t trust you one bit. So you will stay here, where I can keep an eye on you.’

‘Keep an eye on me?’ She couldn’t keep the disbelief from her voice, not when he made her sound like a wayward charge. ‘What is it that you imagine I am going to do?’

‘I won’t pretend to know your mind,’ he hit back, and it was another heavyweight blow straight to her middle because he was the first person that Rae had allowed to know her in her adult life. She realised now that he hadn’t known all of her, not the parts of herself that she’d lost or concealed in her effort to be the wife she’d thought he’d wanted, but he remained the first, and only, person she had let close to her after the horror of losing her parents. ‘But until I know exactly what involvement you have in Elena’s will, I want you where I can see you. I will have Portia show you where you can sleep tonight.’

It was unsurprising to her that Domenico wrested complete control as usual, blatantly ignoring her wishes and her needs. No, not ignoring—not even asking!

Rae bristled with a fury that had her opening her mouth to vent the protest already on her tongue, but she was suddenly too exhausted to argue. Instead, she nodded and let herself be led away by Portia when she arrived, content to let Domenico have his way in that moment because once she’d benefitted from a restoring full night’s sleep, and felt more like herself, she had no intention of letting it happen again.

She had changed, and the days of her silently acquiescing to his decisions and wishes were well and truly over.

CHAPTER TWO

DOMENICOPROWLEDAROUNDthe gilded darkness of the palazzo like a restless animal. There was too much emotion coursing through his body for him to rest easily, either asleep or awake. The hours he had just spent in his private gym, pushing himself on the treadmill and punching until his knuckles felt raw, had succeeded in exhausting his muscles but had failed to rid him of his aggravating emotions.

Damn Rae.

Damn her for leaving and damn her for coming back.

He had far too many other matters in need of careful handling to be giving any thought to the wife who had walked out on him, and yet from the moment he had turned away from the window and settled his hard eyes on her, his only thoughts had been of her body. Wrapped around him. Welcoming him inside her.

He had very much wanted to sweep her onto his desk, part her legs, slip into the warm space between her thighs and bury himself inside her. He craved the velvet welcome her body had always offered, her muscles contracting and then clenching around him, her sweet heat enveloping him, urging him to sink deeper. He had been shaking with the force of the wanting, and the effort required to resist it.

Because he refused to want her. After the way she had abandoned him, desiring her was not an option.

But there had never been anything tame or cooperative about his feelings for Rae. The first time he’d seen her, standing outside Venice’s airport, looking unbelievably attractive in an all-black ensemble, the natural highlights in her chestnut hair glinting in the low sun, he had wanted her immediately. Wanted to know who she was and to have her in his bed. Beneath him. On top of him. And in the hundred other ways flying through his mind. The potency of the desire had stopped him in his tracks on the busy pavement, bludgeoning all other thoughts from his mind, and the charge that had rocked his big body had been so electrifying it was as though he’d been struck by a bolt of lightning.

That fevered desire for her hadn’t abated as he had expected it to, as had been usual in his previous relationships—if they could really be called that. Far from satisfying the craving, claiming her body as his own had only intensified his hunger for her and very quickly that scorching want had morphed into aneedthat he hadn’t seen coming.

A need to keep her close. A need for her smile and her piercing blue eyes to be the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes each morning. A need to have the warmth of her body beside his all day, every day.

None of his past relationships had triggered anything so domestic in him, but none of those women had given him what Rae had seemed to be giving—her wholehearted acceptance and warmth and love. Oh, she hadn’t said the words, but Domenico had known she was falling in love with him. Knew it by the way her eyes tracked his movements, by the way she took every opportunity to touch him—light brushes of her hand, tender grazes of her lips—and by the way she snuggled in close at night.

It had been addictive, so much so that Domenico had actually been unhappy about their affair ending when it was time for Rae to return home, but he hadn’t expected that melancholy mood to last for more than a day, two at the most. To his surprise, however, he’d found himself missing her at all kinds of odd moments, missing her so much that eventually he’d given in and hopped on a jet to London. He’d surprised her when she finished work, waiting outside the bridal boutique where she was a consultant, and the smile that had lit her face when she’d spotted him had been dazzling. He couldn’t remember a time when someone other than Elena had been that happy to see him, and as she’d thrown herself into his arms Domenico had felt something tight and knotted within him loosen, certain in that moment that life would be better if Rae was always by his side. Lowering her to the ground, he’d gazed down at her and said,‘Marry me...’the words bubbling up inside him.

Her response had been instantaneous.‘Yes.’

Four weeks later they had been married in Venice. Domenico had refused to wait any longer than that, wanting the marriage to be official as quickly as possible, wanting their claim on each other to be inviolable, wanting that new chapter of his life with a wife who loved him and would always be at his side to begin.

As the recollections crashed through his mind, Domenico cursed under his breath, hating the memories and their power. Hating his own stupidity. Had he really believed that Rae had loved him above all else and in a way that no one had loved him before? It seemed laughable now and he was riddled with detestation for his own pathetic weakness. For allowing himself to be so caught up in how good it felt to be wanted by someone, to be claimed by them for all to witness. After being rejected by his mother and never formally adopted by Elena, marriage to Rae had given him something that he’d never had before—acceptance and validation. Belonging.

---