Page 216 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

So right.

They didn’t need to talk. There was no need to exchange words. Their eyes and bodies did all the communicating as they slowly and languorously undressed each other, every removal of a piece of clothing, every piece of skin revealed deserving of worship and adoration, the press of lips, the lave of a tongue.

She soothed him. She comforted him, every touch stoking the fires building inside them.

And when he moved over her—positioned his legs between hers—and filled her, it was so poignant, so beautiful, so tender and sweet, that it was her time for tears. Tears for Rosaria. Tears for Dom. And tears for herself, because she was lost.

Tears that turned to stars as he sent her over into the abyss.

‘You’re crying,’ he said as their bodies floated down from the heights of their lovemaking. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘No,’ she said, because it was nothing he’d done, and everything she had. She’d known the risks when she’d taken on this role. She’d known that she was susceptible, but the lure of filthy lucre and the wall of hatred she’d erected between them had turned her head and convinced her that she was impervious to him. A wall without substance, bricks laid without mortar.

And Dom was dismantling them, one brick at a time.

‘You weren’t serious about leaving straight away, were you?’ he said.

Oh. She’d been going to talk to him about that.

‘There’s no need to rush off. At least stay for the funeral.’

She turned to him. ‘Is there any point? I’ll still be leaving.’

‘What will people say if you’re not there? Five minutes ago, everyone was celebrating our wedding, and the next minute you disappear, nowhere to be seen.’

Mari knew it sounded every kind of callous, but what did he expect when he’d been the one to set the contract conditions? And she was the one in danger here, and the longer she stayed, the harder it would hurt when he was finished with her.

‘Wasn’t that the point of our agreement? You wanted a temporary wife, and you got one. There was nothing in our contract about staying for a funeral.’

‘How heartless are you? I thought you liked Rosaria.’

‘I loved your mother! You know that. And she was happy. That’s all that matters. That’s what counts.’

‘Then think about me. Think about a funeral when, instead of everyone celebrating the life and mourning the death of the deceased, everyone is focused on why the son’s brand-new wife isn’t there.’ He looked earnestly at her. ‘Do you really want to turn my mother’s funeral into some kind of gossip fest?’

Mari turned away and rose from the bed, lashing a robe around her. It was not fair that he insisted she be there to attend Rosaria’s funeral. He had no idea why she wanted—no, needed—to get away. He had no concept. He was trying to protect his image. She got that.

Whereas Mari was trying to protect herself.

‘I thought… I was thinking…that things had changed.’

She knew immediately what he was referring to. God, what a mistake it had been, falling into Dom’s bed.

‘Because we had sex?’

She heard him rise from the bed. ‘We made love. You know that. And it was just like it used to be. Amazing. We made love again just now. Why would you throw that away?’

And the answer came back to her, crystal-clear.

Because sex was one thing we always did right. Love, not so much.

And she wouldn’t put herself in a position where her love meant so little to him again.

‘Grief sex,’ she said with a shrug. ‘You were upset, I tried to console you, and it got out of hand.’

‘Grief sex. That’s all it was to you?’

No. It was much, much more. But she wasn’t about to confess that to the man she needed to get away from. And neither was she as heartless as her words made out. She imagined a funeral without Dom’s so recently celebrated new wife in attendance. She could almost hear the snarky comments being exchanged when the guests should be focused on Rosaria’s life and loves. She couldn’t do that. She couldn’t reduce Rosaria’s funeral into a hotbed of gossip. Mari owed the woman that much after the grand deception they’d pulled off and that she’d been party to. More than that, Mari needed to pay her respects. She swallowed.

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