Page 22 of Modern Romance March 2025 (5-8)

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, rubbing her temple. “It’s hardly fair that I keep throwing that at you but refuse to discuss it.”

She was aware of him moving closer by how his delicious body heat swamped her. “We’ve left ‘fair’ behind us a while ago, Nyra.” His words were full of an aching regret.

She nodded, because he was right. Neither could she forget that she had begun it with her lies.

He tilted her chin up until she met his gaze. “I can withstand this frost of yours, however long it lasts. But I’m not letting you go. If that’s what you think this retreat of yours will lead to, no. I will wait you out. You, and our babies, belong with me.”

“If it were any other man than you, I would consider that a threat.” She laughed. Even to her own ears, the sound lacked any warmth. “See, that’s how I think of you. That you aren’t any other man, that you’re…you. The one man who would never, in a million years, hurt me.”

He thrust a hand roughly through his hair, a pained growl escaping his throat.

“It’s ridiculous, isn’t it? Some of the things we tell ourselves to get through the day.”

He sighed. “All I can say is that it’s not easy for me.”

“And you think the last few weeks have been easy for me?”

“Tell me,bella.Per favore.”

“I wake up cold in the middle of the night and look for you to tuck myself up against. I…miss you so much that it’s an ache here,” she said, pressing a hand to her chest. “And then, when I wake up, I come out of this trance and a knot fists my stomach. Like I have to chase the sensation to figure out what it is and then… I remember what happened between us. All the anger, the hurt and the fear rush back into me. And it’s all viciously fresh again.”

His hand cupped her shoulder but he didn’t pull her closer.

“And seeing you is a hundred times worse. Because a part of me craves the safety you meant to me before all this. Another part hates that I’m so weak with you.”

His Adam’s apple moved on a hard swallow. “What can I do to fix it? To make us go back to what we were? This isn’t good for you or them.”

“I don’t think there’s any going back,” she said, pressing her head to his chest with a helplessness she couldn’t fight. Because he would always be both the storm and shelter for her. “And I can’t find a path forward yet.”

* * *

Adriano wrapped his fingers around his wife’s neck and held her as she trembled from head to toe.

Her hurt, her fear, her helplessness, written so clearly on her face as if he’d etched it into those sharp features with his own hands. It was a humbling point to face over and over for a man like him.

He even acknowledged the fact that a small part of him wanted to walk out on her and her unrelenting stubbornness. Like she pointed out recently, he was a powerful man used to getting his own way.

No, he had to treat this as a test of his own fiber. A series of tests even, the first of which he’d failed abysmally.

He was to be a father in a few months, and the last thing he could afford was to throw a tantrum like he’d done that horrible night. It hadn’t been simply tasteless to declare that his marriage was over in front of his vulture-like family. While he hadn’t known the extent to which his parents had taunted her, he had known that they hadn’t approved of her. And he’d simply served her up into their hostile clutches.

Worse was that that evening had smacked of the very same drama his parents had indulged in, over and over again, in their eternal battle against each other.

He’d meant to hurt her and the admission was galling. To learn that he’d behaved exactly like them was a bitter pill.

So he swallowed his anger—mostly directed at himself—his frustration, of the plain and sexual kind, and stroked his fingers down her neck and her shoulders, wanting to soothe her as much as himself.

There was a strength in her stubbornness, in her refusal to give in, in how she communicated her fear even when she had nothing to fight him with.

She would be a wonderful mother to his children. The thought dispersed his gloomy mood like a ray of sunshine. It was a foothold when he had no control over anything else in his life.

“I apologize for forcing this…confrontation. That wasn’t my intention. I hate upsetting you, Nyra. Especially now.”

She laughed. “That’s not how this works, Adriano. I might be extra emotional because of the hormonal roller coaster, yes, but it doesn’t mean you have to treat me with kid gloves.”

“No gloves on,cara mia. You know how much I like it raw and bare.”

She gasped and smacked his chest. “That’s exactly what got us here.”

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