Page 113 of Phantom Mine

“Now you have me wanting to fistfight the rain for getting you sick.”

With that, he closes the door and walks around to the other side. He’s reaching for my hand again before he’s even settled into the driver’s seat.

When he said he was taking me home, I expected him to drive me to my place.

Instead, he takes me to his.

Chapter Thirty

Matteo

Valentina is quiet the entire drive back to my place. She doesn’t speak as we pull into the garage, as the elevators open into my apartment, as I remove her clothes and put her in a hot shower.

Everything that those who know me would say defines me simply evaporates where she’s concerned—my legendary restraint, composure, rationality, and planning all vanish without even putting up a fight. I told her weeks ago that I’m a patient man, but that was a lie. I’ve been feigning patience since she walked back into my life, but I’m approximately twelve hours away from getting down on my knees and begging her to open up to me if she still hasn’t decided to do it herself by then.

That’s how bad this has gotten.

How completely she inhabits me.

I spent a week handling my panicking father and cleaning up the fallout of Rocco’s murder, and all I could think about was enthralling hazel eyes and a warm body I was pretty sure I wasgoing through severe withdrawals for. Pretending to give a shit that that asshole was dead was almost as hard as not seeing her.

Valentina starts crying again as I towel her dry. She doesn’t make a sound, but the tears fall down her face regardless. She’s still crying when I dress her in another one of my t-shirts and sit her in my bed, drawing the covers tightly over her legs. I know these tears are for Adriana, that she’s grieving her, but there’s something I’m missing. This seems an excessive amount of pain for the loss of a friend, no matter how close said friend was to her.

I hold her face as she cries. Her tears fall into my palms like they’re mine to steal away.

I didn’t know it was possible to feel pain because of someone else’s pain. That it could be so acute, that it could hurt so deeply when they’re not your own emotions, but watching her fall apart kills me.

“Let me in,” I plead softly, thumbs brushing her cheeks. “Have I not proven to you that you can trust me?”

Her haunted eyes find mine and her hands close around mine, holding onto me as she keeps crying silently.

She doesn’t say anything.

I grind my teeth in irritation, frustration lengthening the line of my spine. When I push to my feet, my hands drop from her face to my sides. My back is as rigid as it's ever been as I head for the kitchen to make her some tea. I’m starting to think patience was the wrong approach and that she won’t ever open up to me of her own accord. Maybe I should change my tactics, because I will get the truth out of her, one way or the other.

A hand clasps my arm just above my elbow and stops me. Another finds my opposite shoulder.

One touch and my pulse accelerates.

Then her soft curves mold against my back and her arms close around my chest. Her cheek presses between my shoulder blades and she hugs me, holding me back.

“Don’t leave,” she whispers softly. “Please.”

The ache in her voice weighs my heart down with lead. “I’m not going anywhere,” I reply gruffly.

“I know I’m not making it easy for you to stay,” she continues. “I know that. I’m afraid of letting you in, of what happens if I let you get too close.” Her voice is muffled against my back. “I can’t lose anyone else, Matteo. I won’t survive it.”

I try to turn around, but her arms don’t budge. She keeps me where I am, with her front pressed against my back.

Outside, the rain continues. It beats down vengefully against the windows, as if desperate to get our attention. Neither one of us moves.

Valentina’s palms flatten on my chest and tighten. She holds me like she’s afraid I’m going to storm out and leave her. She’s on the verge of speaking and I don’t dare breathe for fear of inadvertently scaring her off.

“A week after Adriana disappeared, I was in a complete daze,” she finally whispers. “I felt like… like a raw nerve exposed to the entire world. The pain was excruciating and constant, but so was the dullness, thenumbness, to everything else. I was desperate to feel something other than the hurt. I was desperate to stop crying, because Adri would have hated it.” She hums quietly and holds me closer. “That night, I went mindlessly in search of thatsomething. I don’t remember leaving my apartment or knowing where I was heading when I did, but when I finally came to a stop, the sun was rising around me and I was standing in front of the Raffles hotel. I walked the entire night and I had the key you gave me clenched tightly in my fist.”

She smiles against my back at the memory and I swallow hard, my chest suddenly too tight.

“I went in, showed the front desk the key, and asked if the penthouse was still occupied, but they told me it was empty. I don’t know why I expected that you might have stayed. You’d left for Italy, just like you told me you would.” A shaky breath leaves her lips. “I couldn’t bring myself to leave the key though. I had the opportunity to, but I couldn’t do it. Not when it meant giving up the only thing that connected me to you, even if that thing was just a meaningless piece of plastic. That’s why I kept it.”

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