Page 18 of The Butcher's Wife
Women like Serafina have never been my taste—I like big, opinionated, bad bitches, not soft-spoken princess-types.
Serafina gulps, glances down at the bow and arrow in my hands, and smiles nervously. “Dad let me in.”
Whatever she’s got cooking in the oven smells like cheese and tomatoes. Pizza?
I swallow around a mouthful of saliva. “You need to go back.”
Her face crumples with devastation.Fuck me.Is she going to cry?
It doesn’t matter. My penthouse isn’t a place for a young woman. I’m never here, I have loaded guns all over the place, and there’s basically no protection besides the cybersecurity Turi had set up.
“This is for the best,” I say, knowing it’s as much for me as it is for her—I don’t need another fucking responsibility.
The oven beeps behind her, and a change passes over her face.Goddammit. She calms herself with a deep breath.
While looking me dead in the eye, she picks up the knife from the kitchen counter. I remember the flower petals in her hand, how she made me smell like roses after our wedding, and how I scrubbed my hands under a gas station bathroom sink to rid myself of her scent.
“We aremarried.” It’s impossible not to see Annetta in her face. Of the two, Annetta was always the strong one.
The old doubt that had crawled into my brain back at Turi’s house returns with a force. Her parents had me convinced Annetta was dead, and I’d chalked up her strange behavior to her sudden loss, but now?
My gut says something is off again.
“I’m not going back,” she says.
Then, like she’s dismissing her lowest employee, she turns to set the knife next to the oven and uses a dish towel—I don’t even own dish towels, especially not ones with blue butterflies on them—to pull out whatever she’s cooking and proceeds to ignore me like I’m a door-to-door salesman and not a stinky, six-foot-five bearded man with a compound bow in the kitchen.
I bite back a string of swears. The tray in her hand that she’s sliding on top of the stove? It’s got my favorite focaccia with escarole and tomatoes. Even from here, I can see she’s added extra anchovy, just how I like.
There are a thousand things I should do, but I finally settle on the most mature option—I throw a big, man-baby tantrum.
I chuck my bow onto the nearest couch, stomping back to the elevator to grab my backpack and cooler. I drop the cooler in front of the refrigerator with a heavy thud that earns a startled jump from her as she sweeps green leaves off the kitchen floor. That makes me feel like an even bigger asshole, but instead of apologizing, I stomp upstairs to my bedroom.
I have to take a shower before I can deal with the half-naked woman in my kitchen.
Tonight’s surprises are endless. My bedroom, my oasis, has been transformed. A suitcase filled with robin’s eggblue, bright lemon, and cream clothes spills onto my bed like an overturned vase. I glance at my closet—more of her Easter-egg clothes peek out from between my shirts.
“Nope.” I’m not dealing with this right now. I march to the bathroom and nearly crack a tooth from how hard I grit my teeth. “Motherfucker!”
Crystal bottles, jars of creams, and a sparkling glass case of makeup litter my bathroom counter—well, notlitter, exactly, because they’re neatly lined up like they’re afraid to take up too much space, but it’s still fucking annoying. A glance at the shower tells me nothing is safe from the invasion.
“Fuck this.”
I swipe clean clothes from my closet and take my ass to the next room over. In here, at least, nothing has been touched. My housekeeper keeps it from getting dusty, and my brother keeps his favorite bottle of all-in-one hair-beard-body-ass wash in the shower for his rare visits.
I throw my backpack onto the ground and lock myself in the bathroom to take a nice, hot shower—sans jerking off. When I’m done, I pull on clean jeans and a T-shirt and drop into the armchair in front of the bed. I feel clean and less shitty, but I’m still pissed.
Who does this woman think she is? She can’t just waltz into my place, infect all my things with herwomanshit, and take over. That’s… that’s squatting.
For the first time in a week, I glance down at my empty ring finger. After our wedding, Barbara made me return his wedding ring, which I had to use soap to remove, and told me I needed to get my own.
I don’t have to do shit. I didn’t fucking agree to this wedding. Barbara and Turi set it up like backstabbing bastards, and Turi used his new Don status to force me intoit. Well, I’m thesottocaponow, and I don’t have to take this lying down. They can make us get married, but we don’t have to live together, and Turi’s about to hear an earful about it when I drive over to his house tonight.
Not like I can stay here anyway, not when I can see the soft curve of my young, grieving wife’s vulva through her bicycle shorts. I scowl, throwing myself forward to pull on socks and tie up my boots.
Once I’m downstairs, I turn the corner to the kitchen. She’s bent over my ice cooler, the spandex of her shorts stretching so thin it’s almost transparent across her ass and pussy. I bite down hard enough to crack a tooth.
Minchia!
