Page 36 of The Sins of Saint (The Sins of Saint 3)

He clutched me tighter against him. “First you wouldn’t stop pressing for an answer, and now you’re stalling.”

“Not stalling. Just savoring.”

He rested his chin against my head as we continued to dance, his familiar scent trapping me within the moment. I had gone from a woman who hated him with a passion, to a wife who loved him with all her heart. As much as I detested being close to him in the beginning, I now craved it more than anything.

I closed my eyes as he eased his hand up my spine, his fingers cupping the back of my neck. “He killed her.”

I stilled, but Saint kept moving with our own rhythm, his grip on my neck tightening. “I was twelve years old when I found her lifeless body.”

My heart raced, and I brought my fist up to my mouth, my jaw clenched.

“Overdose. That’s what they called it.”

His fingertips stroked the naked flesh of my neck, his chin resting on my head while his rhythm didn’t skip a single beat. “But I knew it was a lie. No one loved life more than my mother. She saw the beauty in everything. Even through a storm, she’d talk about how clean and full of new life the earth would be afterward. And she was happy. Always so damn happy.”

Cracks sounded in his voice as he wandered through the memories, and my heart broke for him. My tears wanted to run for him.

“I can still remember how her smile made everything right in the world. My father was hard on me as a child, always preaching about a man’s responsibilities in life. And while he’d make me feel incompetent at living up to his expectations, she would simply hug me. That hug was all I needed to not lose the security a twelve-year-old boy needed.”

“Saint—”

He tightened his hold around me some more, as if he needed to hold on to something…to me.

“A week before she died, I heard her and my father having an argument. They hardly ever fought, which was why I can still remember every angry word. They were arguing. My mother accused him of having an affair. He denied it, of course, but my mother didn’t believe him.”

“Was it true? Did he have an affair?” I kept my head down, staring at the candles flickering inside the gazebo.

“To this day, he denies it.”

“Is it possible that your mom might have been wrong?”

“No.” He shook his head. “She was broken, Mila. A mere suspicion wouldn’t have been able to cause so much pain.”

With my head against his chest, I could hear his heartbeat. The more he spoke, the faster it became. I wrapped my arm around his waist, holding him tight while his fingers continued to stroke the back of my neck.

“For days, my mother didn’t leave her room. Refused to see anyone, even me. I would sit outside her door and listen to her sobs, imagining a thousand different ways I would kill my father for hurting her. Every minute that passed while I heard her heart breaking, my hate for my father grew stronger and stronger. Until…” His voice broke, and I managed to glance up at him, unshed tears shimmering in the moonlight. “Until one night I went to go sit by her door and heard…nothing. Not a sound. I knew something was wrong, so I got James to help me break the door down.”

“And that’s when you found her,” I said softly.

He nodded and inhaled sharply, pained with the memory. “A part of me died that day. The good part. The part that cared. My humanity.”

“I’m so sorry, Saint.”

“That day, I made my father a promise. I promised him that I’d hate him even after death, and that I’d make his life a living hell.”

I managed to glance up at him while we swayed from side to side. “And you’re sure it wasn’t a suicide?”

Saint stilled and leveled me with his gaze. “Of course I am. She didn’t kill herself, Mila. No matter how much my father hurt her, she would never have left me behind and alone. Never. Her heart might have been broken, but her mind wasn’t. And those pills they found in her room, they weren’t hers.”

“Okay,” I tried to appease him. “So, what do you think happened?”

“My father killed her and made it look like a suicide. “

“But why would he do that?”

“Because for a Russo man, there is nothing that brings more shame to one’s name than his own wife walking out on him—especially in our line of business.”

Business Saint made clear he’d never discuss with me.

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