Page 52 of Bound By The Italian’s 'I Do'

She stopped stomping. Excellent.

He folded his arms across his chest and waited impatiently for her to finally disappear inside. Except there was no obliging sound of a door being slid open or closed.

A loud thud made him jump to his feet.

What the hell...?

But the thought had barely formed when an animalistic howl of agony rent the air.

‘Issy?’ he shouted, rushing to the barrier separating their balconies. Dammit, why the hell had he insisted the barrier be high enough for complete privacy? He called her name again but the only sound from her balcony was heart-wrenching sobs. ‘Stay where you are,’ he ordered, trying not to let the panic that she’d seriously injured herself consume him. ‘I’m coming.’

Racing through his cabin, he yanked his door open and ran straight to Issy’s door, praying she hadn’t locked it. God answered that one, and he pushed it open before racing to her balcony door and sliding that open too.

What he found stopped him in his tracks.

Issy was curled on the floor in the foetal position, great sobs racking her entire body.

In an instant he was beside her and hauling her into his arms so she was cradled on his lap.

‘Where are you hurt?’ he asked urgently. ‘Please,mia amore, tell me where you’re hurt.’

Slowly it dawned on Issy that she wasn’t dreaming. Hallucinating Gianni’s voice had been more than she could endure and she’d covered her ears like a child against the cruelty of it, crying so hard her ribs felt bruised.

She hadn’t hallucinated it. She hadn’t hallucinated him.

Tentatively, still afraid he would disappear in a blink, she touched his cheek. It was as warm and solid as it always was but still she whispered, ‘Gianni?’

‘Tell me where it hurts,’ he repeated in the same urgent tone that had finally cut through her despair.

‘Hurts?’ she echoed.

‘You have hurt yourself. You are in pain.’ His Italian accent was stronger than she had ever heard it. ‘Please, you must tell me where it hurts.’

More tears streamed down her face as her hand fluttered to her chest and pressed against her left breast. Against her heart. ‘Here.’

‘What have you done?’

‘Pushed you away.’

He didn’t understand.

‘Oh, but I’m the biggest fool in the world.’ Trembling, she cupped both his cheeks tightly. ‘Please forgive me. Please give me another chance. Please don’t give up on me and cut me from your life. I couldn’t bear it. Ican’tbear it. I love you, Gianni, and I want to build a life with you.’

He hardly dared believe what her lips were saying and her eyes were pleading.

‘It’s not even been ten hours since you walked away from me and they’ve been the longest ten hours of my life. What we have found together...you’re right. I could walk this earth for a million years and never find it again.’

‘And your sister?’

‘She loves me. She’ll forgive me in her own time, but right now it’s you I need forgiveness from.’

‘Mia amore...’A bubble of hope was starting to build inside him. ‘There is nothing for me to forgive. I didn’t react as well as I should and lashed out at you and for that, I am sorry too.’ He took a deep breath before admitting, ‘I think I have a problem with rejection.’

Her chin wobbled but she managed a smile. ‘A small one, maybe.’

He raised an eyebrow which made her smile widen and a small laugh escape her lips, and then before he even knew it was happening, her arms were wrapped around his neck, his hold around her had tightened and they were kissing with such passion and love that the bubble of hope exploded in a blaze of joy so strong that the last of Gianni’s fears abandoned him.

‘Your reaction was understandable,’ she murmured when they came up for air. ‘We both have abandonment issues.’

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