Page 44 of The Sound in Silence

“You’re very difficult for me to figure out,quello silenzioso. It’s maddening. Your eyes say you hate me, but your body claims otherwise. Which tells me, it may not be hate you feel but a need for protection. Feeling like you should be protecting yourself from me?”

I roll my eyes, sayingAre you serious?in the only method I can at the moment.

“If I explored your body, I could prove it to you.”

Beneath his hold, I manage to lift my chin a fraction. Not sure if I’m daring to call his bluff or for him to release me. Either option wouldn’t be what I crave though. Whatever’s in his head isn’t pleasant, it’s control. And that’s not what I want our marriage to be.

“Do you want me to explore?”

Yes.I shake my head in denial because it won’t mean anything.

“Very well then. You’re in charge, Ariella.”

Am I?Somehow, that isn’t the sense I’ve been getting from him. Not every time we’ve been in the same room, and especially not how my conversation with Nico suggested he’d be. Nico made it sound like if, on my wedding night, I didn’t lie on my back and spread my legs willingly, Erico could force me. Nico claimed theFamiglia’smorals are different. Rape doesn’t exist between a couple, and it was a fact he shared with absolute bitterness and apology. I accepted it and told myself Erico was kind when I met him, and I’d cling to that memory on our wedding night.

Of course, nothing of this marriage has gone how I expected it to.

Erico releases my hip and neck simultaneously and instead cups my face, holding me almost tenderly. “Happy birthday, Ariella, for real this time. Telling you over video chat or in a note accompanying the piano isn’t the real thing. I’m pleased to hear about all your piano usage.”

Fuck, what’s he doing?Luring me in with kindness only to shove me away in my corner again.

It’s perfect,I mouth, giving him my honesty. At least, we can be amicable, right?

His eyes flick to my mouth and even though moments ago, he said it’s in my control, I wonder if he’ll kiss me. I wonder if Iwanthim to kiss me. A replay of our wedding kiss under the guise of this marriage.

I don’t want him to.

I’m unsure what I desire.

I don’t want him to kiss me because his hot and cold personality is annoying. He talks of separate lives, but he comes storming in here when it’s convenient for him.

I turn my head away, my hair creating a wall between us, and in the last second before my eyes flicker shut, I spot his disappointment.

“You know sign language.” Not a question but a fact spoken with bitterness.

I nod and he says nothing more as his hands slide from my face down to the sides of my neck, my shoulders, and toward my arms, almost like he’s tracing me. Like he can’t get enough of touching me. I shiver when his hands travel the length of my arm, his fingers weaving between mine, and I remember the exact item I’m missing when I feel his own brush against my bare finger.

Ripping my hand from the water, he stares where we’re linked together.

“Ariella, where the fuck is your ring?”

Erico

Possessiveness over a woman—over anything, really—isn’t my game. Requires too much energy. Unless it’s directly endangering theFamiglia, I don’t care for it.

But fuck. Already, arriving home, I was tense because by the time the flight landed, hours had passed since messaging Ariella and Sebastian and neither had a good excuse for ignoring my texts. My nerves were frayed and I arrived home antsy and on edge, immediately searching out my wife, all for Carlotta to direct me outside.

Instead of going through my house, I purposely went around the building to practice calming down before I lost it on a woman who, I knew deep down, didn’t deserve my wrath over a text. My soldier, now he’d be a different story, but I’d be dealing with him later.

That was the plan anyway. Take the long way, calm down, and reappear in Ariella’s life asnotan asshole. Then I witnessed how they were talking, the way he was looking at her, her body language, and mentally, I lost it. Years of my father’s training in control prevented me from murdering my soldier right then and there in front of her.

It was discipline and unease I even had that passing thought that prevented me from spending the rest of my afternoon disposing of a body. Possessiveness over something I own is natural, but less so, if I don’t care for them. Besides the promise of theFamiglia’s future, deep down, I shouldn’t care about Ariella.Don’tcare about her.

So why did my jaw clench, and my stomach knot, witnessing her smile back at him? Carefree and easy and unlike anything I’ve received from her in our video calls. The short chats I didn’t realize, until seeing her in the pool, I was clinging to so desperately, knowing they were something only her and me shared. That even when gone, she agreed to meet with me.

And then, when I directed him away, and she spoke to him with her hands, purposely using the language both know I don’t comprehend to share their final, secret message had me seeing red. Worse, because he nodded back. Heunderstood.

Fucking sign language.

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