Page 17 of Made to Sin

A nearby maid ran over to give me a towel, the shocked expression on her face told me just about everyone in the vicinity witnessed my fall. Tears blurred my vision, but I refused to cry in front of these evil people. They would probably go as far as collecting my tears for a trophy.

I wrapped the towel around myself and turned to go inside. I had the irritating urge to push Sofia into the pool to see how she felt, but it was only going to end up in me getting in trouble, so I walked past her and didn’t look back.

Keep calm, she’s not worth it.

“Katarina, if you wanted to go on a swim, you could have said so,” Marco called out, trying to break the tension with a bad joke.

Nobody else thought it was funny, not a peep from the crowd, but my husband was never any good at reading his surroundings.

Still, I didn’t meet anyone’s gaze, continuing to place one foot in front of the other until I was out of eyesight.

—

At the threshold of my room, I stripped out of the clingy white material— not caring about the door being wide open or the trailing wetness. It was comforting we had wood flooring instead of carpet, considering the puddles that now occupied the dry space.

At least one thing worked in my favor today: my bright pink undergarments had matched.

Not a full second of relief later, my neck tingled with the awareness that someone was watching me. If it was Marco coming to chastise me, I was going to scream. If it was Sofia, I might push her down the stairs.

God, could this day be any more eventful?

Spinning on my heels, I saw the last person I needed to see leaning against the door frame. Why does Lucifer— I mean Luciano— have to be present during my worst scenarios?

“What do you want, Luciano?” I asked, annoyance laced in my voice.

He didn’t answer right away, letting a sultry silence pass between us. The idea of him seeing me in only a bra and thong made me uncomfortably itchy. I was trying to control my human reactions, but he made it difficult with his prickling stare.

If I thought his eyes were a deep shade earlier, they were the definition of pitch black now. There was no amusement, no anger, no emotions. Nothing but an indiscernible darkness coasting the lengths of my body.

“I didn’t know you were a tease too, Katarina,” he rasped.

If I had to bet money on one person who saw the full truth behind Sofia pushing me in, it would be on him. He was too perceptive to miss anything. It was the fact that he came to me, the victim, spewing nonsense that made me angry.

“We both know I didn’t jump in the pool willingly, but your rude girlfriend pushed me in. And I do have another color other than white underneath.”

The crude mention of the pink relit the dwindling flames in hiseyes, but they were wiped as soon as he flickered his gaze to the side.

I blew out a disbelieving breath of air at how easy it must be for him to hide his feelings. I clearly needed lessons, given how he read me like an open book.

“Sofia’s not my girlfriend.”

I hated to admit it, but the unwanted pressure from earlier lifted off my chest at his clarification. I rationalized it was simply because it was wrong to fantasize about a taken man, but it didn’t stop my body from lighting up.

The next best thing to say was, “Okay,” and end the conversation. I didn’t. Strange enough, I felt free to be myself around Luciano. He already witnessed two embarrassing moments, what was another? Being nosy couldn’t possibly trump being drunk.

“Sister?”

He stared around my room, lingering on the messy dresser where I displayed the few things that were important to me. “No.”

“Cousin?”

His eyes darted back to mine. “No.”

“Do you have any relation to her then?”

He rolled his eyes as if he was only answering to get me to shut up. “She’s a friend.”

I didn’t have many friendships to compare it to, but with what Marco had shown me in our relationship, any woman with a vagina was a plaything to him. In short, a friend was code for hookup. The sourness was back.

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