Page 40 of Playing the Sicilian's Game of Revenge

Which infuriated him. It made him feel as though he was overreacting when, of course, he was not. He’d seen her too close to that man with his own eyes, in front of all those people who were supposed to believe she was engaged to him.

Something had to change. She had introduced these changes, this being herself, and he had not pivoted yet. He needed to sort out his response, shore up his defenses. He could not let her get to him like this.

“I would simply like you to consider the optics of cozying up with another man when we’re trying to convince people we are engaged. I did not think it needed saying before tonight, but apparently you need some educating on how to behave like an engaged woman.”

She stared at him for a full silent minute. He wanted to look away. He—inconceivably—wanted to move his body in what could only be called a fidget. Unacceptable.

“I don’t recall cozying up to anyone. Except the odious Nevi, and I don’t think she is who you mean.” She kept staring at him, like she could see through every last brick wall she claimed he had. “The only man even remotely my age that I spoke to at that event was Carlo. Who happens to be my sister-in-law’s cousin. And married. We were talking about his impending fatherhood.”

“It is my experience none of these things prevent a man from wanting what he should not have.” Those words felt damning...but not toward her. Toward himself.

Again, her silence dragged out, even as the limo came to a stop outside her home. His skin felt too tight, and everything inside of him too tense, like he might simply explode. He did not understand anything that was happening inside of him.

“Were you jealous, Teo?” she asked softly. All silky promise.

He barked out a laugh, too loud in the condensed air of the limo’s back seat. “I am worried about how it seems to those we need to convince in order to achieve my only goal.” He wanted to add that he did not care who she laughed with, who she touched, but the very image had his throat closing so tight he could not force out the words.

“Ah.” But she did not sound convinced, and this pounded through him like an uncontrollable fire.

She turned to him then. Her knees brushing his, those eyes flashing with something he recognized all too well. A softness he did not want from her. Ever.

“You were my first. You have been my only.” She reached forward, brushed a hand over his tie, the words, the gesture sending all that fire straight to his sex. “Does that make you feel better, Teo?”

“I am quite sure I do not care one way or the other,” he ground out, but something primal roared through him in direct contrast to his words. He wanted to reach out. Take. Hold. Keep.

“Would you like to come in for a drink?” she asked, still playing with his tie. “We could discuss jealousy. Flinging. Brick walls.”

He raised an eyebrow at her, not at all trusting what she was up to. Or maybe it was the roaring need inside of himself he did not trust. “You really have thrown the rules out the window.”

“Like I said, those were about protecting myself. I think...is it really living if you’re always protecting yourself? Never risking? Never feeling? I suppose you get injured constantly flinging yourself at the brick wall, but sometimes you break through. And it’s worth the bumps and bruises along the way.”

He did not like this analogy. For a great many reasons. “You have attached a lot of philosophy onto sex, Saverina.”

She didn’t even falter. “Sex is what you make of it, Teo. I don’t mind it being a little philosophical. Not with you. So, do you want to come in?”

She wanted him to say yes, clearly. She wanted some admission of jealousy. He would not give her those things...but that did not mean he had to all-out resist. As long as it was her idea. Her choice.

Because if she chose it, it did not have to be about any of those things he did not want it to be about. It could just be sex. Something they were very good at together. “Are you inviting me in?”

She sighed heavily and shook her head. “Teo, I’m asking you. Is that what you want to do? Regardless of revenge. Would you like to come inside and share a drink and some time with me?”

Words seemed to jumble. Regardless of revenge when he was only made of revenge. When nothing else could matter—not her, not wants, not something as foolish as jealousy. Nothing.

“I’d be happy to invite you in, to take you upstairs, to enjoy all this heat between us, Teo. I’d be happy to forget all my rules, but you’ll have to come out and say it, Teo. Do you want me? Is a night together what you want?”

She was trying to...break down his supposed brick walls. But there was nothing behind his walls. Just a void. “It is of no matter to me, bedda.”

She nodded, then reached for the car door and opened it herself. “Then I’ll see you Monday at work.”

She was outside in the dark evening before he could muster a response.

He would let her go. He should let her go. None of the feelings fighting it out inside of him, painful and angry, were things he could ever let win. Could ever let control him. He couldn’t control loss...so he could only ensure he won. He couldn’t want that which would lead him astray. That which threatened all the control, all the walls he’d erected these past two years.

“You have been my only.” As if that could ever matter in this world. In his plans. The only thing that mattered was his revenge.

But his hand was on the car door handle, and all he could think about was her. “Do you want me?” She’d posed it like a simple question, and maybe it should be, but it felt more like he was being cleaved in two. What he wanted. What he didn’t. Somehow both the exact same thing.

Want. Want. Want.

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