by Maya Blake
His face tightened. ‘You don’t know what you’re asking, Ava.’
And she had a feeling she would regret the words, but her need to be with him, to experience the sheer bliss of Cesare’s lovemaking had pushed her past shame. ‘You’re my husband. I’m your wife, albeit an unwanted one. What could be simpler?’
He whirled around. ‘We haven’t had sex in almost a year.’
A harsh laugh left her throat. ‘Trust me, I know. And I’m not sure whether to be ashamed because I’ve let myself accept this preposterous situation between us or disgusted with myself because, despite everything, I still want you.’
His smile was tinged with an arrogance that made her palms itch to slap it off his face. Then kiss him like he was her last breath. ‘Our chemistry defies reason and description. Always has. But you’re chasing a dream, cara. One that can never become reality.’
She stopped and licked her lips. ‘Then why are you still here?’ Knowing he still wanted her, still desired her enough to shake his formidable control made her bolder.
Cesare had always prided himself on his control. It was only with her, on occasion, that she’d seen his formidable willpower slip. She’d suspected for a long time that he resented her for that loss of control.
She watched his hands unclench, and immediately clench again. ‘Because it’s becoming physically impossible to stay away from you.’
His gaze locked on hers, studying every movement like a predator tracking a doomed prey. ‘Now it’s your turn. You know I can’t give you the wholesome family you want. What are you prepared to settle for?’
The white-hot gaze slid down to linger on her lips. She knew exactly what that look meant, and yes, she could have settled for wild, untamed, skin-melting sex. But she knew it would never make her happy. ‘I’m not prepared to settle.’
Her heart thudded as he gathered himself together. His features hardened, closed off as completely as a solid steel door slamming in her face.
‘Then we have nothing left to talk about.’
Pain rushed like an icy river through her veins. Gasping in air, she lowered her head to hide the effect of his words. With numb detachment, she noticed her neckline was gaping, showing the full upper curve of her breasts. Hastily, she rearranged her dress, thankful her hair had loosened enough to cover the heat rushing into her face.
She sensed him coming closer. For a second she thought he would touch her, soothe away his harshly spoken words, but when she risked a glance she saw him veer towards the door.
Anger, gratefully received in place of fruitless hope, roiled through her. She surged to her feet and yanked her dress down.
‘Why?’
He didn’t turn around.
‘Tell me why you still wear your wedding ring but are condemning our marriage?’ She heard the strained bewilderment in her voice and would have given her eye teeth not to. ‘Is it...is it because you don’t love me any more?’
With one hand tensed on the doorknob, he turned. ‘Any more?’
‘Yes. Is that it?’
‘Ava, I desired you. I craved you with a need and desperation that bordered on the unholy. But I never claimed to love you.’
* * *
Ava lay in darkness, sleep a thousand miles away as Cesare’s words played an unrelenting refrain in her head. Words that had cut into her, devastated her so completely that she’d sunk into the sofa, incapable of speech.
Cesare, of course, had walked out after reminding her coolly of their call to Celine the next day. She’d clamped her lips together, begging whatever fates were within hearing distance to help her hold it together until he was out of earshot.
Then a long, hideous whimper had escaped her. The sound had reminded her of a wounded animal, alien and ugly, torn from the depths of her soul.
In that moment she’d hated herself. She’d always been weak when it came to Cesare. Minutes after meeting him, and agreeing to have a drink with him at a wine bar in London, she’d known in a deep, innate part of her being that he possessed the power to make her do things, feel things no other human being could. They’d never made it to the wine bar. He’d taken her to his country pad in Surrey and they’d ended up making love, right there on the bonnet of his car in the middle of his driveway. It had been the start of the most erotic, soul-shaking six weeks of her life.
Yes, he’d enthralled her from the very first look.
But the sex wasn’t why she’d fallen for Cesare. During those six weeks, he’d taken care of her, treated her as if she was the most important thing in his life. And for someone who’d always felt like an afterthought in her family, it’d been like being handed a little piece of heaven.
Ava turned over, punched her frustration into her pillow. For Cesare to deny the man he’d been before their marriage and Annabelle’s birth hurt her deeply. Because that man had been there—she hadn’t dreamed him. Or had she?
She sucked in a shaky breath. Cesare’s accusation that she was pushy, of foisting her dreams on him, cut through her muddled thoughts like deadly acid.
Falling pregnant with Annabelle so soon after meeting Cesare had merely accelerated the realisation of a lifelong desire, because nurturing a family she could call her own had always been her one and only dream. And when Cesare had proposed, she’d thought it’d been his dream too.
How wrong she’d been.
Because, she recalled, for a split second after she’d told him she was pregnant, Cesare had looked like a man who’d just glimpsed his worst nightmare.
‘But we were so careful. How could this have happened?’ he’d asked in shaken disbelief.
Since she’d asked herself that very same question, but with a burgeoning joy, she couldn’t have summoned an answer to save her life.
Ava threw back the covers and padded to the window. Moonlight gleamed off the courtyard flagstones—the same flagstones she’d stood on when Cesare had proposed.
I never claimed to love you.
Foolish tears prickled her eyes. She wanted to hate Cesare for his callous words, but he was right. He’d never said the words. Oh, he’d demonstrated his desire exceptionally well; he’d provided for her every carnal and materialistic wish. But he’d never told her he loved her. She’d just...assumed...
Damn it. She wouldn’t cry. Hell, at the back of her mind she’d accepted that at some point one of them would have to make a move to dissolve this empty marriage.
Except, of course, when the time had come she hadn’t demanded a separation or divorce. She’d practically begged for him to take her back.
How pathetic was she? Furious with herself for wallowing in self-pity, she threw a shirt over her thigh-length nightgown, grabbed the monitor and left her suite.
Aimlessly wandering the house, she finally ended up in the kitchen. A wry smile twisted her lips. Her brother, Nathan, the only one of her three brothers who’d come remotely close to acknowledging her existence when they were growing up, would have mocked her mercilessly if he’d seen she’d reverted to her old habit of comfort-eating. Opening the fridge, she took out a half bottle of Soave and poured herself a glass.
A small platter of stromboli stood next to the large stove. She picked one and bit into it, then, on impulse, she tugged the phone off the wall, dialled her brother’s number. Her disappointment was tinged with relief when she got his voicemail.
What would she have said to him anyway? That her husband had announced he’d never loved her and a part of her believed she’d caused her marriage breakdown by forcing a family? Grimacing, she left a short, nondescript message and hung up.
She turned and jumped at the shadow looming in the doorway. Her heart flipped several times more when Cesare stepped into the subdued kitchen light.
‘Mi dispiace. I heard voices.’ His narrowed glance went to the phone, then returned t
o her. ‘Who were you calling at this time of the night?’ he demanded.
‘Nathan. I got his voicemail. I was leaving a message.’
‘Have any of your family been in touch recently?’
‘You mean have they developed a desperate need to get to know the sister they’ve rejected all their lives? That would be a no.’ She refused to acknowledge the pain.
Cesare frowned. ‘Do they know what’s happened to you this past month?’
She swallowed the lump in her throat. ‘They don’t concern themselves with my well-being, Cesare. They never have.’
‘I’m sorry—’
‘I don’t need you to be. And I don’t need your pity. What I need you won’t give me, so you can either leave me in peace, or we can change the subject.’
He stared at her for a full minute, then he leaned against the doorjamb. His gaze slid over her, lingering in places it had no right to linger. She wanted to scream at him to stop looking at her. But this was Cesare. Asking wouldn’t mean getting.
Silence stretched as neither made a move to speak. The air in the open space closed off, growing thick until it felt as if they breathed the same pocket of oxygen.
Slowly, excitement licked through her belly, transmitting knee-weakening desire along her nerve endings. Ava forced herself to remember. Remembering how she’d humiliated herself a mere two hours ago fortified her resolve. She moved forward, then paused, realising that to walk out of the door she’d have to go past him.
Her glance fell to his hands and took in white padding and red specks where his knuckles bled. ‘You’ve been in the gym?’
Cesare kept a fully equipped gym in all of his homes and kept ultra-fit by boxing.
He gave a grim nod. ‘I was overwhelmed by the need to pummel something.’ His eyes locked on hers, drilling into her until she feared he could see right through her.
‘How did that work out for you?’ Her voice emerged breathless, strained. She took a hasty sip of her wine.
‘Not nearly as successful as I’d hoped it would. You?’
‘I leave the pummelling to others.’ She raised the items in her hand. ‘I prefer to wage my war armed with carbs and wine. I’ll let you know later if I’m winning.’
Half of her had hoped her answer would drive him away. The other half, the foolish half that never listened to reason where Cesare was concerned, leaped with joy when he came closer, slowly unwinding the padding from his bound fingers. Sweat glistened off his honed biceps, emphasising the play of superb muscle as he moved. Even more riveting was his half smile, more potent now he’d stopped beside her.
‘Pour me a glass, would you?’ He nodded at her glass.
‘Do you think it’s a good idea?’
He surveyed her with the sleepy regard of a jungle predator. The taut smile that barely curved his lips was acutely discerning. ‘For me to drink wine, or for us to be in the same room at the same time?’
‘Both.’ She cursed her candid tongue and tried to address the less volatile issue. ‘Also, isn’t water the recommended drink after hectic exercise?’
Heat flared in her cheeks as his gaze turned even more intense. The torrid promise of sheet-burning sex pulsed between them. His nostrils flared for a second before he moved to the sink and ran his hands under the tap.
‘I drank water after the workout. Now I need something...stronger.’ His gaze dropped to her chest, his bold stare causing her breasts to grow heavier. ‘I’ll get the wine myself if you can’t stand to be here.’
The clear challenge made her bolder. The red in her hair and nature made backing down from a challenge an impossibility—or so she’d often been told.
She wouldn’t slink away like a scared puppy just because Cesare was in a testy mood. Setting her drink on the vast centre island, she pulled out a stool and perched on it.
Cesare grabbed a glass, brought over the plate of stromboli and placed it down between them. She poured his wine as he took a bite of bread. After taking a sip, he sat back and looked at her.
‘Sleep was eluding you also?’
‘I think sleep would elude any woman whose husband announces he never loved her and regrets marrying her.’
He tensed immediately. ‘Ava—’
‘It’s okay. No, actually, it’s not okay but I’m not about to launch into another bout of hysteria if that’s what you’re worried about.’
He exhaled. ‘You’re the last woman I’d accuse of hysterics. But grazie.’
The piece of pastry she popped into her mouth to delay her response tasted like sawdust with a hint of garlic. Taking another sip of wine helped her force it down, but realising another bite wasn’t a good idea because she risked choking, she put it down.
‘Don’t thank me just yet. I’m still reeling from the revelations about Roberto and about us. Just because I’m calm now doesn’t mean we don’t have a situation that doesn’t need to be resolved.’ Clearing her throat, she forced the words out. ‘I think it’s time we stop playing ostrich and take what’s happening between us to the next...permanent level.’
The violent scrape of the stool as he pushed it back on the tiled floor raked across nerves already raw with her ravaged emotions.
Cesare planted both hands on the smooth surface and glared fire and brimstone at her. ‘Di Goias do not divorce.’
Her mouth fell open. ‘Excuse me? Shouldn’t you have thought of that before you decided to enter a marriage you didn’t want?’
‘You were carrying my child. I had no choice.’ His lips barely moved with his words.
She sucked in a stunned breath. ‘Wow, you do know how to keep piling on the charm, don’t you? I’m sure you would’ve made some damsel a perfect husband in the Dark Ages. Unfortunately for you, we’re in the twenty-first century, so unless I signed on to this Di Goias Do Not Divorce without knowing about it, I don’t see that you have a choice.’
His glare intensified. ‘You knew we were only marrying because of Annabelle.’
‘Wrong! I thought you were marrying me because you loved me, that you wanted to make a family with me.’
He stepped back abruptly as if she’d physically assaulted him. ‘Again with the family!’
‘What is so wrong with that?’ she yelled, suddenly not feeling so calm any more.
‘I never confessed such a feeling.’
‘I know. Stupid me, mistranslating all those heated Italian endearments you whispered to me in bed as words of devotion and undying love.’
A dull flush washed across his taut cheekbones. ‘I never lied to you about my feelings in or out of bed.’
‘But you made me think you cared about me, that you wanted what I wanted. It was a lie by omission.’
As if frustrated with her logic, he whirled away from the island and started pacing in tight circles. She followed his prowl, helpless to avert her gaze because Cesare had always been a source of intense, almost worshipful fascination for her.
He finally returned and gripped the edge of the countertop. ‘I never lied to you, Ava. And I did care.’ His gaze speared hers, almost imploring, as if he willed her to believe him.
She swallowed. ‘Obviously not enough. Ultimately, it was all about the sex for you. Shame I had to go and get pregnant, wasn’t it?’ The words were forced through a painful knot in her throat. ‘Whatever you say next, even if you think and feel it, please do not tell me you regret having our daughter.’
Pain flitted over his face. In the next instant it was gone. ‘I have not for a single moment regretted Annabelle. But you have to admit, things got very complicated very quickly with us.’
She released the breath locked in her throat and quickly swallowed down the threatening tears.
Enough.
Before she got sucked down into a quagmire of her own making, she stood. �
��Well, it’s time to de-complicate things. There’s nothing to stop me seeking a divorce so whether you want one or not doesn’t really matter. You said you shouldn’t have married me, that I was too fixated on wanting a family with you to see that you didn’t want one. I hate you for misleading me if that’s the way you really felt. You still want me—do us both a favour and don’t deny it, please. You want me but you don’t want to be married to me, and yet you still wear your wedding ring.
‘Frankly, I don’t have a clue what’s going on, but I’m done turning myself into a basket case trying to figure it out. So I don’t really give a damn if it’s the di Goia thing or not, Cesare. I want a divorce.’
CHAPTER SIX
CESARE DESCENDED THE stairs, his mood no less foul than when he’d gone upstairs three hours earlier under the pretext of going to bed.
Sleep had been non-existent. No surprise there. Irrational anger and frustration pulsed in equal measures through him. For the most part he was extremely disturbed by his reaction to Ava’s announcement in the kitchen. Which in turn confused him. He was not a man who enjoyed being confused!
And yet, what had he expected when he announced they shouldn’t have married? That she would dissolve in helpless tears and beg him to reconsider?
He gave a grim smile. Ava was not like that. No, his redheaded tigress reacted with claws, not tears. But there’d been no signs of claws last night...only a calm resignation after her hysterics-free announcement.
The disturbing hollowness inside him expanded.
Even if some masochistic part of him had wanted her to fight, what good would it have done? He wasn’t wired to be a family man. He never would be.
Di Goias do not divorce. He snorted under his breath. For a man who prided himself on being ruthlessly straight in his business dealings, he was sure as hell making a pathetic ass of himself in his private life.
Ava only needed a competent Internet search engine to verify his hot-headed statement as a pack of lies. Granted, divorce in his family was rare, but wasn’t his Uncle Gianni neck-deep in a particularly messy one with his third wife right this very minute?