The slender set of her shoulders tightened. “What did you want from me, V? A call telling you that I was questioning everything you said and did with me, that I couldn’t even bear to look at myself in the mirror because I’d made such a fool of myself, or that the thought of being near you while you happily destroyed Massimo and Leo made me physically nauseous?
“I needed to get away. From you. From Greta. From all of it.”
“And?”
“And what? What’s with the interrogation? How can you not see that all the promises we made to each other mean nothing when the foundation itself is cracked?”
The last bit of his temper frayed and his voice pitched dangerously low. “And if it’s broken, you simply walk away, instead of fixing it?”
Still, she didn’t back down. “Not if it’s completely shattered, like my trust in you.”
Tears and hurt were preferable to this version of Alessandra that looked at him with stony defiance and distrust. “I guess Massimo is right.
“The Alessandra that’s lauded in the papers, that captures millions of hearts with her take-charge attitude is a sham. The Alessandra that said she’d always dreamed of having a big family is a lie.
“The woman I married is in fact an impulsive brat who runs when things don’t go her way.
“Whose promises means nothing.
“Who clearly thinks marriage is only fun and sex and romantic escapades. Who’s so immature that she can’t even stand and communicate with the man she’d promised to spend the rest of her life with.”
CHAPTER FOUR
IMPULSIVE. IMMATURE.
Words she’d heard before. Words she’d buried deep. Her mother, Alyssa, had used them far too many times in the conversations they’d had over the years. When Alex refused to take any kind of step toward healing their relationship.
From Vincenzo, the accusations rang true and stung deep. But it was the flash of disappointment in his eyes before he buried it under a thick veil of resentment that she couldn’t ignore. It didn’t help that she was already feeling fragile after attending her mother’s and stepfather’s funerals.
She’d expected Vincenzo’s anger, had been warned by Massimo of the cold burn of it getting worse with each passing day. She’d chalked it up to an arrogant, ruthless man not getting his own way, probably for the first time in his life.
Away from his commanding presence, awash in her own hurt, it had been easy to forget that he had certain expectations of her, that her learning of his true identity and actions toward the Brunettis made no difference to him, to how he felt about their marriage.
“Running away from problems only makes them worse, piccola.” Her biological father’s wise words when she’d begged to come and live with him after yet another fight with her mother. But in the end, Carlos had indulged her wish, and as a result, the ocean of distance between her and Alyssa had become permanent.
Had she done the same this time too? What did she owe a man who had trapped her in a web of lies?
And yet, he’d gained nothing so far by marrying her.
“I married you because for the first time in my life I saw something I wanted outside of revenge.”
Heat flamed her cheeks, but she refused to look away as if she was in the wrong. “If I apologize for my actions, it won’t be truthful,” she finally offered. “You left me feeling like I had no other choice than to go.”
“And now, bella?” He leaned against his massive desk, throwing those long legs out in front of him. Pulling her starved senses to the sheer masculinity of him. As though she were a magnet and he was her true north. “Have you found one? Is that why you’ve deigned to return?”
With him standing no more than two feet from her, Alex weakened and let herself drink him in.
Take in the magnificent presence of the man she’d allowed into her heart.
Power and arrogance shimmered around him, a second skin. An armor he was using to keep her out now. But he hadn’t done it in Bali. He had let her in. He had been a different man. Or was that just her naive belief in a fairy tale that didn’t exist?
And how had she not seen the similarities between him and Leo and Massimo? The cut of his features, the very way he held himself slightly separate from the crowd, the affection she’d heard in his voice when he’d spoken of his mother—he was so much like his half brothers. So much a Brunetti through and through.
But she knew instinctively he would hate that comparison. The confidence in his speech, the commanding power of his look—it had been hard-won for Vincenzo and would be so much harder to shed too.
Deep smudges darkened his electric gray eyes, gilded by long lashes that should have made him look almost feminine. But the aquiline nose, with no fewer than two dents marring its aristocratic lineage, and the strong chin saved him from that. While his thinly sculpted upper lip hinted at the contempt she’d foolishly never seen before today, the lush lower lip spoke of the sensuality he hid beneath that ruthless mask.
She shivered slightly, even though his office was set to a comfortable ambient temperature.
The gray shirt revealed a teasing V of olive skin, skin Alex had kissed and petted to her heart’s content. Her palm tingled in desperation for that contact again—to be able to slide her hand over his warm skin stretched taut over sculpted muscles. She’d thought it so romantic that she, with her always cold toes and fingers, had found a man who could warm her up just by holding her.
But even that reminder of her naive dreams couldn’t stop her mind from imagining the slide of her hand moving farther down his defined chest to the thick slabs of his abdominal muscles, down to the solid strength of his thighs and then back up…
“Alessandra!”
Lost in the splendor that was the
