Giulia walked out of the living room. I was frozen, not because Giulia had caught onto Elia. No, because she wanted to move out of our bedroom. This time it was definitely my fault. I hadn’t fought Gaia when she’d insisted on her own room many years ago. I’d accepted it. I wouldn’t make the same mistake, not only because I feared a repeat performance. I wanted Giulia in my bed, close to me.
I chased her and caught up with her on the staircase. Cupping her elbow, I turned her around to me. She almost lost her balance and had to grab on to my shoulders to steady herself. Her eyes swam with tears. This was at least the third time I made my young wife cry. Marriage wasn’t the place for cruelty. That was what Father had said, and I’d been certain I wasn’t guilty of it. Yet cruelty came in different shapes and forms. Giulia had done nothing to deserve my suspicion, my coldness, and yet she’d been punished for another’s crime.
“I won’t let you move out of our bedroom, Giulia. You’ll stay.”
Giulia searched my face. “Why? You don’t even want to hold me at night.”
Fuck. The look of hurt in her eyes made me long for those whips again. “Stay.” I cupped her cheek. She leaned into the touch. I brushed her cheekbone.
“Why?”
“Because I tell you to.”
She shook her head. “Give me another reason.”
“Because I want you close. Because I liked falling asleep with your strawberry scent at night.”
Her mouth twitched. “Strawberry scent?”
I bent down, pressing my face into the delicious spot where her throat met her shoulder, soaking in that sweet aroma before pressing a kiss to her skin. “Like a goddamn strawberry field. I don’t even like strawberries.”
She giggled, twitching under my mouth. “Who doesn’t like strawberries?”
“Me. They are false packaging. They promise sweetness, but most of the time they are sour and watery.”
Giulia tried to squirm away from my lips that I ran over her throat, relishing in her choked laughs. “Cassio, that’s tickling.”
I lifted my head.
Her eyes lit up with amusement, and just looking at her unguarded joy dispersed some of the heaviness from my soul.
“Nobody can resist a sweet strawberry.”
“Yeah,” I murmured. “I can see that.”
Giulia shook her head. “I can’t smell like strawberry. My shampoo is cherry.”
I chuckled. “It’s strawberry for me.”
“Sure. If you order the cherry to be a strawberry, that’s what it’ll be.”
I shut her up with a kiss, not the harsh ones beckoned by anger. A gentle kiss. She kept her eyes open, not letting me off the hook. “You want me close at night?”
“I do.”
“Okay.” No mind games, just a simple okay.
I lifted her into my arms and carried her upstairs.
“Cassio…”
“Shhh… we’ll talk afterward.” She didn’t argue. The moment I laid her down on the bed, she molded her body to mine. Would I ever tire of her scent and taste?
She was sprawled out on top of me afterward, my hands splayed out on her firm ass. Her bangs stuck to her sweaty forehead. “Now we talk,” she said when I hadn’t even caught my breath.
“Giulia—”
“You promised,” she said, and her eyes stopped any protest I might have had.
“I did.” She waited. For an admittance, for my plea of guilt. “You are right. I asked Elia to test your loyalty.”
Giulia pushed into a sitting position, straddling my stomach. I loved that she wasn’t shy about her body, and I loved admiring her. Her expression made it clear that she wasn’t trying to go for another round. She wanted the higher position to feel more in control. I’d give it to her. I grasped her hips, needing to touch her.
“Test my loyalty? You told another man to come on to me to see if I was willing to cheat.”
Bitterness twisted my thoughts. “I don’t trust anyone, not just you.”
“I’m your wife, Cassio. We have to trust each other. I don’t want us to be strangers living under one roof. I want this marriage to work, not just for us but for Simona and Daniele too. They need a happy family.”
“Happy family,” I repeated. My children had never experienced a happy family. For a while, Gaia and I had managed to hide our resentment for each other, but in the last couple of years, things had turned for the worst.
“I want that,” she whispered fiercely, lowering herself until her face hovered over mine.
“So do I,” I said. But I was a realist, and in a few years, Giulia would be too.
“But you don’t believe in it.”
Looking up into Giulia’s hopeful, kind face, I really wanted a happy family. “It’s not a matter of belief.”
“It is. If you don’t believe in it, if you don’t work for it, then it won’t become reality.”
I smiled wistfully, wondering if I’d ever been this optimistic.
“Don’t blame this on me being young,” she warned, eyes flashing with annoyance. “Being positive is not a trait of the young. You are being a grumpy old man by choice.”
A laugh burst out of me. Giulia smiled. Then she became unguardedly hopeful. “Cassio, I want to be happy. I want us all to be happy.”
“What do you want me to do?” I asked without thinking. Giulia
