Warm water trickles along my back, shielding Valencia from impact. We’re blanketed in steam. It’s some type of make believe. I make it reality and kiss her freckled shoulder. “Let it out. It’s okay to feel this way.”
“I…” Valencia’s turns to face me. Her hair is darker, slicked back from the water. “I need you to hold me.”
It takes a moment. A single second. A hitched breath. I pull her into the securest embrace of our lives. She clutches onto me tight, as I do her. The sweet nothings I murmur while rubbing her back in circular motions take me back. Water sprays in my eyes, but I don’t dare move.
The softness in our voices has me yearning for her more.
I kiss the side of her head and note her hair smells like me. “I’m not going to let go.”
“I want her, Giulio. I want our baby back. Please.”
It’s difficult to suppress my own pained tears when she cries out for Addilyn. In a perfect world, I would give Valencia everything. Anything she wants, I’d find a way for it to be hers again—ours again. In a perfect world, I would devour her against these very tiles for the way her naked body surges against mine with those stunning breasts making both my heart and cock feel. But this is no perfect world. One wrong step and our marriage will be further damaged.
Even if we were to get back together, our differences are bound to set us apart again.
“The twins. We need to—”
I place her mind at ease. “Nobody is going to hurt us. I won’t allow it. I’m going to protect you. I’m going to protect Oscar and Slonne. Whatever it takes.”
“What if one of us has to die to save our family?”
It’s haunting. Eerie. I know exactly how she feels.
We’re experiencing the same tragedy but in completely different worlds.
My silence has Valencia looking up. Her hazel eyes are dim as water drips from her long lashes. With my free hand by her waist, I cave to the feeling of her fingers around my neck. I know they won’t stay there for long. It’s the hardest part. That’s why I cherish it the most I can now.
“Please, don’t talk like that,” I whisper.
“But what if it’s a part of the ‘whatever it takes?’”
I know it’s not the alcohol speaking now. It’s her. And so I tell her the only thing I can vow. “Then I go down protecting our family. But it won’t be you. It will be me.”
“I don’t want that. I don’t want anybody to die.”
“It’s a wicked world out there. I’ll do what I have to.”
“How can you be so sure it’ll be you, not me?”
Some can’t guarantee it…
“Darling, I just feel it.”
But for her, I can.
Valencia
I wake to the distant smell of coffee brewing.
The morning sun illuminates my vision as I turn over to glance at the bedside clock. 10:47 A.M. Oh no. My throbbing head is a reminder of last night.
Bryce McCarson.
The ugly crying.
Giulio. Telling him to make love to me. Ugh!
I groan and sit up to lean against the bedrest. When I lower the gray bamboo Lyocell sheets from my chest, I notice I’m wearing a dark oversized sweatshirt and navy pajama pants.
They’re both his.
One whiff of Giulio’s alluring aroma and flashes from last night resurface. Bryce’s advances and how Giulio rescued me. The following events become blurry until I focus and recall crying in the shower. I remember the concern laced in Giulio’s voice when he called out for me and I didn’t reply. I couldn’t. I was too numb.
He called me darling.
I remember the way he held me closely and how our naked bodies pressed together. I felt better after his comforting touch. Wordlessly, Giulio had dried my hair, carried me to the bed, and had helped me get dressed. When I slipped under the sheets, on the verge of falling asleep, I swear he kissed my forehead. I’m sure of it. But I missed what he whispered seconds before leaving.
Ugh!
This used to be our bedroom. Our house. Now, it is a reminder of everything I have lost.
My marriage.
My daughter.
Myself.
I hold onto the familiar vanilla smell of the sheets and how it transports me to the past. He still uses the same laundry detergent. Things like this shouldn’t get to me, but they do.
A soft knock has me glancing towards the door. A smiling Giulio crosses the room and sits on the edge of the bed. “Good morning.”
“Morning.” I smile, flustered.
He hands me ginger tea in a floral mug with the words; We love you Mommy! The sentimental mug is one he bought on the twins’ behalf for me one Mother’s Day. I guess I had forgotten to take everything to Helena’s.
I do my best to not react and thank him for the two pills that follow. I down them quickly, for a second forgetting how to swallow at the sight of his broad shoulders, narrow waist, and the lush charcoal colored towel around his hips, framing his toned body and naturally lightly tanned skin.
I never thought months without him…without this sight would affect me so deeply…boy, was I wrong. One glance at the sexy thin trail of trimmed dark hair that runs down the center of his defined V muscle and disappears beneath the towel has me taking an extra-long sip. Steam filters into my vision as my gaze hovers over the mug.
So not obvious, Valencia.
Fresh out of the shower, Giulio’s damp hair is tousled in that sexy kind of way I love. Handsome doesn’t even begin to describe him. Not in the slightest. He most likely went to the gym after dropping the kids off.
The kids!
I snap out of my trance and expect to meet his
