Читать книгу Postcards From…Verses Brides Babies And Billionaires - Rebecca Winters - Страница 85

LORENZO’S JAW DROPPED. “Angie—”

The bell rang again. His wife turned, unlocked the door and walked out. Blood pounding at his temples, he straightened his shirt and followed her out.

How he sat through the last act, he wasn’t sure. It was like someone was driving nails into his head in some kind of ancient torture. When it was finally, mercifully over, they bid Marc and Penny a good night and acquired the car from the valet. Neither of them spoke in the loaded silence of the car.

The penthouse was in shadows as they entered, Manhattan spread out before them in all its glory. He threw his jacket on a chair and headed straight for the bar and a stiff shot of whiskey.

Angelina kicked off her shoes. When she headed for the bedroom, he pointed to the sofa. “Sit.”

She lifted her chin. “What’s the point? I know you can’t tell me what I want to hear. You would have said it to me in that dressing room if you could.”

It was a truth he couldn’t deny. He wanted to—he wanted to tell her everything she wanted to hear if it would wipe the hurt from her eyes, but he’d promised her honesty and they’d come too far to give each other anything but.

He set down the whiskey. Pushed a hand through his hair. “To lose someone you love like I loved Lucia changes a person. You know too much. Things you should never have to know…things that make you question everything you once took for granted—the natural order of things. It isn’t a faith I’ll ever have again. Loving someone like that isn’t something I’m capable of doing. But it doesn’t mean I don’t care for you. You know I do.”

Her eyes grew suspiciously bright. “Not capable,” she asked quietly, “or simply unwilling to try?”

He lifted a shoulder. “It is who I am.”

The brightness in her eyes dissolved on a blaze of fire. “You know what I think, Lorenzo? I think it’s a cop-out, this ‘I am who I am’ line of yours. Saying you can’t love again is easier than making yourself vulnerable…easier than exposing yourself to the potential for pain, so you choose not to go there. You choose to believe you are incapable of love.”

He shook his head. “I won’t tell you lies. We promised each other that. But what we have, Angelina—is something more than love. What we have is based on rationality, on that great partnership you’ve always wanted, on the affection we have for each other. It is real. It’s what’s going to make this marriage work. Last.”

She wrapped her arms around herself. Turned to look out the window. He closed the distance between them, curled his fingers around her shoulder and turned her to him. “We have a good thing,” he said softly, “an electric connection—a special connection. The kind that rarely, if ever, comes along. We will be great parents to our child because we know the gift it is. What more could you ask for?”

“The love of a lifetime,” she said quietly. “You had yours. Maybe I want mine. Maybe this isn’t enough.”

His stomach contracted, her words sucking the breath from him. He inhaled, dragged in a breath. Searched for something, anything to say. But he knew what she was saying was true. She deserved to have that untainted love—everything he couldn’t give her. But he’d thought he could make her happy by giving her everything else. He should have known it would never be enough.

Naked pain wrote itself across her beautiful face. “I have to go to bed. I need to deliver that bracelet to Juliette tomorrow and I still have to figure out the clasp.”

He watched her leave the room, a heavy, hollow ache in his chest, because he wasn’t sure he could fix this. It was the one thing he couldn’t fix.

Bleary-eyed from a restless, sleepless night, Angie forced herself into the studio shortly after her husband left for the office, putting on coffee just as the birds were beginning to sing.

She sat down at her desk with a cup of the strong brew, numbly processing the events of the night before. She hadn’t meant to confront Lorenzo. She’d meant to give him time. But somewhere along the way, her emotions so raw, it had just come tumbling out. Maybe it had been the way she’d been desperately begging for crumbs in that dressing room when they’d made love, terrified they were falling apart again—needing to know they were okay. How they were once again using sex to solve problems they couldn’t fix.

Her heart throbbed. How could she have allowed herself to make the same mistake she’d made the first time around? To think, on some instinctual level, her husband might love her but not be able to admit it?

It was never going to happen even if he did. And she knew, even if she convinced herself that what they had was enough, even if she bought his whole line about them being more than love, she’d end up hating him for never offering her what she so desperately wanted. Because she wanted it—she did. The love she’d never had. The love she knew they could have together.

She deserved it. She had always deserved it. She was worthy of it. She knew that now. And what hurt the most was her husband was capable of it. He’d loved Lucia once. He just wasn’t going to offer it to her.

The ache in her insides grew. She wanted to be the light in Lorenzo’s life, his everything as he was becoming to her. As he’d always been to her. This wasn’t her sabotaging them, it was him sabotaging them.

She took another sip of her coffee. Pulled herself together. Allowing her work to slide wasn’t going to make this any easier.

A return email from Juliette Baudelaire sat in her inbox. A short, curt reply.

Not to worry. I found another piece to wear to the luncheon. Given that, I no longer require the bracelet.

Her heart sank. Thousands of dollars of diamonds had gone into that bracelet. But that wasn’t even the point—she could resell it. The point was that Juliette knew everyone and loved to talk. Her reputation was going to take a bump for this, she knew it in her bones.

She sat back in her chair. Closed her eyes.

“You okay?” Serina breezed in and hung up her coat.

No, she decided, tears stinging her eyes. She was most definitely not okay. But she wasn’t going to let that man take her apart again. Not this time.

“Do you want the good news or the bad?”

Lorenzo eyed his lawyer, his mood vile. “Why don’t you start with the bad and work up to the good?”

“The Belmont lawyers called while you were in your meeting. They want to meet tomorrow in Miami to discuss some final issues.”

Lorenzo’s fingers curled tight around the toy football he held. Marc Bavaro was going to be the one to finally make him snap. He could feel it.

“What’s the good news?”

“The meeting will be at Erasmo Bavaro’s place.”

He sat forward. “That is good news.” But Miami…tomorrow?

Cris eyed his scowl. “Please tell me we’re saying yes.”

“Bene.” He blew out a breath. “Make it happen. We need to get this done. But I swear this is the swan song.”

His lawyer left. Lorenzo sat back in his chair, his satisfaction at finally moving this game to a place he was comfortable with only slightly improving his foul mood. His volatility had as much to do with his wife’s ultimatum as it did with Bavaro’s antics. With the fact that she’d thrown that explosive three-word phrase at him, pushed him for things he couldn’t give and destroyed the delicate, satisfactory stasis he’d had going on. Backed him into a corner with nowhere left to go.

Flying to Miami tomorrow seemed unwise given the current state of affairs. But what could he do? If he didn’t get Erasmo Bavaro on board this deal was as good as dead.

Swinging his feet off his desk, he threw the things he’d need for Miami in his briefcase and headed home to solve his problem. His wife was making herself some hot milk in the kitchen when he walked in.

“How was your day?” he asked, setting his briefcase on the floor. Reintroducing stasis.

“Busy.” She put down the cup and rubbed her palms against her temples.

“Did you get Juliette’s bracelet done?”

She lifted her gaze to his, her face expressionless. “I lost the commission. She went out and bought something else to wear.”

Uh-oh. This did not bode well for the conversation they needed to have. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly, “that was wrong of me. But we still need to talk. Work this out.”

She shook her head. “You need to work this out. I know how I feel.”

A twinge of unease spread through him. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying I can’t live without love. I can’t stay in this marriage unless you can offer that to me.” She shook her head, teeth sinking into her lip. “You have made me face up to my past, Lorenzo. You have made me see how I run from the things that scare me so I won’t get hurt. Well, I’m not running now. I deserve to be happy. I deserve to have all of you. And if you can’t offer that to me, it will break my heart, but I will walk away because you’ve also helped me realize how strong I am.”

His chest clenched. “You’re willing to throw everything we have away because I can’t say three words?”

Her eyes darkened. “It’s more than that and you know it. I’ve watched you struggle over the past few weeks. I know how hard this is for you. But I can’t live with pieces of you. It would break my heart. We would end up hating each other. You know we would.”

“No, I do not know that.” His fists tightened at his sides. “This is not negotiable, Angelina. You are carrying my child. Our fate was sealed the day that happened.”

“No, it wasn’t.” She shook her head. “You have your heir. We will work that out. But you can’t have me. Not like this. I must have been insane to ever agree to that deal we made.”

“You aren’t walking out on me again.” His voice was pure frost. “You know the conditions I attached to this.”

“You won’t do it.” Her eyes were stark in a face gone white. “The other thing I have learned is that under that armor you wear is the man I met. The man I would have given anything to have. He wouldn’t let my family suffer. He would not hurt me.”

Blood pounded in his ears, a red-hot skewer of rage lancing through him. “Try me, cara. Just try me. You think you can leave me and cozy up to Byron again with my child inside you? It will never happen. I will drag this divorce out for all eternity.”

She stared at him as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. He couldn’t believe what he was saying. But the rage driving him didn’t care who or what he hurt.

She didn’t flinch. Held his gaze. “Byron and I were over when I realized I was still in love with you and you damn well know it.”

He raked a hand through his hair. Struggled to see past his fury. “I have to go to Miami tomorrow. Erasmo Bavaro has agreed to meet with us. We will talk about this when I get back.”

“I won’t be here.” The pain staining her blue eyes nearly tore him in two. “I know who I am, Lorenzo, and I know I can’t do this.”

She turned on her heel and walked toward the bedroom.

Corrosive anger roped his heart. “Goddammit, Angelina, get back here.”

She kept going.

In the center of the red zone, well aware of where it could take him, he downed the rest of the whiskey. He could not afford to go there, not now with the most important deal of his life hanging in the balance. Not ever when his wife was asking more of him than he could ever give.