Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 138526 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 554(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138526 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 554(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
“Get in the car, let’s go for a ride.”
“Are you crazy?”
“Please… ten minutes, and I’ll bring you back, I swear.”
I’m about to say no but truth be told I want to be around him just as much as he wants to be around me. If only for a little while. His presence, though he destroyed me, still comforts me. “Ten minutes.”
He smiles, relieved, and opens the passenger side door for me. I pass him, about to climb in when he kisses my cheek and slides his hand around my waist. He sniffs my neck and scowls. “You smell like Robert.”
“You smell like Elizabeth,” I retort, sitting and buckling myself in. He checks my belt like he always does whenever we travel together. I discreetly pull out my perfume from my handbag and spritz a bit behind my ears and on my wrists. He smiles secretly but it fades when I ask, “How is your pregnant wife?”
“Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“Talk about her.”
“Then what do you want to talk about?”
He puts the car in drive and pulls out onto the busy street. “You. How is your new job? Your new life?”
“My new job is amazing; my new life is yet to be discovered but I’m almost happy if that’s what you’re asking.”
He smiles softly. “Good.”
“Definitely. I get way more respect in my new workplace than my last.”
A muscle ticks in his jaw. “At least I gave you a chance.”
“And then ripped my heart from my chest.”
“Don’t, tesoro mio,” he begs. “I haven’t seen you or spoken to you in nearly six weeks. I just… want to have a conversation. I went from seeing you every day to not seeing you at all. It is killing me.”
“Then maybe you do love me in your own way,” I mutter, and he turns to face me, stalling at a red light.
“You think I don’t love you?”
I shrug my shoulders but don’t answer.
“I can’t even touch my wife for wanting you so badly. I’ve done nothing but think of you since we parted like there’s space for nothing else in my mind and heart but you.”
He can’t touch his wife…
“Do you think that’s healthy? Staying together like that even for the baby?”
He shakes his head and starts to drive again. “Of course I don’t but what else can I do? I married her, she’s pregnant with my child. She’s so desperate to make this work she’s willing to overlook my affair.”
“Will she if she knows who it is and that you’re with her right now?”
“She doesn’t want to raise the baby alone, she’s terrified, she didn’t take well to Maria in the beginning, her labor was very traumatic. She needs me. The child needs me.”
I frown, that’s sad to hear but still, it’s not my problem. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I’m trapped, I feel trapped.” True to his word, he pulls back in front of Robert’s apartment building in the same space as before and turns towards me; the rear end of his car sticks out into the road but he doesn’t seem to care. “And I miss you and if I can’t have you then at least allow me a piece of you.” His eyes roam over my face and he reaches out a hand to cup my cheek. “I know I do not deserve it and I know I should not want it, but I need it. I need you.”
He pulls us together, my forehead against his and my hand immediately seeks out his heartbeat.
“Please.” He whispers to me in Italian, begging me with words I don’t understand while peppering kisses all over my face. His lips find my tears and kiss those away as his thumb strokes my cheek and he continues whispering in his beautiful language. “Ti amo.”
“Ti amo,” I whisper back and press my lips to his. Allowing myself one last taste of him. “We will correspond sometimes. Rarely… but sometimes.”
“Grazie,” he replies and tastes me again, deepening the kiss with a moan that has me squirming in my seat. “Losing you will always be my greatest regret.”
“Falling in love with you will always be mine,” I respond breathlessly and climb from the car.
I head towards the parking lot where I left my new vehicle yesterday and mutter a very unattractive curse under my breath when I see Halley gaping at me, mouth wide open, eyes even wider, arm suspended in mid-air like she was about to put her bag on her shoulder.
“What the fuck?” she cries, and I just know this is going to be a moment.
“So… that’s…” Halley gapes at me, struggling to find words. “Wow.”
I stick a piece of sushi in my mouth and chew it. Yum. “I mean… I know it was bad, but can you imagine falling head over heels for somebody while loving another?”
“That’s conflicting.”