The Temporary Wife: Chapter 28

“So this is where you’ve been hiding,” Luca says, leaning in the doorway of his home office. “I suppose I should’ve known this is where I’d find you.”

It’s odd to find him wearing such casual clothes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him in gray sweatpants and a white t-shirt, and it looks oddly seductive. There’s something about seeing Luca Windsor relaxed that makes my heart beat a little faster. I glance down at the ugly pajamas I’m wearing, feeling self-conscious about it tonight.

“Why didn’t you wait for me? We could’ve gone home together.”

I shake my head and snap out of my daze. “I drove to work myself, so I didn’t want to leave my car behind.” While I technically have a driver assigned to me, I always feel bad calling him. I much prefer to drive myself.

Luca pushes off the wall and walks toward me, his gaze intent. Something about that look in his eyes reminds me of the way he touched me today and the things he said.

You belong to me, Valentina. You don’t have to like it, but you need to remember it.

He was treating me like an object again, like I’m one of his possessions, but somehow, I didn’t mind it this time. I used to think that Luca was crazy, but it appears that the person who’s slowly losing their sanity is me. How could I want him so desperately despite everything?

“What are you working on?” he asks. Luca pulls me off his desk chair and steals my spot before swiftly pulling me onto his lap. His arms wrap around me as he reaches for the mouse, his chin resting on top of my shoulder. “Expansion plans, huh?”

“Luca.” I attempt to move off him, but he tightens his grip on me and keeps me in place.

“I’m sorry,” he tells me as he tilts his face, his lips brushing against my neck.

I freeze, surprised. “What for?” I ask, my tone biting. “There are a multitude of things you should be apologizing for, so tell me. What are you sorry for?”

He chuckles and fully wraps his arms around me, embracing me. “I should’ve known you’d never let me off easy.”

“Why should I?” I snap. “You don’t do things halfheartedly, right? If you’re going to apologize, do it properly.”

I expected him to laugh it off, but instead he wraps his hands around my waist and repositions me in his lap so he can look at me. The unexpected remorse in his eyes renders me speechless for a moment, and I inhale sharply when he cups my face. My emotions have been entirely in turmoil for weeks now, even more so now than before. One moment, I’m angry at him, and the next moment, I can’t contain my racing heart. He confuses me, and I hate the way he makes me feel. I don’t like feeling so out of control.

“For starters, I’m sorry for not admitting that I was jealous of Joshua Rivera that day, at Ares and Raven’s wedding. I saw you dance with him, and you laughed at something he said. That’s all it took for my thoughts to fill with images of you with him. It drove me so crazy that I cut my dance with my grandmother short, just so I could pull you away from him. I wasn’t ready to be honest about my motives back then, not even to myself — so I lied, to both of us. The lies that left my lips that night cost us dearly, and this apology is months too late, but you deserve one nonetheless.”

I stare at him in shock. There must have been a vein of truth in his words. He wouldn’t have chosen those exact words if no part of him thought them to be true. He’d have accused me of corporate espionage and left it at that. He wouldn’t have accused me of trying to become Joshua’s mistress, would he? It’s like his words that night were designed to cut deep.

“I’m also sorry about the way I treated you around Natalia. Words can’t adequately describe how much guilt I felt whenever I saw you, especially when she was there. You were the one I wanted, and she was the one I thought I’d marry. I needed to put some distance between you and I, so I defaulted to treating you as nothing but an employee. I had to remind myself that’s all you could ever be if I were to marry someone else, but at the same time, I couldn’t truly let you go.”

He sighs and lets his hand fall away. “I’ve been extremely selfish when it comes to you, Valentina. I know that. I pushed you away, and when you left, I punished you for it by blacklisting you and making it impossible for you to find another job. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I tried to use your grandmother’s disappearance to coerce you into this marriage. I know I’ve been acting fucking insane, and I know an apology isn’t enough. I know all of that, yet here I am, asking you for your forgiveness nonetheless.”

The torment in his gaze makes me feel conflicted. “Why now?”

He gently grabs a strand of my hair and wraps it around his finger. “I’m not sure. Perhaps it’s because you told me that you think you hate me, or maybe it’s because you looked bitter when I gave you your new identification documents today. I don’t know why I suddenly feel the need to apologize to you, Valentina. All I really know is that I don’t want to spend the next three years of our lives with so much standing between us. I don’t want us to spend three years together with festering wounds that only seem momentarily forgotten when we lose ourselves in passion instead.”

He pauses for a moment and looks away. “The one thing my parents always told me mattered most when it came to family was communication. This isn’t easy for me, Valentina, but you’re my wife now, so I want to try. I know we can’t start off with a clean slate, but I want to do what I can to take away the past’s power over us. I can’t just sit back and let it define what the next few years will look like.”

Luca never brings up his parents, and I know just mentioning them is hard for him. “Communication?” I repeat. “My family doesn’t communicate at all. I grew up in an environment where apologies were never given, and feelings were never acknowledged. But that isn’t a cycle I should continue. It isn’t what I want for myself, and you’re right to say that the past shouldn’t determine the future.” I pause then, hesitating. “I accept your apology, Luca, but that doesn’t mean it hurts any less. Can you acknowledge that much, at least?”

He nods. “Of course,” he says, exhaling slowly. His fingertips brush over my temple, and for a moment, he looks as lost as I feel.

“You took me for granted,” I murmur, my voice breaking. “You always have. You still do, and there’s nothing I can do about it. You play around with my life and my feelings like everything is just a game to you, and each time I thought we stood on equal footing, that you respected me, you turned around and proved me wrong. I’m not mad about Joshua or Natalia. I’m hurt that you treated me so badly and then had the gall to jeopardize everything I’ve ever worked for. I always put you first, but when it was time for you to do the same for me, you let me down.” I don’t think he could possibly understand what my job meant to me, to my family. I felt like I gave him my all for years, and all of my hard work and loyalty meant nothing to him. He doesn’t respect me, and he made me feel like I’m nothing but a pawn to him in an elaborate game that I don’t even know the rules of.

Luca cups the back of my head gently, his gaze sincere. “I won’t let you down again,” he tells me. “I can’t promise you that I won’t make any more mistakes, Valentina. But I promise you that from this day forward, I’ll put you first.”

I nod, and one of the many knots in my heart finally unravels. I never realized something as simple as an apology could make me feel so much better.

“Do you think we could go back to the way we used to be?” Luca asks, his voice soft. “Today, when you looked at me with passion in your eyes… fuck, baby. It’s the first time in months that you seemed to trust me. Please trust me with more than just your body, Valentina. I promise that I won’t let you down again.”

He’s right. We can’t let the past have so much power over us, but I have no intention of forgetting it either. I look into his eyes, the sincerity in them making me cautiously hopeful. “If you want my forgiveness, you’ll have to earn it.”

He nods and presses a kiss to my forehead, his touch lingering. “I will,” he promises.