Page 51 of The Scars We Keep
“I’ve been with a lot of women, Bella.”His thumb brushes across my bottom lip.“But none of them have ever made me want to burn the world down just to keep them safe.None of them have ever made me question every damn decision I make.None of them have ever gotten under my skin the way you have.”
“Lorenzo—”
“You are not just another fuck to me.”His grip tightens.“You are not just my wife.You are the only thing in this world that makes me feel anything other than rage and emptiness.”
My heart pounds against my ribs.
“I don’t do soft,” he continues, his eyes boring into mine.“I don’t know how to be the man who whispers pretty words and makes promises I can’t keep.But what I can do is make sure no one ever touches you.No one ever hurts you, Bella, not even your father.No one ever takes you from me because you are mine, and I protect what’s mine with everything I have.I need you to understand that what we have is not normal.It’s fucking obsessive and probably toxic as hell.But it’s real.And it is the closest thing to love I’ve ever known.”
The confession lingers between us.As close as he can get to saying the words.
My eyes burn with unshed tears.
He leans in, his lips brushing against mine.“You have me, Bella.All of me.The good, the bad, the fucking ugly.And I am not letting you go.Ever.”
Then he kisses me hard, full of everything he can’t say.This is all he has to give, and it’s more than enough.
Chapter Eleven
Lorenzo
Ishouldbegonebynow.That’s what I tell myself as I lie here at dawn, watching Bella sleep.Normally, I would have been out of this bed hours ago, back to the world where I don’t have to think about the things that make me weak and vulnerable.The things that remind me I am still human beneath all the blood and violence.
But I can’t seem to move.I don’t know if it’s because of what I told her last night.How I opened myself up in a way I never had before, admitting without saying the words that she has become everything to me.Or maybe it is the look on her face when she thought I was fucking someone else.That pain.The raw jealousy that mirrored exactly what I would experience if I thought another man had touched her.
Just contemplating it makes my blood boil.It makes me want to put bullets in the heads of every man who has ever looked at her.She is mine, and I will kill anyone who tries to take her from me.
But none of them will die the way Arturo Serrano will die.That bastard will pay for what he has done to her.
He did something unforgivable.He took a young girl and broke her by forcing her to watch him kill the boy she loved.All while she begged and pleaded for mercy that never came.
Her own fucking father used her heart as a tool to teach her a lesson about loyalty, obedience,and what happens when you defy him.He took the one pure thing she had in this fucked up world and he murdered it right in front of her.And then expected her to fall in line to smile and obey and forget that he had just ripped her heart in two.
The fury that consumes me when I reflect on it is unlike anything I’ve ever felt.It makes me want to do things that would make even the most hardened men look away.
I am going to kill him.I’m going to make him suffer in ways he cannot even imagine.Make him beg for death and make him understand exactly what he took from her and what he destroyed.Because I know what that does to a person.
It will not bring back the boy she loved.It will not erase the trauma or the damage, but it will be justice.
And it will be mine to deliver for her.
My eyes roam over Bella the way they always do.I can’t help myself.The sheet is down around her waist.Her hair is spilled across the pillow, dark and wild from where I had my hands fisted in it hours ago when I fucked her in this bed, making her scream my name loud enough for the entire house to hear.
One arm is thrown up over her head in complete surrender.Her tits are right there—full and perfect.Those nipples are peaked even in sleep, begging for my mouth.I want to lean down and suck one right now.I want to wake her up with my tongue on her skin and my cock buried inside her pussy.
No other woman I’ve encountered rivals her beauty.And looking at her fucking hurts.
For the first time in my life, I want something I can’t control.Something that could destroy me.I’ve spent fifteen years building walls on the graves of my parents and my little sister, constructed from grief, rage, and the kind of pain that turns boys into monsters.
I kept people out.Fucked women and forgot their names.I killed without hesitation and became exactly what this world needed me to be.Cold.Ruthless.Untouchable.
And then she walked into my life and tore down every single one of those walls without even trying.
I should hate her for it.For causing me to experience emotions I vowed not to experience again.For making me care about something other than power, control, and keeping myself safe from the pain of losing someone I love.
Instead, I’m lying here, watching her breathe and experiencing something that feels dangerously close to peace.
My chest rises and falls in sync with hers.My heartbeat slows, and for the first time since I was that boy who lost everything, I am not pondering death, revenge, or the next move.I am merely thinking about her.She owns my fucking heart, and I have no idea what to do about it.
