Page 80 of Ruthless Claim

“Why three stars?”

She cuts the tape. “I like stars.”

“You drew one on the first note,” I continue, my heart thumping. “Two on the second. Three on this morning’s. Why?”

“I’m not sure what you think that means,” she says to my knuckles.

“Valentina.”

She looks up and the composed, cool Valentina Santoro is gone. In its place is the unguarded version of her, the one that slips through sometimes when she’s not expecting it.

Those dark eyes are doing something I don’t have a word for, and neither does she.

“You kept them,” she says, quietly.

“Yeah,” I say, mouth dry, eyes trained on hers. “I kept them.”

The kitchen is so quiet I can hear the city below us.

She has both my bandaged hands in front of her, we are sitting close enough that our knees are touching, and she hasn’t moved and neither have I.

“I kept yours too,” she says, and it comes out small, almost like she didn’t mean for it to come out at all.

Damn.

I reach for her, but not in the urgent way it’s been before. I take her hands and pull her toward me.

She slides off the stool and into my lap, sitting sideways across my thighs.

Her gaze is on me, and this is the face I don’t get nearly enough of, the real one, the one with nothing in the way.

“Hi,” she says softly.

“Hi,” I say back before I lower my mouth to hers.

She makes a quiet sound and brings her hands up to my jaw and her hands trace my face as she kisses me back.

I stand with her, her legs around my waist, and I carry her to the bedroom.

Later, she’s deep asleep and my arms are wrapped around her naked body. I should be asleep, too, but I like to watch her sleep sometimes.

But not in the creepy Twilight way.

Because in sleep is when the real Valentina comes out.

All the tension she carries in her shoulders finally lets go and she just becomes a person.

Undefended.

Her dark hair is spread across the pillow, one hand open near mine on the sheet.

I’ve been lying here for forty-five minutes watching her breathe.

I know this is the behavior of a man who has completely lost his fucking mind, but I find I can’t bring myself to care. Because my wife has gotten into every facet of my life.

Because that’s what she is.

My wife.