“You had to ask her in person?”
“Yes. Why is this a problem, Isa? It wasn’t like I was with her because I wanted to be.”
“Are you sure all you did was talk?”
“Yes. All we did was talk. She didn’t even have anything; she was just wasting my time. Isa. Please calm down. Sit. Why are your clothes in the suitcase?”
“How can you ask me to stay here when you just told me you have been out spending time with another woman?”
“I was talking to her, babe. Nothing happened.”
I walked out of the closet and to the bedside table where the envelope was. I held it out to him.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“You look and tell me,” I shot back. He slid the pictures out, reading the note Elissa had written first. He looked from image to image with a look on his face that went from curious to knowing, to amused. And then the man did the unbelievable. His face broke into a smile, and he started to laugh.
“Wh-what are you laughing at? What's so funny?”
I didn’t want him to see me cry, but I broke. I shattered like a mirror right there. How could he talk to me like that? How could he laugh at a time like this? Did he think having me see him fuck another woman was funny? I felt his arms around me and was just too drained to try and fight him off.
“Don’t touch me... I-I hate you,” I stuttered through the tears. I felt his hand in my hair. I tried to move away from him, but he was holding me too securely.
“Hey, I’m sorry Isa. I didn’t mean to make you upset,” he said.
“Well, you shouldn’t have fucked Elissa.”
“I was with Elissa, yes, but we didn’t have sex. Those shots are years old. Ancient. I told you. We used to date.”
“Did you know she had them?”
“I knew she probably had them somewhere, but I didn’t know what she wanted to do with them. To be honest, I wasn’t particularly keen on seeing those again. She came onto me, but I shut her down. She kept saying that she had sent you something. I didn’t know it was this. I didn’t think she would stoop so low.”
“Your ex is tacky and desperate,” I said childishly. He laughed and reached out for me, touching my hair.
“I’m sorry she did that to you,” he said. “Did you really believe I had anything to do with it?”
“I didn’t know what to believe. I had a million horrible thoughts about what was going on. I thought you had gone back to her, or that you and she had gotten back together right after we got married because we weren’t really having sex then... I even thought...”
“What?”
I took a deep breath, looking down.
“I even thought you had mailed it to me together. That it was all a setup, and you just wanted to get rid of me. Make me leave you and humiliate me. Stress me out so much I lost the baby.”
“Whoa, what?”
I looked up at him.
“You thought I wanted you to lose the baby?”
“I thought you wanted to get rid of me. The baby—at that point—would have just been collateral damage.”
“Isa,” he said. I looked down. I didn’t want to face him. “Isa, look at me.”
I did. His face was pained.
“Never say things like that about yourself or our child again, do you understand?”
“Don’t give me reasons to doubt you,” I said back.
He held my face and looked at me, dead in the eye.
“I need you to be able to trust me,” he said. His voice was hard.
“I want to trust you. I do. I know that Elissa was part of your past, but I can’t take the uncertainty. It isn’t good for me, and it isn’t good for the baby.”
He kissed me then—with surprising sweetness considering we had just had a fight—and looked down at me.
“I made a vow, Isa. I wouldn’t do anything knowing it would hurt you.”
“I hope you mean that,” I said and sighed. He held my hand and kissed it. Suddenly, he dropped from his towering height above me. He sunk to one knee. That gesture was globally recognizable as the one that precedes marriage proposal, but why? He did know that we were already hitched, didn’t he?
“Isa—”
“What are you doing?” I blurted out. Because really, what was he doing? Was he making fun of me? He had never done this because our engagement was something that was pre-planned and then presented to us. He had never proposed, and I had never accepted his proposal. Not officially, anyway. My father had made the announcement, and we had been married within the next fortnight. Why did it make me so uncomfortable? I wanted him to stand up. That suit was so expensive, he needed to get off the floor.
“I love you, Isa.”
“Lorenzo—”
“I do. It was hard at the start, and I know that I wasn’t any help. I’m sorry for making you regret making your vows to me. I love you...and I love our baby that hasn’t been born yet.”
“You don’t have to do all this to get me to forgive you. I believe you.”
“Then believe me when I say this. I love you.”
DON’T STOP NOW! The romance continues in Book 3 of the Montorini Crime Family trilogy: OWN ME BAD BOY, available now at any online bookstore!
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Did you love Tease Me Bad Boy? Then you should read Own Me Bad Boy by Claire St. Rose!
Own Me Bad Boy is book 3 and the finale of the Montorini Family Mafia trilogy!
He forced me into this marriage.
My life was turned upside down the day I was told I had to marry Lorenzo Montorini--the heir of the Montorini crime family.
A man with a NEED for control. A NEED for an heir.
And I was going to be the mother of that child.
They say no one’s happier than a bride on her wedding day.
They lied.
Oh, I smiled through it all but inside, I wanted to scream.
I never asked to be married. Especially not to Lorenzo Montorini.
I don’t care that he’s got a smile to die for.
I don't care that his body is tempting me to touch him.
I don’t care that our marriage is the only thing keeping our families from war.
All I wanted was to scream no. To take my own life back.
But when the priest asked if I will take this man to be my husband.
The only words that came out were “I do.”
And from the moment Lorenzo slipped the ring on my finger, I knew.
There was no way he would ever let me go.
Also by Claire St. Rose
Montorini Family Mafia
Touch Me Bad Boy
Tease Me Bad Boy
Own Me Bad Boy
Steel Jockeys MC
Vicious Night
Vicious Touch
Vicious Kiss
The Hitman's Heart Trilogy
Going Once, Taken Twice
Wrecked Twice
Three Times Owned
Trojans MC
Wicked
Nasty
Cruel
Tease Me Bad Boy Page 9
