by Tara Pammi
“Pia, that’s not true.”
“That’s what your actions have made me believe, Raphael,” she said softly. “That’s what hurt the most. He didn’t have to barter me to you as if I were cattle he couldn’t wait to get rid of.”
Raphael cursed. “He did that because he thought I needed you too.”
“Then he is a foolish old man. Because you don’t need anybody, least of all a naive idiot like me. Congratulations, Raphael, you have the company, you have the world’s adoration, and you have proof that you’ll never give something as weak as love any place in your life, like the rest of us. But you’ve lost me.”
Tears catching her throat, Pia pushed away from him.
“Do not walk away from this. Talk to me. Tell me what you need from me. This is the night of our engagement party. There are two hundred people arriving even now.”
“All these weeks I was desperate to hear those words from you. I was... I really needed you, Raphael. You will protect me from the big bad wolves of the world. You will triple and double my stock value in VA. You will ply me with expensive, breathtaking gifts. You will seduce me long into dawn. You will pleasure me until I don’t know my own name. But you can’t love me, can you? You were right all along. It’s just not in you.” Poison spewed from her lips and Pia couldn’t seem to stop herself. And for this, for turning her into this, she truly hated him. “I thought it was only words you weren’t capable of.”
“I understand that you’re upset. But you’re being far too cynical about it.”
“Shouldn’t you be happy that I see the world now as you see it?”
“Nothing has changed.”
“No, everything has changed, Raphael. Don’t you see? I have changed. My perception of you has changed. In my eyes, you’re no better than Frank.”
He reared back as if she had hit him. His nostrils flared, his jaw became tight. “You do not mean that.”
“He cooked a friendship with me, pretended to love me because I was an easy mark he could siphon cash out of. You proposed marriage, you bought me with a ring for the same reason. Ergo, you are just like Frank.”
A paleness seemed to pool beneath his olive skin. His hands folded, he shrugged. “If you can think that of me, you’re right. There’s nothing left between us to fix.”
Tears clawed up her throat, but she was damned if she would cry again in front of him. Her chest hurt, her limbs trembled. And suddenly Pia knew why it hurt so much, why it felt as if a part of her was being wrenched away.
Why even the worst words from Frank hadn’t given her a millionth of this pain. Why it was utterly important that she preserve her pride in front of Raphael while she had flailed like an idiot in front of Frank.
Because his betrayal felt like he’d taken her heart and pounded it into pieces. Because it felt like she would never stop loving him and yet she could never bear to live with him.
She wrapped her arms around herself. “Please tell your cohort that the engagement is off. I can’t bear to be near you right now. Tell Gio that I will see him again when he stops hanging that stock sign around my neck for every eligible man to look over. Maybe Gilda didn’t sacrifice herself for love, Raphael. Maybe she just wanted freedom from the Duke and her father. And that was the only way she could have it.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
YOU’RE NO BETTER than Frank.
Weeks after she had spoken them, Pia’s words burned holes through Raphael’s head.
For the first week or so, he had held on to the anger.
How could she even think that he was the same as that bastard who had deceived her, who had used her for his greed? If he was so low in her estimation, there was no point in them continuing the relationship.
By the third week, his anger had drained away and all that remained was a gnawing sensation in his gut. A burn in his throat. Dio, her accusations were a nail continually scraping at his flesh.
But even beneath the hurt, he knew the dread that she was right. At least from where she stood.
He could hardly sleep for the regrets that ate through him all hours.
Even after Frank had hurt her, Pia had never wished him harm. But she’d been so angry, so cynical that day.
So hurt by his actions...
His first thought of even having a relationship with her had begun with Gio’s proposal in mind. That he had felt guilty about it, just as she had perceptively realized, was also true.
As days had flown by in the buildup to their engagement party, and the more they were entrenched in each other’s lives, the more he had realized that she deserved so much that he could not give.
It was why he had withdrawn from her. Why he had struggled for the first time in his life with the idea that he was inadequate for the role he wanted to play. Nothing and no one had ever prepared him to receive such unconditional acceptance, such unadulterated affection.
And instead of telling her the truth, instead of admitting to his mistakes when she had confronted him, he had pushed her away.
I needed you, Raphael, so much.
The most important person in his life, and he hadn’t been there for whatever it was she had needed from him.
He wanted to cherish Pia; he wanted to give her everything she wanted. Dio mio, he wanted to be able to love her.
No, not just be able to...
He did love her. He’d been so caught up in his own insecurity that he hadn’t realized that he wanted her happiness above everything else in the world, even above his own.
Instead of telling her that, instead of sharing his crisis of faith in himself, he had alienated the best thing that had ever happened to him. Crushed the heart of the one woman, the only person who had seen the real him, who had loved the true him.
I want you, Raphael. Just you.
This time, her words filled him with elation, with energy. This time, instead of pulling away the ground from underneath him, he realized how fortunate he was to have found Pia.
How incredible it was that such a generous woman had seen something in him that was worth loving. That he had been given a chance to love her in return, to spend the rest of his life knowing that whether he succeeded or failed at another business venture, whether he remained hard and unyielding or not, Pia would always love him.
That was how she was made.
And, maledizione, he had hurt her for loving him.
Refusing to waste another moment, Raphael choppered himself to Gio’s estate instead of being stuck in traffic.
“She’s not here,” Giovanni mumbled from the sitting lounge even before Raphael could ask the question.
Gio looked tired. Raphael took a seat next to him, his throat closing up. “I ruined it all, didn’t I?” He buried his face in his hands. “I... I should have never interfered. I shouldn’t have forced—”
“I never intended to hurt her, Gio. I have been a fool, ten times everything you told me I was becoming. But I didn’t listen.”
“You see, you and I both misjudged Pia. We thought just because she’s soft-spoken and generous to a fault, she needed us to look after her, to treat her as if she were a child. But she is tougher than even my Lucia, I think. Only a strong woman could forgive the hurt we caused her.”
Raphael jerked his head up. Hope burned a hole through him. “What do you mean? Is she talking to you again? Has she come back from her...friend’s house?” He almost choked on that word.
That she had moved to her carpenter friend Antonio’s house had been a physical blow.
Even split up as they had been—permanently, in her mind—he knew Pia still loved him. That Pia would never just fall out of love with him.
Still, every time he had thought of her sharing a small studio with him—and it had been every waking minute—a possessive urge to throw her over his shoulder and bring her back to his apartment had overpowered him.
“Si, she has returned. She said she was too worried about me but it didn’t mean she has forgiven me. I am worried about her.”<
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“Why?”
Gio didn’t quite meet his eyes. “I promised her I would stay out of this mess between you and her.” He sighed. “So I didn’t send for you even though... I cannot say more, Raphael. Are you here to fix your mistakes?”
“Si. And to beg her to forgive me, if need be.”
“But she’s very hurt. If you do not love her, you will do it again.”
“Giovanni, trust me this time to get it right. Per favore.” Yet Gio stared at him doubtfully. When had his reassurance not worked for Gio? What the hell was he not saying?
Had he lost Pia?
He shot up from his seat, his nerves shot to hell for the first time in his life. “Where is she?”
“In her bedroom. I’m sure her nap is done.”
And since when the hell had Pia needed to nap in the afternoon? The woman was either studying or carving or walking or making friends or learning Italian.
He was already at the foot of the steps when Gio’s words stopped him. “Remember what you did and how much she has to forgive. Do not get angry. Do not let your ego get in the way.”
Gio’s warning ringing in his ears, Raphael took three stairs at a time, pushed open the door to Pia’s bedroom and strode in.
She was standing leaning against the wall, looking out into the balcony and turned immediately when he closed the door behind him with a soft thud.
And paled when her sleep-mussed gaze found him.
Something was different about her, he would have known even without Gio’s cryptic warnings.
She seemed to have shrunk three sizes in just a few weeks. Not that she had much weight to lose to begin with. Her hair was piled in that knot tightly over the top of her head and it pulled her skin tighter over her features.
Dio mio, she looked as if a hard breeze could blow her over.
Had he done this to her?
“Christo, Pia, what the hell have you done to yourself?”
He rushed to her, desperate for action, desperate to set things to rights.
But she moved back from him, her chin stubbornly tilted. Her mouth narrowed. Only her eyes, her gorgeous brown eyes reflected her emotions. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t talk to me as if I were an imbecile. Or better, please leave, if that’s all you have to say.”
He couldn’t bear to have her look at him like that.
Couldn’t bear the idea of something being wrong with her. Nausea filled his throat. “Are you ill?” The thought of some unnamed disease doing this to her threatened to take him out at the knees.
“Did Gio ask you here?” Fury flared in her gaze at the thought. “Christ, I told him never again. I told him he wasn’t to breathe a word to you and he swore...”
Raphael pulled her roughly into his arms, his heart beating so hard he could hear it in his ears. “Dio mio, calm yourself. Gio didn’t ask me. I came of my own accord. I came to ask him about you. I came because I couldn’t...” He drank her in. “Pia, are you sure you’re not ill?”
“Stop saying that. You don’t have to make me feel worse than I already do. I know I look a fright...”
“Get over yourself, will you? You are beautiful to me. Always. But it’s true that you look like you’ll break apart if I press hard.”
Some of his panic must have come across because she sighed. A wariness entered her eyes. Still, she stepped back from him. “I’m not ill. Just...” A shrug and she looked away. “What are you doing here? Please Raphael, just for once, respect me enough to leave me alone.” Sudden tears filled her eyes. “Seeing you like this...you have no idea how hard it is for me. I have some things to think through, some decisions to make. Then we can talk, si?”
He inclined his head. A lead weight sat on his chest. “But I have something to say to you. Will you hear me out?”
“Si. As long as you give your word that you won’t touch me.”
He swallowed the punch it was to his chest and nodded. “Bene.”
Taking her hands in his, he pulled her to a sofa, then released them. Then went on his knees in front of her. The tears she had valiantly tried to hold back fell over onto her cheeks. And she sniffled.
“Please, bella. Do not cry. That I did this to you...” Even his throat was burning now. “Pia, I adore you from the bottom of my heart.”
She shook her head and he said, “Just one chance, Pia. Let me finish. I...yes, it was Gio who...maneuvered me into this. You were right. He dangled everything I wanted in front of me. I resisted as long as I could and it was hell for me. But the night of his heart attack, I just couldn’t deny it anymore. You were right. I felt the inevitable weight of your responsibility on my shoulders. With Gio looking like he did... I couldn’t walk away anymore.
“Everything you said about it is true. But Pia, even if he hadn’t, there was a connection between us from the first moment. Not just attraction, cara mia. Something that went deeper than that. Even with my jaded view of the world, I knew how incredible you were, how giving. Giovanni was right when he said I needed you in my life, just not the other way around. Only I didn’t want to acknowledge the connection. I didn’t want to see anything deeper at that time. How could I? I have never known a connection like that before.
“Given enough time, I would like to believe that I’d have come around to the same idea. I have to believe that I would have recognized how precious you are. Seen how much happiness, how much peace you brought into my life. Your love humbles me, cara mia, reminds me of what is important in life. Strips everything from me and leaves the core of me stronger. And I would spend the entirety of our lives, an eternity, making you happy, if you would give me another chance.”
Breaking his word, he kissed her knuckles. He buried his face in her chest. Her heart thudded near his mouth, the scent of her settling deep in his pores. With Pia, he was home. “I love everything about you, cara mia. Every inch of you. Every smile of yours.”
“I want to believe you, Raphael. I missed you so much too.”
It was as if a weight lifted from his chest. He pressed kisses from her wrists to her shoulders and then across her neck, joy filling him to the brim. “Then marry me, Pia. Marry me because I can’t go another day without seeing you, without holding you, without kissing you. Marry me because I want to be yours. Pia’s Raphael—when I’m with you, I’m the best of myself.”
When her tears gave way to sobs and she fell into his arms, Raphael held her tight and uttered useless phrases for he could not bear her pain.
“You made me doubt myself. You made me hate myself. Love should not do that,” she whispered, between hiccups.
He clasped her cheeks and stared into her eyes. “No, cara mia. It should not. There’s nothing in the world that could put a price tag on you. I fell in love with you long before I realized it. I would not change a thing about you, Pia. You have to believe me.”
She nodded and wiped her cheeks, sudden resolution in her movements. “Then I have to tell you something too. And you have to promise that you will tell me what you feel. That whether you get angry or furious or hurt, you will communicate with me. That you won’t just shut me down.”
Heart beating rapidly, he nodded. “Pia, you can tell me anything.”
She drew in a long breath. “I’m pregnant.”
He felt dizzy, as if someone had robbed all the air around them. Questions pounded through him, like flies buzzing, and beneath that, a crushing sense of void in his gut.
This was what Gio had been talking about. Christo, how long had she known? How long had she been hiding the truth? How long would she have kept it a secret?
“It is yours,” she said so softly that his head jerked up.
He gritted his teeth, trying to corral the hurtful things that wanted to get out. “For all my sins, Pia, I never doubted your loyalty, your love.”
The betrayed look in his eyes made Pia wish she could change the circumstances. She had never wanted to be the one who deceived him, never wanted to see that disillusionment in his eyes,
but if she had told him, with what she’d learned since about Alyssa... All she had held on to was hope.
He was processing it, she knew, running through the emotions. Breath braced, she waited, hoped he wouldn’t just cut her off again. Even a furious explosion was preferable to him shutting her down.
“How far along are you?”
“Almost ten weeks. I think it happened that first time.”
“I wore a condom.”
“They are not foolproof. Raphael, I know it’s a shock but—”
He stood up, a sudden energy to his movements. “What was the decision you had to make? Things you had to think through?” Whiteness emerged under his skin. “Dio mio, were you just going to leave Italy without telling me, like Lucia did to Gio? Was that my punishment for hurting you, Pia? Is that all your love means?”
Pia wrapped her hands over his shoulders, willing him to look at her. “Raphael, please listen to me. I... I wasn’t going to go anywhere. I would have never left Italy without telling you, even if I wasn’t pregnant.”
His fingers manacled her wrists, emotion tight in his features. “Then why the hell didn’t you tell me?”
“Because if I had told you, you would have insisted on us marrying.”
“Of course I would have. Do you want our child to be illegitimate?”
“I don’t care for that label, seeing as my father carried it his whole life. I love you with everything in me, Raphael. I will love you the rest of my life. But to be married to you knowing that we were together for our child, knowing that you were doing it to protect me and the baby, to be another responsibility to you, it would’ve killed any love I felt for you...” She shuddered. “I couldn’t live like that.”
“What if I had never come back, Pia?”
“After my initial anger faded, I couldn’t help but hope. Gio told me about how Alyssa wasn’t even yours.”
When he cursed, she bade him to look at her. “I was the one who held her first. The one she bonded with, the one who she asks for when she has a hurt. She’s just as much mine as she’s Allegra’s. It doesn’t matter that biologically I’m not her father.”
