Buttons and Blame

by Penelope Sky

  “Just stupid banter. Said Adelina was his favorite whore, and he missed her.” Both of her hands tightened into fists. “If I’d had a gun, I would have shot him.”

  “And you would be dead, so I’m glad you didn’t bring one.”

  “I hate feeling this way,” she whispered. “I want to get her out of this situation…she deserves better.”

  Adelina was an exceptional woman who had a strength that matched Pearl’s. Her quiet beauty, her gorgeous eyes, the sound of her voice…all of it was hypnotic. “I wish I could help her too. But there’s nothing we can do. You need to let it go and move on.”

  “There has to be something…”

  “Unless I refuse to give her up. But that will lead to a war. And since he already has my shipment of weapons…the timing isn’t great. Men will die. Crow and I will be vulnerable. You’ll be vulnerable. It’s not worth it.”

  She stared across the fields, solemn. “Then what will happen to her?”

  “She’ll suffer…then she’ll die.”

  “I’d rather just die instead.”

  I debated telling Pearl what I’d offered Adelina. The cyanide pills would induce a heart attack. It would be painful, but it would be over quickly. It would look natural, that the pressure of her treatment caused her to collapse. And then it would be over. She would finally be free.

  I felt so sick.

  “It hurts so much,” she whispered. “It hurts that I’m free and she’s not.”

  “You got lucky, Pearl. If Crow hadn’t fallen in love with you, who knows what would have happened.”

  “Yes, I’m very lucky. Or at least I was lucky.”

  “He’ll come around,” I repeated. “He always does.”

  “He hasn’t looked at me or spoken to me in days. My own husband wants nothing to do with me…”

  My eyes shifted to the ground.

  “But I’m angry with him too, so it’s not like I want to talk to him either.”

  She was angry at him? I didn’t think she had any right to be. She was the one who stormed off and put herself in danger. “What did he do?”

  “When I came back from seeing Tristan…he lost his temper.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He slapped me.”

  I cocked an eyebrow. “So?”

  “So?” she countered. “I’m his wife, not his prisoner. He can’t treat me that way.”

  “You walked right into the lion’s den. He needed to punish you so you would learn from your mistakes. If you ask me, he should have slapped you a few more times.”

  Pearl looked at me like I was about to get a knife in the throat. “Excuse me?”

  “You don’t listen. You put yourself at risk all the time. How will you learn? You’re like a child that needs to be spanked. But since you like being spanked, he needed to do something else.”

  “I don’t put myself at risk all the time.”

  “Are you kidding me?” I asked. “You went shopping by yourself in Florence.”

  “I can’t believe he told you about that.”

  “And you took my place with Bones, leaving Crow without giving him a chance to do anything about it.”

  “We both know he would have stopped me.”

  “And he should have stopped you,” I snapped. “It was a stupid decision.”

  She stared at me with fierce eyes that were as sharp as daggers. “You’re alive because of that stupid decision. You’re welcome, by the way.”

  “But I wasn’t worth the risk. You should have let me die, Pearl.”

  She shook her head.

  “And now you’ve pulled this stunt. It’s obviously a pattern with you.”

  She looked away, shutting me out.

  “I know you don’t want to listen to me ridicule your decisions, but I’ve got to be honest. We live in a dangerous world. You need to be more careful. I’m not just saying this as Crow’s brother—I’m saying it as your brother too.”

  Her pissed expression finally slipped away, and her features softened. She turned back to me, looking at me with blue eyes, unveiled and true. Her hostility had finally evaporated like water on a hot pan, the steam drifting above our heads and headed somewhere else. “I know, Cane.”

  2

  Pearl

  Five days came and went.

  Crow and I didn’t speak to each other. We took our meals in different rooms. I slept in the master bedroom, and he slept in a guest room on the second floor. Lars brought all of Crow’s clothes to the guest bedroom so he didn’t even have a reason to come into the bedroom we shared. Tensions seemed to escalate with every passing day rather than die out.

  It was getting worse.

  I was sick of the silent treatment. I was sick of the neglect. I would much rather listen to him yell at me than pretend I didn’t exist.

  The loneliness was the worst part.

  He told me he didn’t want to speak to me for an entire week. It’d only been five days, so I had to wait a little longer. Since I never usually listened to him, I decided to listen to him this one time. I pressed through the final few days, not eating or sleeping. Without his smell on the sheets, I couldn’t close my eyes. Not sharing my meals with him made me lose my appetite. I felt like I’d lost more than my husband—but my entire life.

  On the eighth day, I waited at the foot of the staircase. He’d have to walk past me if he wanted to get to his room, and there was no way he would ignore me now. At five o’clock on the dot, he left his car with the valet then walked inside.

  Lars greeted him and took his coat. “Good evening, Your Grace. Dinner will be ready in an hour.”

  Crow’s only response was a nod. He loosened the buttons along the wrists of his collared shirt as he approached me. It took him three steps to realize I was standing there. He didn’t break his stride, but his eyes darkened noticeably.

  He was still livid.

  He rolled up his sleeves to his elbows and stopped at the foot of the stairs. I stood on the bottom step, but he was still taller than me. His cream-colored shirt and pale blue tie contrasted against the darkness of his hair and eyes. Even when he was smiling, he still took on a formidable appearance. He was dark like the shadows, constantly consumed by the night. He looked at me with cruel indifference, not a single drop of affection.

  Now that I was face-to-face with him, I didn’t know where to begin.

  Crow excused my silence by walking around me and heading up the stairs.

  Were these past seven days easier for him than they were for me?

  I turned around and followed him, trailing behind him until he reached his bedroom. He stepped inside and unbuttoned his collared shirt, preparing to get in the shower like he usually did right after work.

  I stepped inside and shut the door behind me.

  He turned around and pulled his tie out of his collar. His shirt was open, revealing a tanned and muscular physique. His chest muscles were thick and hard like concrete. His chiseled stomach disappeared into his waistband, a hint of the V noticeable.

  His sexiness didn’t distract me, but seeing him nearly shirtless made me miss him even more. I used to sleep right on his chest every night. Now I was on a completely different floor of this mansion.

  Crow didn’t speak, which was normal for him. But right now, it drove me crazy. I wish he would speak his mind so I would know what he was thinking. “Say what you came to say. If not, I’m getting in the shower.”

  Fucking asshole. “Has this week been easy for you?”

  “No.” He pulled his shirt off and dropped it on the floor.

  I actually missed picking up his things.

  “But that’s because I’m still as pissed today as I was a week ago.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest, refusing to be intimidated by him. “I told you I was trying to help her. I had good intentions.”

  “I don’t give a shit what your intentions were. Do you have any idea what would happen to me if you were taken?”

 
“But I wasn’t—”

  “My entire life would have ended.” He took a step toward me, his dark eyes burning me like hot coals. “Everything I worked toward would be nothing. I’d have to kill Tristan and all of his men in retaliation. It would probably claim my life in the process. Cane’s too. And even if it didn’t, I would be haunted by the cruel and sick things they were doing to you. I’d have to suffer every single day until I got you back. And even if I did get you back, I still would have suffered. Just because Bones is dead doesn’t mean my nightmares have stopped.” It was the first time he had said that name to me since he was killed, no longer cushioning my feelings. “Sometimes I can’t breathe, Pearl. Sometimes I think about what he did to you, and my chest caves in.” He moved even closer to me, Crow’s frame making me step back. “I don’t show this side of me when you’re around. I take a drive to the countryside, suffering in my own captivity because I know you can’t help me. It’ll only make you feel just as terrible as I do.”

  Moisture built up in my eyes, but I refused to let it turn to tears.

  “And then I think about Vanessa… I couldn’t save her.” He pointed to my chest. “But I saved you. You fixed the hole she left behind. You make me feel sane, make me feel whole. Despite the burden of your past, you make me complete. And if I lost that…I would have nothing left. This house is nothing without having you to share it with. My life is nothing without having you to share it with. So when will you understand, Pearl?”

  My eyes shifted back and forth as I looked into his.

  “You took a knife and stabbed me with it. You ripped my heart out of my chest and stepped on it. You disrespected me, humiliated me. You risked the one thing that I can’t live without. All I want is to keep you safe and protect you. But you spit on that every single chance you get. Don’t apologize to me because there will be no forgiveness, Pearl. Not this time.”

  “I wasn’t apologizing…”

  His eyes narrowed in the fiercest glare I’d ever seen. “Think carefully before you speak, Pearl. Very carefully…”

  “I was trying to save her.”

  “And you risked my life to do it.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “You risked your life, which is the same as mine,” he hissed. “We are one person, Pearl.” He held up one finger as he looked at me. “You told me this was important to you, so I tried to figure out a way to make this work. But there was no solution. You act like I didn’t try.”

  “I know you tried…but I wanted to try harder.”

  “This woman is a stranger. You risked our entire lives for this person you don’t even know.”

  “She’s not a stranger. She’s a human being.”

  He stepped back and sighed, trying to control his anger. His jaw was clenched, and his eyes looked frightening. “So we’re equal, then? Your husband and some stranger have equal value to you?”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “You’re right, it’s not. But it’s what you proved to me when you risked everything for her.” He turned around and rubbed his hand over the scruff of his jaw. His back rose and fell at a rapid pace as he did his best to control his rage. “Get out, Pearl. I don’t want to talk to you anymore.”

  “You can’t just ignore me again.”

  “I can do whatever the fuck I want.” He turned around, looking more livid than he did before. “If you don’t want to get slapped, you should leave.”

  “Don’t talk to me that way.”

  “Then don’t betray me,” he snarled. “I don’t ask for much, Pearl.”

  “You owe me an apology.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “I owe you an apology?” He tilted his head slightly. “Are you insane?”

  “You shouldn’t have hit me like that.”

  For just an instant, his eyes softened. But his furious look returned so quickly I wasn’t sure if I saw it in the first place. “You don’t respect our marriage. So why should I?”

  “Crow, I didn’t do it because of us. I did because of this poor woman—”

  “Then you need to put us first. It’s that simple. I’m your husband. I should always be at the top of your damn list.” He yanked his belt out of his loops then tossed it on the floor. “Get out. I don’t want to look at you right now.”

  “Crow—”

  He grabbed me by the neck and squeezed. His grip was tight, but I could still breathe. “Get. Out.” He dropped his hand and walked into the bathroom, slamming the door just for my benefit.

  Once the shower turned on, I let the moisture in my eyes turn into drops. I let the tears flood my cheeks, succumbing to the heartbreak.

  It seemed as if things were worse now than before.

  I was sorry for hurting him, for causing him the kind of pain he described, but I couldn’t apologize for being who I was. It wasn’t in my nature to stand by and do nothing while an innocent person suffered. I couldn’t stop until I tried every single outlet. If Crow and Cane had given up on me easily, then I wouldn’t be alive right now.

  I wish he understood that.

  It was another night of bad sleep. I wondered if Crow was sleeping any better. He’d been an insomniac before I came around, usually drinking scotch until he passed out from the liquor.

  I didn’t want him to go back to that.

  He had his breakfast in the dining room, the same place we used to have breakfast together every morning. Lars had been bringing my tray directly to my room, and I ate on the terrace.

  But today, I walked into the dining room.

  Crow was in his crisp suit and tie, the newspaper open in front of him. He was eating the same thing he always ate, egg whites with asparagus. He took his coffee black, dark just like him. He barely lifted his gaze when I walked inside. He took one look at me, seemed bored, and then returned his gaze to his newspaper.

  I wasn’t there to fight. I was there to take a step in the right direction. Despite his coldness and cruelty, I loved him so much it hurt. A life without him was one I couldn’t contemplate. It would be the same as it was when I was back in Manhattan—empty of all feeling. “I going to go to Cane’s place today and spend some time with Adelina. Do you have a problem with that?” It actually hurt my mouth to say the words, to ask for permission when I shouldn’t have to ask for anything. But these actions would mean a lot more to him than an apology.

  His eyes darted up from the newspaper, and he stared at me with a different gaze. It wasn’t cold. It wasn’t cruel. It resembled the same look he used to give me every single day. “No, I don’t have a problem with that.” He was finished speaking, but he didn’t turn his eyes back to the newspaper. His stare was reserved for me.

  I missed that stare so much.

  “Can I take one of the cars? Or would you rather drop me off?” These questions weren’t as difficult to ask. When I gave him what he wanted, he responded positively. He was more handsome when he didn’t look so fierce.

  Both of his arms were resting on the table, his silver cuff links exposed and shiny. His tie was yellow that morning, bright in comparison to his dark suit. His hair was combed neatly, but he still hadn’t shaved. His facial hair was coming in thick, thicker than I’d ever seen it. “I’ll drive you. But I’d rather have the two of you at the winery. Do you have a problem with that?”

  Instead of making a cold demand and expecting me to follow it blindly, he met me halfway. When I gave him what he wanted, he gave me what I wanted in return. I couldn’t complain. “No.”

  He picked up the newspaper again. “I’m leaving in fifteen minutes.”

  “Okay.” I knew the conversation was over, so I turned around.

  “Button.”

  I halted in my tracks and felt tears sting my eyes. He hadn’t called me that in over a week, but it felt like an eternity. I stood still, savoring his tone as well as the word itself. “Hmm?”

  “Thank you.”

  Crow drove through the countryside on the way to Cane’s house, bypassing the traffic on the bu
sier streets. The scenic route was better anyway. It seemed like we were the only two people in this beautiful land.

  He drove with one hand on the wheel while the other rested on the gearshift. He looked straight ahead, not giving me more than a glance. His silence wasn’t as tense, and it wasn’t outright hostile either.

  We didn’t try to have a conversation.

  I looked out the window and didn’t know how to talk to my own husband. I knew he was still pissed at me. Otherwise, he would hold my hand on the drive. He didn’t want to scream at me anymore, but our fight certainly wasn’t water under the bridge.

  We pulled up to the roundabout, and Crow honked the horn.

  Adelina came outside a moment later, dressed in black jeans and a white top. Her hair was in loose curls, meaning she got her hands on a curling iron. Maybe Cane bought one for her. She got into the back seat and pulled her seat belt on. “Morning.”

  Crow was far nicer to her than he’d been to me. “Good morning, Adelina.”

  I almost glared at him. “Hey. Ready for another day at the winery?”

  “Yes.” She looked out the window as Crow drove away from the house. “I’m excited. It’s so beautiful there. Not that it’s not beautiful here…but I get lonely when Cane isn’t around.”

  That implied she missed him when he wasn’t there. It reminded me of how I felt about Crow in the beginning of our relationship. He was my captor, but I didn’t like it when he wasn’t around. The feelings were difficult to understand.

  Crow drove to the winery, turning on the music and playing something Italian. I understood a few words here and there, but since Crow and Lars both spoke English to me, I’d never been pressed to learn it.

  A few minutes later, we pulled up to the winery and got out of the car.

  “Let me know if you need anything.” Crow dismissed us and walked inside to his office. He didn’t kiss me goodbye like he usually did. He walked away, treating me like I was nothing special.

  It hurt.

  Adelina didn’t notice the strain. “What should we do first?”

  We finished the last wine tasting for tourists and then closed up for the day. I washed the wineglasses while Adelina corked the bottles and returned them to the small fridge. We wrapped up the leftover cheese and bread and saved them for the following day. Most of the tourists spoke English, and they seemed excited when they encountered someone who could speak their language so well. Only a handful of times had there been visitors speaking Italian and no English at all. In those instances, I had one of the other workers help me out.