Chapter Thirteen

Benecio

Somehow, I found myself planning a wedding in between fucking the brains out of my fiancée and getting to know the child who’d brought us to this point. Two weeks after bringing them to the island, we played in the shallow water just feet from the shore near the house, and Domino was a new child. He played in the sands while giggling and splashing the warm waves, peppering my legs with the sea. It felt … odd. Tamatha rested at my feet, sitting in the water and keeping an eye on her son.

Our son.

I shouldn’t have had those feelings, and yet the more I watched him, a growing sense of attachment and protection steeled into me. I wanted to ignore it, to deny that I found his mother more appealing than the agreement we had between us.

“Thank you,” Tamatha whispered, and I looked down at her.

“For what?”

“This,” she said, motioning toward her son. “I haven’t seen him this happy in his life.”

I swallowed, not knowing what to say. I didn’t do entanglements, but I felt meat hooks gouging into my heart at her words. And fucking pride. I’d saved a child, one who’d gone through hell like me, and I’d found a way to protect him against ever being hurt again. I understood, of course, why I’d been drawn to him. It was like looking into a mirror, a splintered piece of reflective surface where his pain mixed with my own. Fuck, I probably would have taken Tamatha without her agreement—just to save him.

“He sleeps through the night now,” I said. I shouldn’t have.

Tamatha’s gaze burned into my face, and I felt her pleasure and pride in being mine. I waited. I needed her to push, to lash out instead. I wanted her to fight me, to swing us back into the places that made sense. Where I didn’t care about her except for my need for a hole to fuck.

You’ve never been there.

I clenched my teeth, the muscle ticking in my face, and I refused to look at her. I needed to regain control, a way to break us apart and place my feet firmly back on the ground. But when I finally looked at her and couldn’t tear my gaze away, the edges of love and acceptance brought me to my knees. Her hands reaching for me had me gasping for breath. Tamatha should fear me. I had blood on my hands, and I would fucking break her. She had no idea what I came from.

My father had never loved me, and though I tried to be the perfect son, it never mattered. No amount of good grades, respectful manners, or accepting his beatings made him feel anything. My mother watched it all, sneering at me, or crying when he turned his fists on her. One night, when he was drunk and wanted to fuck her—though I didn’t understand what that was at the time—she screamed at him to have fun beating me instead. God, he broke five bones that night and left me on the floor in my own blood. It wasn’t until the next morning, when he woke up from his alcohol coma, that he’d realized what he’d done and called in the family doctor to look at me. And my mother? Well, she’d been cooking breakfast since I wouldn’t get off the floor from my “temper tantrum”. I think the only reason my father helped me at all was he’d find himself dead if the famiglia found out.

“I watch over him at night,” I admitted, hoping the balmy breeze would take away the sound of my words and push the memory deep down inside.

Of course, it didn’t.

Tamatha reached out all the way, tentatively, and gripped the edge of my linen pants. “They can’t hurt you anymore.”

Her warmth seeped into my skin, pulling at the edges of my mother’s hatred. That same, odd pulling inside me grew with her touch. For a few moments, I let it. It would be so easy to let her console me, to take her to bed and lose myself in the folds of her body. But doing so left me in a tailspin where I didn’t know which way was up or down. She strangled me and left me dry heaving on dry land every time I touched her. I should have left her on the fucking corner and taken the blonde escort home. She would have given me relief for the night and no entanglement I couldn’t seem to fight.

I claimed Tamatha, and yet she was the one tightening the collar on my neck.

Sucking in a breath, I looked back at the happy, playing boy on the beach. His small fists clasped ever-slipping sand, and his eyes were bright. Happiness. Did I even know what that meant? I shook myself, stepping away from Tamatha. I couldn’t breathe. The walls closed in around my chest, clenching down like a vise-grip, and I wanted to launch her into the water and watch her flounder—or hold her close and never let go. It should have been impossible for her to slide her way in so deep, so fast. I blamed it on Domino and my urge to give him what I never had—a safe environment in which to grow up.

“Benecio?”

Tamatha’s worried voice reached my ears, but it might as well have been a gunshot the way I startled. I would not break. She was the one who was supposed to be in pieces. I needed control, and I’d lost it since we’d come to the island. No, if I were honest with myself, it happened when she fought against me to save Domino, tooth and nail, knowing she couldn’t beat me. Gasping, I gripped my phone and dialed blindly.

“Benecio?” Nathan answered.

“Make a trip to the mainland for shopping with Domino and Rene for a few days.”

I walked away from Tamatha and Domino. The picture-perfect scene on my private beach made my heart pound and break all at once. I needed to mess it up, dirty it, and get back to reality. Things like this didn’t happen to Benecio Rey without there being strings attached. She was planning something. Had to be.

“For what?”

“Just fucking do it. I’ve got plans to make. I expect you to be out of the house in twenty minutes.”

I disconnected the call and headed back to my home, my sanctuary. I couldn’t look at her or my resolve would crack. Reality smacked me in the face. This was a pure business arrangement, and she needed to be reminded of that. The point of all of this was to have a malleable wife I could control, and that was it. Our shared breakfasts were trouble, the way she curled around me in sleep wasn’t real, and she only clung to me because she needed me to keep her son safe.

And you want her to want you.

The thought only pushed me to move faster. I didn’t fucking want her to need shit from me, nor did I want stupid emotions that only clouded judgment. I wanted her to submit and move at the snap of my fingers, nothing more. I’d remind both of us what that meant.

*

The night brought me calmness as I tinkered with the tools I’d need for the next step. Nathan had already left the island, Rene and Domino in tow. It wouldn’t take me long to do what was needed, but I didn’t want the distraction of Domino to stay my hand. My fingers brushed over my tool bag, and a smile curved from deep inside. This was what I needed. Chills raced over my skin, and the desire to start immediately urged me to my feet, but I paused. It wasn’t time, not quite yet.

I’d spent hours locked in my office, working and watching Tamatha piddle around the house, searching for me, her delicate features twisted with worry and fear. Love. It made my heart quicken, but it angered me too. This was never supposed to be about love. For a while she waited in the living room, her hands primly on her lap, but I didn’t come for her. Instead, I sent her a message to go to bed, since I was working, and she was not to leave the room until she had my say so. My blood was alive every minute she didn’t come back downstairs. The action set my foundation back on solid ground. Already, with just having this simple line of separation, I felt better, more myself. Slowly, so I could savor each step, I left my office. The tools I needed were in hand, and I’d be sure to play this to the fullest.

If only I didn’t feel like I would lose something inside me for doing this.