Chapter Two

I sighed against the fluffy down pillow, pulling the duvet tighter around my body, not wanting to wake up. Dante lived in my dreams now, and I didn’t want to leave him, not if this was the only time I could pretend we were still together.

An arm snaked around my midsection and I quickly rolled over, flinging my eyes wide open, trying to make sense of where I was, how Dante was here when I could have sworn I left him. Did he find me already? Or had I snapped under the weight of my broken heart?

Reaching up, I ran my hand along his scruff, delighting in the feel of him, the smell of him, the heat of him. “It was just a dream?”

“What was, mia cara?”

I stared into his concerned eyes, not wanting to blink for fear he’d disappear from my bed, my heart, my mind. “Everything,” I answered with a tremble, my fingers drifting through his thick, dark hair. “I thought I flipped a coin at the airport in Rome to determine whether I should stay or go. It told me to go. But now…”

He palmed my lower back, bringing me closer. His lips brushed mine, a ghost of a kiss. It wasn’t enough. I needed it deeper, needed to feel all of him, to relish in him, to lose myself in him and never come back up for air.

“You did go.”

“But—”

He brought his finger up to my mouth, silencing me. “We’ll always have our dreams.”

“What if that’s not good enough?”

He placed a kiss on my nose, wiping my tears. His hands felt rough, just like I remembered. “It’ll have to be for now. I promise. I’ll always find you there.”

“Always?” I asked through my tears.

“Always, my beautiful Eleanor.” He drew my head against his broad chest. “Always.”

“Always,” I murmured, clutching onto him with every ounce of strength I possessed.

When I no longer felt the tickle of his chest hair, I shot upright in bed, staring at the mattress. The only thing beside me was a down pillow.

Running my hand over my face, I took a moment to get my bearings. I was in Mila’s guest room. The sun was shining, although I could tell it was beginning its journey toward the horizon. My belongings were strewn all over the little bit of available floor space. And I was alone. No Dante. No arms wrapped around me. No soft murmurs of desire in my ear. Nothing but sadness and emptiness.

I pulled my hair back, securing it in a messy bun, then stood. I was exhausted, but if I kept sleeping, I knew I’d be wide awake in the middle of the night. So, instead of curling up into a ball and pretending my heart wasn’t breaking more with each passing second, I trudged down the hallway in search of coffee and my best friend.

“There she is!” Mila’s chipper voice called out when I walked into the kitchen. She got up from the couch in the open living room area and headed toward me. “How ya feeling?” Grabbing a mug out of the cabinet, she placed it under her one-cup brewer. The smell of coffee immediately filled the air.

“Better,” I answered in a quiet voice, not wanting to tell her about my dream. She eyed me skeptically. “Just recovering from jet-lag, that’s all.”

“Whatever you say.” She turned back around and tore open a packet of sweetener. After adding it, she grabbed the milk from the refrigerator, pouring a bit into the mug, then handed the coffee to me.

“Thanks, Mila.”

“Anytime.”

I met her forlorn green eyes. Only Mila would be able to know exactly what was going through my mind without me having to say a single word. She knew how I thought, how I processed things. She knew me better than my own parents or the man I was supposed to marry. At that moment, she knew I was barely keeping it together.

“Oh, Ellie.” She took the mug out of my hand, setting it on the counter, and wrapped her arms around me. “It hurts like a fucker, doesn’t it?”

“More than I thought it would,” I choked out, finally letting my true emotions show instead of keeping them locked away, worried someone would use them to their advantage. Mila would never do that to me. She was the only person who’d ever been real around me, who didn’t put on an act. She was who she was, take it or leave it.

“I’ve been there.” She rubbed my back, then pulled away and handed me a box of tissues. Grabbing my coffee, she wrapped her arm around my shoulders, steering me into the living area. “You saw what a wreck I was after our little trip to San Fran all those years ago.”

“Yeah, but that’s you.” I sank onto her comfortable sectional, yanking a stuffed animal out from beneath me and wiping my cheek. “You’ve always been the emotional one.” I dabbed my eyes with another tissue, blowing my nose. “This isn’t who I am.” Tears welled up again and I pulled my legs into my chest, feeling like I was losing control over everything. I’d always been put-together, unaffected, perhaps even a bit cold. In the past few days, I’d shed more tears than I had in all my years combined. “At least it’s not who I used to be. Now I don’t even know who I am, what I’m supposed to do, how I’m going to move on and pretend my life is back to the way it was before all this began.”

She placed my coffee on the table in front of us, wrapping me in her arms once more. “You’ll figure it out, Ellie. You always do. You don’t need to have all the answers right now. Just take this time for you. Relax. Spend hours watching crappy daytime television. Get drunk before noon. You deserve it.”

I laughed, drawing in a calming breath as I settled against her chest. “Thanks, Mila.”

“You don’t have to thank me. This is what friends are for…to be the glue when you’re falling apart.” She smoothed my hair, just like I did for her in our younger years whenever she came crying to me because of a boy. I never imagined she’d be the one soothing my tears, that she’d be the glue holding me together. “It’s big, isn’t it?” she asked after several moments of silence, my shaky breaths the only sound filling the room.

I immediately pulled out of her embrace, staring at her with wide eyes. When I saw the devious smile crawl onto her plump lips as she waggled her eyebrows, I burst out laughing. Wiping my cheeks, I grabbed my coffee mug, taking a sip. I’d never been more grateful to have a friend like Mila, a friend who knew exactly what I needed when I needed it. Right now, I just wanted to sit on the couch with her and pretend my world wasn’t falling apart around me.

“More than a mouthful,” I shot back.

“You hussy!” she joked, playfully punching me in the arm.

I’d never felt comfortable talking about sex before. Now, after Dante opened my eyes, heart, and mind, I didn’t feel ashamed about it. It was natural. It was beautiful. It was honest, unlike anything else in my life.

“But I’m glad you finally got to experience real sex.”

“Did I ever.” I brought my mug back to my mouth, a warmth washing over me as I recalled my week with Dante Luciano. Even when we were fully clothed, there was something so sensual about him. The way he looked at me. The way his presence made me lightheaded. The way his proximity made me ache to touch him, to feel him, to hold onto him and never let go. I’d never met another man like him. I doubted I ever would again.

“What was he like?” Mila asked after a while.

I gazed at the ceiling, considering her question. How could I possibly describe him? Words couldn’t do the man justice. The dark eyes that peered into my soul with alarming accuracy. The strong hands that held me captive for days, never wanting to let go. The seductive, raspy tone of his accented voice that I still heard in my head, my brain playing tricks on me, making me think he was beside me when he was thousands of miles away. The impact the absence of all these things had on my heart.

“Powerful. Commanding. Mysterious.” I sighed, meeting Mila’s eyes. “Beautiful inside and out. After our first meeting, I couldn’t stop thinking about him. Granted, when he first spoke to me, I thought he was just some arrogant prick, but I still found myself inexplicably drawn to him. He had this way about him… With just a few words, he’d taken my mind prisoner. After our first kiss, I never wanted to be freed.”

“Damn.” Mila settled back on the couch, fanning herself. “If you’re still this enamored with him, I’m assuming you got some answers about the whole Brock situation.”

“I’m sorry,” I offered, chewing on my lower lip. “The last few days were a bit of a whirlwind. I meant to call and fill you in…”

She waved me off. “No need to apologize. I was actually glad you didn’t call. It meant you worked things out and were getting laid again.” She winked. “So what reason did he give for not telling you he was Brock’s brother?”

“Because James killed his daughter,” I said over the top of my coffee mug before I brought it to my mouth, only to have it ripped away, coffee splashing onto the leather sofa.

“What?!” Mila’s eyes looked like they were ready to pop out of their sockets. “Dante Luciano has a daughter?!” She stared at me, stunned, momentarily speechless, which was quite the feat for Mila.

I nodded.

“Holy shit,” she breathed. “I’m pretty sure my ovaries just exploded.”

I laughed, shaking my head. “I love how I tell you James Harrison may have been responsible for the death of a little girl and the only thing you take away from that is the fact that Dante’s a hot dad.”

“Hot dad would be putting it mildly. Anyway, that whole family always gave me the creeps. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a secret torture chamber in their basement where they perform experiments on helpless runaways. They’re like a walking Criminal Minds episode.”

“They’re not that bad.”

“Yes, they are. They’re too…perfect. I’d say the same thing about your family if you weren’t a part of it. You make your parents normal.”

“Only because you made me normal,” I reminded her.

“I do my best.” She tossed her strawberry-blonde waves over her shoulder. “Now that my ovaries have had time to recover, I need details. Why does he think James killed his daughter?”

“Well…,” I began, about to go through the whole sordid tale, but she cut me off.

“Wait a minute. This calls for wine.” She jumped up, rushing into the kitchen. She grabbed an open bottle and two glasses off the counter, paused, then grabbed a second bottle. “Lots of wine.” She returned to the couch, yanking out the cork with her teeth.

“You’ve got to stop using your mouth like a kitchen utensil. You’re going to lose a tooth one of these days.”

“Yeah. Yeah. Whatever.” She handed me a glass, pouring the red liquid into it before filling her own.

“Now you may proceed.” She sat down beside me as she took a sip. “Dante approached you because he thinks James killed his daughter,” she urged. “How did she die?”

“Leukemia,” I answered, swallowing hard. “Lilly had leukemia.”

She shook her head, covering her heart with her hand. “I couldn’t imagine.” Then her eyebrows furrowed. “Wait a minute. If Dante had a daughter, why haven’t I ever read about her? I certainly would have remembered that little tidbit.”

“He wanted it that way. He wasn’t married or even in a serious relationship with the girl’s mother. The pregnancy was a bit of an accident. But after his own father abandoned him, he didn’t want his child to grow up always wondering who her dad was. He didn’t want her to be in the spotlight, either.”

“He sounds like a good guy, and I’m not just saying that because I want more details about his cock.”

“Mila!” I shoved her shoulder. “You’re married!”

“I told you! He’s my free pass. Steven would want details, too!” She giggled.

“Anyway,” I continued, my face heating. I proceeded to walk Mila through all the information I’d gleaned from Dante — his daughter’s leukemia, her failed intravenous chemotherapy, the doctors putting her on Sprylif, her dying within a week, his reluctance to believe her death was solely due to the disease, the phone call he received from Cynthia Edelman.

“She claimed Lilly’s death could have been avoided, that there was a big coverup going on that went all the way up to the head of the FDA.”

“Who just so happens to be his biological father, James Harrison.”

I slowly nodded.

“Do they have any contact?”

“No. He says James is no more a father than a sperm donor would be.”

“What a fuck-tard.”

I chuckled. “Don’t hold back, Mila. Tell me how you really feel.” My tone oozed sarcasm.

“What? He is! Especially now that we know he may be corrupt.”

“He’s not.”

“But—”

I opened my mouth, hesitating, unsure how much more I should say.

“What is it? You can’t leave me hanging like this. This is better than an episode of Hawaii Five-0. We can call it Italy Six-Nine since it involves a sexy Italian.”

I exhaled, rolling my eyes, then filled her in about the phone conversation I’d overheard between Dante and someone I assumed he’d hired to investigate Lilly’s death. “He found emails between her and someone else about the phone calls Dante had made to Barnes looking into Sprylif. The guy on the phone made it sound as if she were ordered to divert Dante’s efforts and put the blame on James.”

“So James isn’t involved?”

“The guy said he had evidence pointing to someone else.”

“Who?”

Reluctant, I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth. I had no problem telling Mila that my almost father-in-law may have been responsible for a young girl’s death. But the idea that my own father may be the one involved sickened me. I didn’t want to say anything until I had more concrete answers. There could have been a completely innocent reason for his contact with Cynthia Edelman, although sneaking around and using an anonymous email certainly didn’t make him look innocent.

“He’s still working on that,” I finally said.

“When do you plan on seeing him again?” Mila asked guardedly.

I released a heavy sigh, pinching my lips together. “We don’t have any plans to see each other.”

“What?” Mila snapped her head toward me, her eyes wide. “Why not?”

I looked at her, my chin quivering. “Because, Mila. We’re too broken. After everything I’ve been through with my parents and Brock, I need time to learn to be myself. I refuse to be one of those women who becomes so dependent on another person for their own livelihood and happiness that I lose sight of who I am. I just…” I inhaled a shaky breath through the heaviness in my throat, the ache in my chest, the breaking of my heart. I met her eyes, my own brimming with tears. “It killed me to walk away, but I had to. He needs to come to terms with what happened to his daughter, and I need to be on my own for the first time in my life.”

Not saying a word, Mila simply reached across the couch, grabbing my hand. That was all I needed. Reassurance from the one person who knew me better than anyone else that I’d made the right decision.

“Do you love him?” she asked.

I stared at her, my silence giving her the answer.

“And you left simply because it wasn’t the right time?”

“I had to,” I protested, not sure I wanted to tell her I flipped a coin to decide which path to take, something the old Ellie never would have done. “I—”

“Do you know why Steven and my relationship worked, even when I came back home and started college, and we were only able to see each other maybe once a month for four years?”

I shook my head.

“Because we both knew the odds were against us. I was eighteen and he was twenty-two when we met on our girls’ weekend in San Francisco. I was starting at San Diego State. He was beginning his last year at Berkeley. I lived in Southern California. He lived up north in San Jose. Nothing about us should have worked, especially when he was across the country at the FBI Academy for six months. But it did because we didn’t give up on each other. We both had things to learn. We both needed to discover who we were, what we were meant to be.” She wrapped her arms around me and I settled against her. “Sometimes the best love you can find is between two imperfect, broken people who learn to navigate through life’s storms together. There are few things worth fighting for, but you can be damn sure love is one of them.” She lowered her voice. “Maybe you should have fought more.”

“I did,” I murmured. “But fate fought even harder.”