CHAPTER EIGHT
A LOUD CHIMING TORE through the room, waking me from a dead sleep, every inch of me sore from the previous night’s calisthenics. At first, I ignored the relentless sound, but when my phone began ringing once more, I blinked my eyes open, staring at the screen. I should have expected this.
When I started to answer, Dante grabbed my arm, preventing me from doing so. “Don’t.”
“It’s my mother,” I insisted. “She won’t give up until I talk to her.” I glanced at the screen just as the ringing stopped, seeing I had six missed calls from her…and that I’d also slept through my alarm. “Shit.” I shot up in bed, steadying myself against the sudden dizziness that overcame me.
“What is it?” Dante asked groggily.
“I have to be at work at nine.”
“How much do you make?”
“Not enough,” I mumbled.
“I’ll pay you triple. Quadruple. I don’t care. Just stay with me.”
“I have clients who need me. I can’t just not show up.”
He lowered his hand to his waist and stroked what I could tell was his hard erection. “I need you, too.” A salacious smile crossed his face, his grin lazy.
I playfully shoved him, but he grabbed my wrist, yanking me back down to the mattress. He pinned me on my back, my hair sprawled out on the pillow behind me.
“You were the most beautiful woman there last night.” He curved toward me, grinding against me, eliciting a moan. “But I expected as much. You’re the most stunning and alluring woman on the planet.” His lips met mine. His kiss was tender, soft, unhurried as he took his time, showing me how much he needed me. “And you’re all mine.”
“Yes,” I breathed, raking my hands through his hair. “All yours.”
“All mine,” he repeated just as my phone incessantly chimed once more.
I dropped my hand to the mattress, pushing away from Dante. “She won’t give up until I answer. If she doesn’t get an answer, she’ll track me down. I’d rather have this conversation over the phone.”
With a heavy sigh, he reluctantly released his hold on me, allowing me to sit up.
I took a minute to compose myself, then adjusted my face, regardless of the fact that she couldn’t see me. It was a habit.
“Good morning, Mother,” I said in as bright and chipper a voice as possible, wondering if she could tell just by my tone what sinful and debaucherous things I’d done the night before. Then again, she didn’t need to hear it in my tone. We’d given the world quite the show, from the way Dante gripped me possessively during his red carpet interview, to the way his hand never left my exposed leg during the ceremony, then to the way he kissed me the instant he was announced the winner… He’d left no question as to his need for me.
“Do you have any idea what I’ve been dealing with over the past twelve hours?” she said immediately, her tone hurried, incensed, frantic. “Ever since the television coverage of you with that…that man, I’ve been on damage control for your father. Do you have any idea how bad this looks? That his own daughter is… Well, I can’t even say it. Decent people don’t speak of the things you engaged in last night. I just… This is an election year, Ellie.”
“I don’t give a fuck,” I retorted, my voice condescending. I could picture her eyes widening from my response. I would have paid a huge amount of money to see it first-hand.
“Well, I never!”
“You should, Mother. Maybe it would loosen the stick that’s been up your ass the past, oh, at least twenty-eight years.”
“I… You… That man. Do you know he’s a…” She lowered her voice, as if speaking a horrible truth, “liberal?”
“So am I.”
She scoffed. “No, you’re not, Ellie. This is just a rebellious stage. You made your point. You didn’t want to marry Brock. He wasn’t right for you. We should have listened.”
“This is not a rebellious stage,” I answered, making it sound as if this whole conversation was old and tired…because it was. “Go ahead and pull my voting record. You’ll see I’ve never voted for a Republican candidate.”
“But…your father. And Brock!”
“Like I said, I’ve never voted Republican.”
It was silent for a moment as she stewed on this information. “You are so ungrateful, Ellie. After everything I’ve sacrificed.”
“You just keep telling yourself that. Whatever you need to do to make yourself feel good. You didn’t sacrifice anything to raise me. You hired someone to do it so you didn’t have to.”
“So what? Because I had duties and obligations you now want to get back at me by slutting it up with a man who represents everything that’s wrong with this country?”
My spine immediately stiffened, my voice caught in my throat at her words. All the confidence I’d felt immediately waned.
“Slutting it up?” I repeated, unsure I’d really heard her correctly.
Dante bolted out of bed, instantly standing in front of me, trying to goad the phone out of my hand. I shook my head, biting my lower lip to stop it from trembling. I looked away. I didn’t want him to see the unshed tears forming in my eyes. I didn’t want him to witness how small this woman made me feel. I didn’t want him to look at me like I was weak. Like I was broken. Like I was being ripped apart at the seams, degraded, beaten, then tossed into the garbage. Like the way my mother always made me feel for failing to live up to her impossibly high standards.
“Exactly. We paved such a bright future for you. Got you into one of the best law schools. Got you a job at the top law firm in the state. Molded and groomed you so you’d be able to make a name for yourself here in California, then hopefully Washington to carry on the family legacy. But you decide to throw it away so you can be paraded around like some made-up whore in a designer gown?”
My hands shook, every muscle in my body tightening. My face heated, jaw clenching, hand balling into a fist. I tried to come back with an argument of my own, but words evaded me. I’d reverted to the same broken girl this woman always made me feel like.
“Because if you continue down this path, that’s all you’ll amount to,” she continued, not even pausing for a breath. “Someone who spreads her legs in exchange for money, for gifts, for your fifteen seconds of fame. Eventually, he’ll tire of you, just like Brock. And what will be left? Nothing.”
Before I could even utter a word in response, Dante ripped the phone from me, the veins in his neck throbbing in a way I’d never seen, his face red, his lips turned up into a sneer.
“Listen to me right now,” he bellowed, making me jump.
I’d heard his demanding, powerful voice before, but nothing like this. Not even when he’d walked into his apartment to find Brock cutting off my oxygen. Something inside Dante had snapped, unmatched rage bubbling inside him.
“Don’t you dare say anything like that to Eleanor again. I don’t care who you are or how powerful you think your husband is, I will make it my mission to dismantle everything you have.”
“Is that a threat?” I heard my mother’s shrill voice crack over the phone.
“No,” Dante answered very matter-of-factly. “It’s a promise. I love Eleanor. And I will not let anyone hurt her, including you. She’s an adult capable of making her own decisions. I hate to be the one to tell you this, but she chose me. And as long as she keeps choosing me, I’ll be right beside her.”
He grabbed my chin, forcing my downturned eyes to his, showing me all the compassion and grace I needed to feel at that moment.
Licking his lips, he finished, “Because I will always choose her.” He slowly lowered his mouth, his lips whispering against mine. “Sempre e per sempre,” he assured me, his voice low so only I could hear it.
I opened my mouth, about to respond in kind, wishing his loving words were more powerful than my mother’s hate-filled diatribe that had polluted my heart, that had tainted everything I’d experienced the past few days.
Staring into Dante’s eyes, his concern for me overwhelming, I almost believed that love was stronger than hate. Then my mother’s demeaning voice sounded through the phone again, spouting more vitriol, and I broke down even more. I quickly tore away from Dante, hurrying into the bathroom, wishing I could just disappear.
I turned on the shower and stepped inside, not caring that the water wasn’t quite warm yet. I sat against the cold tile, pulling my legs into my chest, allowing my tears to finally fall. This was too real. Dante and I had only lived in the clouds, in a fantasy world, in a bubble where our love would be enough to endure even the roughest storm. But that wasn’t reality. That wasn’t my reality. This was just a reminder that maybe our love wasn’t strong enough to survive when the fantasy collided with the real world.
Almost immediately, I heard the creak of the door opening.
“Leave me alone,” I whispered, never feeling as vulnerable as I did at that moment. As much as I would have loved for Dante to wrap me in his arms and promise me everything would be okay, I couldn’t. Not now. I didn’t want him to think I needed him to wipe away my tears and protect me. I didn’t need him to take care of me. I could take care of myself.
“Eleanor, I just—”
I raised my head, my eyes on fire as I glowered at him, my body shivering from the cold water cascading over me. “Get. Out! I don’t need you to slay my dragons, Dante!” I lowered my head back to my knees. “Please,” I begged, my voice quivering as I fought back my sobs, hating that he bore witness to my mother’s hostility and how it affected me. “I need to slay my own dragons. Otherwise, she’ll keep me locked in the tower forever.”
When I didn’t hear the door close, I looked up again, meeting Dante’s concerned gaze. His lips were parted, his brows gathered in as he silently pleaded with me to let him fix this.
“Please,” I struggled to say past the lump in my throat. “I don’t want you to see me like this.”
“I meant what I said.” His voice shook with emotion. “I’ll never stop choosing you. I’ll never stop fighting for you. I’ll never stop doing everything in my power to give you the happiness you were never given as a child, to give you the love you were never given as a child. Don’t shut me out because of her. Don’t let her win.”
I opened my mouth, wishing I could give him the reassurances he needed. That I loved him, that this was always and forever for me. And maybe it was. But what if our forever was only a month, a week, a day? What if the heat I felt pulsing through my body last night as I perched perilously on the balcony ledge was the dragon’s breath coming dangerously close?
“What if she already has?” Swallowing hard, I swiped at my tears, teetering as I stood on my shaky legs. I adjusted the temperature of the water, turning away from Dante. “I need to shower and get to work. I’m already late.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“What do you mean?”
“We didn’t get to bed until after four. You can’t expect to function on such little sleep.”
Grabbing the loofah, I squeezed some body wash onto it, then glanced over my shoulder. “I have to.” Then I faced forward once more, still able to feel the burn of his eyes studying me. “It’s the only thing in my life that’s ever made sense. Whenever my mother or Brock made me feel worthless, like I would never be good enough for their high expectations, I would remind myself that at least I had my work. I need my work.”
He was behind me instantly, ripping the loofah out of my hand. He spun me around. “Let me be enough. I don’t want you to go to work today.”
“But I want to.”
“But you don’t need to. I can provide for you. You don’t need to stay here and be a victim to that woman’s hate. You can start over again in Italy…with me.”
I blew out a breath, briefly closing my eyes. I knew this conversation was going to rear its ugly head at some point. As much as I loved the idea of running away with him, of leaving this life that had never brought me anything but pain, I feared it wouldn’t work and I’d be left even more broken and beaten than I already was.
“Dante, my clients need me. I can’t just leave them.”
“Your clients at a job I can tell by the lack of life in your eyes that you hate?” He lifted a brow.
My lips formed a tight line, my tone becoming severe. “I’m not just going to ignore my responsibilities to them. So, if you’ll excuse me, I need to shower so I can get to work.”
“No, Eleanor. Not like this.” His voice turned demanding. “You can’t!”
I blinked repeatedly. “I…can’t?”
“I mean—”
“I can’t?” I said again, my voice rising in pitch, becoming increasingly irate with each word. “Just because I let you tell me what to do last night doesn’t mean I’m going to let you control my life.”
He stepped back, increasing the distance between us, trying to soothe my anger with his placid demeanor. This was the final straw. I snapped, my nostrils flaring, a fire washing over me. My face heated, the vein in my neck throbbed.
“You don’t get to come in and order me around! You don’t get to decide what’s best.” My lips curving in disgust, I approached him, my hands landing on his naked chest. His expression was wide, torn, confusion and hurt clouding his eyes. “Game over, Dante.”
I pushed him away, turning around to resume my shower. Closing my eyes, I remained still for several protracted moments, praying he wouldn't push the subject any further. Finally, I heard the door creak, signaling his departure, and I released a grateful breath.