Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 80550 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80550 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Suddenly, his eyes glance my way, the penetrative glare setting my soul ablaze before I swiftly hide behind the curtains and pretend I wasn’t peeking.
God, this is so dumb. He already saw me, so he knows I’m watching.
I sigh out loud at my own foolishness, then look again, but he’s already gone. His employee has fetched a shovel from the tool shed and is actually digging a hole somewhere in the yard while the bag lies next to him in the grass.
What the hell is he burying?
The door slams shut, and I run from the window to the door, tearing it open, only to meet Matteo’s fiery gaze head-on.
Fuck.
I have never seen him this bloodied before.
It’s like he doused himself in someone’s lifeblood.
“Oh my God,” I mutter.
He stares at me for a moment. “You changed out of the red dress.”
Wait, what? That’s what he focuses on right now? When he’s the one who’s covered in blood?
“Are you …?” I mutter.
“Hurt?” He narrows his eyes. “Is that what you were hoping, Tesoro?”
He walks up the stairs, and I immediately follow. “No, no, that’s not what I meant.”
He heads straight into his room, so I dart in behind him right before the door closes. He turns, and his lips part as if he didn’t expect me to follow him inside.
He’s absolutely covered in blood from head to toe; fingers, hands, chest, even his face. There are splatters everywhere, and it definitely doesn’t belong to him because he doesn’t even have a scratch on his face.
“Did you …?” I don’t even know how to finish my sentences.
His hand balls. “I wanted to. Desperately. But it would be an easy way out for a monster like him.” The rage he exudes is palpable, even from all the way over here. “I couldn’t stomach the thought of him hurting you, so I made him pay in blood.”
I’m amazed Matteo would actually hunt Lucio down for me. That he’d make Lucio pay for putting his hands on me when I was still his fiancée despite the fact that Matteo doesn’t even know me, and that I even tried to poison him.
He still cared enough to want to protect me.
I should hate Matteo for locking me up, but my icy heart is slowly melting away for him. I know I shouldn’t have these feelings. I know I shouldn’t ask.
But I still can’t help myself because I know how badly he wants revenge. “What did you do?”
“I took his fingers.” Matteo clenches his jaw while still breathing ragged breaths from the unchained anger. “He will never hurt you again. I swear until my last dying breath.”
He wants Lucio to suffer just as badly as I do, yet he did this all for me.
“You did that for me?”
Is it wrong to smile?
“I did it because it was the right thing to do,” he replies.
But it isn’t just the right thing. He knew this would set off a chain reaction that’s impossible to put out. He mutilated Lucio. His whole family will get up in arms.
He just started a war for me.
Matteo closes his eyes and grumbles to himself before he turns around and marches toward his shower. “I need to cool off.”
“Wait, but aren’t you hurt?”
I can’t help but slowly take steps toward the bathroom, lured in by the mere idea of him.
No one has ever done something like that for me before.
Absolutely no one.
He rubs his hands so roughly under the water in the sink that I fear he might get abrasions, so I grab his hands and stop him. He glances at me from over his shoulder, blood and war marring his face. But I’ve seen enough of this man to know he will always find a way to win.
And something about that is just so damn alluring.
I grab a towel lying next to the sink and dip it into the water, then softly brush away the blood off his cheeks, nose, and lips, lingering as they pull down with every stroke I apply. He doesn’t resist, but the stares, God, those needy stares are going to eat me alive.
Stay focused, Stella. You can do this.
I dip the towel under the water again and slide it down his neck, carefully removing the blood until there isn’t a trace left of his crimes. But when I get to his shirt and unbutton the top one, he grabs my wrist and stops me from going any further.
He clears his throat. “Don’t.”
When I was at my lowest, with all my pain on full display, he didn’t try to put me down any further. He helped me breathe through my panic attack until it subsided, and that’s something no one has ever done for me before.
And now it’s time for me to thank him for that.
I throw him a look. “Let me help.”