13. Bella

13

BELLA

S omething is off with Gabriel in the morning. I come downstairs for breakfast and see him sitting at the head of the table, his jaw tight and his eyes on his plate, as if he's a million miles away. He barely looks at anyone else, occasionally glancing at his phone, his mood so evidently dark that he might as well have a rain cloud floating over his head.

I'm not in the best of moods, either. Last night, I saw the way he looked at me over dinner. There was something in his face, an emotion that I can only describe as something close to longing, and it frightened me. After what happened in the library between us, it felt like something I needed to escape from. Something that I needed to put distance between me and it, before I gave in and said something I shouldn't.

No matter how much he might want me, one thing has never changed when it comes to Gabriel. He's never faltered on the point that he's not emotionally available. He's never said that he feels differently, that he thinks he can love me the way I hope one day I can be loved. Only that he wants me. And that makes allowing myself to have the feelings I do impossible.

If Agnes notices how dark both of our moods are, she doesn't say anything. We eat in relative silence, broken by the occasional chattering of Danny asking why there are no puppies on the estate and Cecelia talking about paint colors for the library. Then Agnes gets up without a word, collecting the plates and then collecting Cecelia and Danny before I can, urging them out of the room with a single backwards glance at Gabriel and me.

My stomach lurches instantly. I've gone through too much in my short life to not know when something is wrong. When something is off . And it's not just Gabriel who is off this morning, I realize. I can feel the hairs standing up on the back of my neck as I realize that something is going on.

"Gabriel?" I turn to look at him, and he lets out a heavy breath, finally looking up at me. There's something dark in his eyes, a resignation, and it makes my stomach feel heavy.

"I need to talk to you alone." That resignation is in his voice, too, and the heaviness slides into my chest.

"We are alone." I look around the dining room, which is empty of anyone other than him or me.

"Alone, and private." He stands up, and if it weren't for the look on his face and the dead seriousness in his voice, I would think that he has some ulterior motive. That he wants me alone for far more interesting reasons than what I think is probably happening right now.

Some instinct, buried deep in my mind, leftover from everything I endured with Pyotr on that awful wedding day, shouts that I should tell him no. That I should tell him that whatever it is, we can talk about it right here. Now. That we don't need to go anywhere else.

But I trust Gabriel. He's one of only a very few people in the world that I trust absolutely. So I nod, and I follow him out of the room.

He doesn't say a word as he leads me to the library. My heart stutters in my chest as we walk in, memories of the last time we were in here a few days ago flooding me. His hands on me, his lips, the feeling of him pressed up against me, pinning me to the shelves?—

Liquid heat pools through me, and I feel my breath catch in my throat. For a moment, I forget the heaviness in his voice, the anxiety that unfurled in me when I heard it. I forget that whatever we're in here to talk about, I felt sure a moment ago was nothing good.

I'm alone with Gabriel, and?—

He looks around the library as he shuts the door. It's much cleaner than it was the last time we were in here, although there's still a ways to go. The bookshelves alone are hours upon hours worth of work.

The thought instantly flees when I hear the lock on the door click.

"Gabriel—" I turn towards him abruptly. I trust him, I think, but that doesn't stop the flutter of fear that cascades through my chest.

"I want to make sure we're not interrupted."

That makes a different feeling flutter through me that has nothing to do with fear. But then Gabriel turns back to face me, and the look on his face chases every salacious thought out of my head.

"We need to talk, Bella."'

"You said that," I whisper, my chest tightening.

"Igor attacked." He says it bluntly, and even as I flinch back, my entire body going cold, I'm grateful for that bluntness. Over the course of the things that have happened to me since I was engaged to Pyotr, I've realized that dancing around the truth makes everything worse. Dragging things out, trying to soften them, it makes it all worse. Especially in the end, when the truth comes out anyway.

"What happened?" My voice is a choked whisper, and I see the muscle in Gabriel's jaw tick.

"He burned the mansion. My home," he clarifies. "In New York."

His voice is flat, almost empty—or it would seem that way if I didn't know him as well as I do. If we hadn't spent a handful of times tangled up with each other intimately, if I hadn't heard his voice crack with desire and longing and need. If I hadn't heard him gentle and angry and afraid. I hear what's underneath that flat statement—the anger, the worry.

There's still resignation, too, and that's what scares me the most.

"Gabriel, I—" The shock of what he just said fades, turning instantly into guilt. My stomach tightens, and I wrap my arms around myself, feeling a hot burn behind my eyelids. "I'm so sorry. I?—"

"No." His voice is still flat, hard, but now all of that is directed at me , and my stomach twists again. "No, you're not going to do that, Bella. You're not going to take the blame for this. It's not your fault. None of this is."

"It is —" I start to argue. "If I hadn't?—"

"And I could have told you to leave, when I found out what had happened." Each word snaps like the cracking of a branch. "I could have sent you back to your father. We've been over this, Bella, again and again. What happened is not your fault. I made a choice to protect you. And I'm going to keep protecting you?—"

"How?" I can feel a shivering fear starting to run through me, that old terror rising up to join the shock and guilt and all of the other emotions that I'm sure are coming hard on their heels. "He's just going to keep chasing us, Gabriel. He'll come here, and?—"

"He wants his fiancée." Gabriel spits out the words, like they taste rotten on his tongue. "So I'm going to make sure that Igor can't have you. I'm going to make sure you aren't his fiancée any longer."

I blink at him, not understanding. "I don't know how?—"

"I'm going to marry you."

There's a ringing in my ears. For a second, I'm pretty sure that I've misheard him. That he can't possibly have said what I think he did. "What?" I manage, and Gabriel's jaw tightens. He steps closer to me, letting out a heavy exhale of breath.

"You won't be Igor's fiancée any longer. You'll be my wife. Mine ."

The ragged way he says that last word, as if it means something more to him than just a means to keep me safe, makes my heart jolt in my chest in a way that's entirely inappropriate to the situation. I should be terrified, fighting him, but my mind is racing instead, trying to make sense of what it would mean to be Gabriel's wife.

His wife .

The first feeling I have is a good one. A feeling of sudden excitement, anticipation—the feeling that I've been handed everything I want in one surprising swoop. And then, a second later, reality comes crashing back in.

Gabriel is marrying me for my protection. Out of duty, responsibility, practicality—not because he loves me. He made it abundantly clear to me that love is something he doesn't expect to ever be capable of again.

He's been married before, to a woman he loved. A woman taken from him unexpectedly. The threat of Igor will only make him less likely to love me, not more. What he feels for me has always been only physical, but this?—

This will make me something so much worse. A wife he doesn't really want, forever coming second to the one he did love.

I'll be the woman who forced him to do something he said he'd never do again, because of the danger I dragged into his life. The danger that I put him and his family in. He'll make vows to me that he doesn't really mean in order to keep me safe. He's going to make sacrifices that he doesn't want to make, and all of that is because I didn't just leave when I knew that all of my secrets were out, and that it could put him in danger.

I was selfish, and this is what it's brought us to.

I shake my head, taking a step back. "No. I can't."

"Bella." He lets out a sharp breath. "I know how you feel about an arranged marriage. I know that this isn't what you want. I know how hard it is for you to agree to this, even with me—but it is me, Bella. You know me. I'll never hurt you. It's not the same as it would have been with anyone your father would have chosen for you?—"

I know that, I want to scream. I know, and that's why I can't. I can't because it is different, because I do love him, and because marriage to him is everything that I wish I'd had from the very beginning. It's everything I could have wanted— he is everything I could have wanted, and I can't think of anything more painful, in this moment, than to be given that, and for it not to be real.

But I can't say that. I can't tell him any of it. Not only because I know it would only make everything worse, but because my throat is tight, so choked that I'm not sure any words would make it through. I draw in a shaky breath, taking another step back, and Gabriel follows me.

"I promised I'd protect you, Bella." His jaw tightens. "I know you don't believe me, that you don't think I actually can, but I promised. And if he believes you belong to him, then I need to make sure that you can't. That you belong to someone else."

"To you." My voice sounds hollow to my own ears—it doesn't even entirely sound like mine. I want to keep backing away from him, but I don't feel like I can move any longer. Shock and a different kind of pain—a feeling that if I do this, I'll be losing something—has me rooted in place.

"He'll just kill you," I whisper. "If you marry me, you'll just be in the way of him doing what he wants. So he'll kill you and take me anyway. He already knows I'm not a virgin. It's not like a wedding night will make any difference?—"

Even with all the fear and anger weighing down the conversation for us both, I can see the way Gabriel's eyes darken at the mention of a wedding night. At the mention of my virginity, which belongs to him. He took it. He already made me his, in every way that could possibly matter. The possessive light in his eyes takes my breath away and makes my knees feel weak.

I would never have thought I'd feel anything but fear and derision at a look like that on a man's face—but on Gabriel's, it makes me feel something so much different. It makes me want him to take what he wants. It makes me want to give in to anything he asks.

My hands are trembling as I manage to take another step back. My calves bump into the edge of one of the chaises, and I stop, licking my lips nervously as I try to think of what else to say. What else might convince Gabriel that this isn't the solution he thinks it is.

His gaze drops to my mouth, and it feels hard to think.

"There are rules in this world of ours, Bella," Gabriel says roughly. "If you are my wife, it changes things. When Salvatore took Gia from Pyotr, they came to terms with him. They didn't attack. A marriage in front of a priest, one done in a church and on paper, means something. It will change the rules of this conflict. You will be mine, in every way that matters to a man like him, and?—"

"It won't matter," I whisper. I know, down to my bones, that a vow in a church and a signature on paper won't matter to a man like Igor, one who feels that so much that is his right has been stolen from him already. He'll burn the church and rip the paper to shreds if that's what it takes. But I can see in Gabriel's face that he doesn't believe that. He still thinks Igor will play by the rules. I laugh, a bitter sound that fills the air between us. "He won't care if we're married, in a church or otherwise. You'd have to get me pregnant, just to really make sure I'm entirely yours, and even then?—"

Before I can say another word, Gabriel has closed the space between us, and his mouth is on mine.

The kiss is hot, frantic, almost desperate. His mouth crushes mine, his teeth dragging over my lower lip, his hands dragging hungrily over my skin, under my t-shirt. "That's what I'll do if I have to," he breathes against my mouth, and I can feel how hard he already is against me, like iron against my thigh. "I need you safe, Bella."

His hands close around my waist, and he turns us abruptly, sinking back onto the chaise as he pulls me down atop him. The seat is wide, wide enough for me to straddle him with plenty of room for my knees, and the instant that he pulls me down into his lap, a strangled moan escapes me at the feeling of his cock pressing between my thighs, through his jeans and mine.

"I need you ," he whispers against my mouth, and then his hand fists in my hair, tangling it around his fingers as he drags me back down into a searing kiss.

All I can feel is him. His hand knotted in my hair, his mouth against my lips, his tongue tangling with mine. His fingers, jerking loose the button of my jeans, yanking them down past my hips, further down my thighs. "Off," he growls, his mouth devouring mine. "Get them off."

I kick them away without thinking, my mind a fog of lust. Need has overtaken every rational thought, every part of me aching for him, all of the desire that I've been struggling daily to keep at bay surging up all at once at the raw, feral need in him. He nips at my lower lip, pulling my mouth back to his, and I hear the metallic clink of his belt buckle as he yanks it open.

"I need you," he repeats, hoarse and desperate, his fingers curling around the nape of my neck. I feel the hot, hard length of his cock pressing against me, burning through the thin cotton of my panties as he frees himself from his jeans, and then his fingers hook beneath the fabric, yanking my panties to one side as he pulls me upwards just enough to slip his cock between my thighs and sheathe himself to the root.

I cry out, the keening wail of pleasure loud enough that anyone nearby could hear, but I can't help it. He's impossibly large, thick and long, and Gabriel's hand on my hip pulls me down atop him as he starts to thrust, his mouth claiming mine again as he fucks me hard and fast. I can feel him inside of me, bare and hot and smooth, hard as steel, his powerful, muscled body surging up against mine again and again. We're still wearing half our clothes—his on except for his open jeans, my t-shirt bunched around my waist, and neither of us can separate long enough to take anything else off. He keeps my mouth sealed to his, one hand in my hair and the other on my hip, guiding me.

I've imagined riding him before, but this is something different. He's in control, even with me on top, dragging me back down onto his cock each time I try to rise, his hungry kisses devouring every sound I make. It's primal, rough, possessive in a way that it's never been before, and I would have thought this would terrify me, but?—

With Gabriel, it's so arousing that I'm already on the verge of coming.

Every desperate thrust of his hips grinds his pelvis against my clit, his hot, smooth skin, and rough pubic hair rubbing against that most sensitive spot, and I cry out again, a flood of arousal soaking us both as I buck against him, craving my own release. It feels good—so fucking good, and I moan his name against his lips as I feel the pressure building, on the verge of letting go, an orgasm so intense that it feels like I'll die if I don't reach it.

"Gabriel—" His name is almost a sob as I moan it again, rubbing myself against him. I lean forward as he frantically fucks me, each upward thrust filling me again and again with his cock in a way that feels almost too good. It's too much pleasure, searing my nerves, scrambling my thoughts, and I claw my fingers into his shirt, rolling my hips against him as I try to tear my mouth away from his.

His hand in my hair tightens. "I want to swallow your scream when you come," he growls against my lips. "I want my name in our mouths when you come all over my fucking cock. Come for me, Bella. Come?—"

Whatever else he might have been about to say is lost in the orgasm that hits me, seizing every muscle in my body as my back bows so deeply my spine feels like it could snap, my hips pressed hard to his as my fingers dig into his chest through his t-shirt. The orgasm is vicious, terrifying, violent—and it's the best thing I've ever felt, sweeping through me and obliterating everything else until there's nothing but pleasure, nothing but the feeling of my body clenching and shaking around Gabriel's, his cologne and sweat in my nostrils, the heat of his skin sinking into mine, and?—

" Fuck!" He snarls the word as he grabs my hips in both hands, lifting me just in time for his cock to slip free. His arm slides around me, hand holding tightly to my waist as he grabs his cock in one hand just as it starts to spurt, his head falling back as he jerks himself hard, cum splashing over the ridges of his abs. It spurts up onto his shirt, his hand clenching his length until he's almost white-knuckling his own cock, his jaw clenched as his eyes squeeze shut, and he moans something that sounds like my name.

I can't move, frozen atop him, as I stare down at him. He's the most erotic thing I've ever seen, strung taut with pleasure because of me , shuddering with it. He swallows convulsively, his hand sliding once more over his cock, and then he lets it fall away, his eyes slowly opening.

"I almost came inside you." His eyes flutter closed again for a second. "That was one of the hardest fucking things I've ever had to do. Not—" He swallows again, and his hand tightens on my waist. I look at him, and my chest aches, burning with an emotion that feels like it's going to eat me alive.

He wants me. He wants me with the kind of lust, the kind of passion that I never thought I would experience. But he doesn't love me. And marrying him without that feels like it's going to kill me.

In the aftermath of what we just did, however, as reality settles back in, I can't deny that he has a point.

I don't believe Igor will obey the rules. I don't believe that he'll care if I'm Gabriel's wife or just a nanny hired to watch his kids. He'll come to take me back, one way or another, and unless Gabriel has protection against that, he'll leave devastation in his wake.

But marrying Gabriel has a different benefit, one that he was likely about to tell me and that I didn't think about until now, as my emotions and arousal are cooling.

Gabriel has connections in the mafia world. Connections he's made and tended to over the years. Calling in favors and asking for those connections to help him stand against Igor is no small thing, but it will be made more possible if he asks for them to help defend his wife.

A lot of men in that world would see me, while I'm only Gabriel's employee, and tell him to give me back. To not risk the danger that comes with standing up to Igor. But if they see me as his wife, all of that changes.

Numbly, I feel Gabriel lift me off of his lap, as he sits up. He strips his shirt off, using it to clean off his stomach, and I stare at his abs as they bunch, resisting the urge to reach out and touch him. A part of me wants to fall back onto the chaise with him, to rouse him until he fucks me again, so we can put off the rest of this conversation. And the rest of me knows that we need to have it, before anything else happens between us.

"Bella." He turns to face me, his expression tired now, instead of angry. "Please—say you'll marry me. Let me protect you."

I almost laugh. The only reason that I don't is that I know he won't understand why, and that it will hurt him. It wouldn't be him I would be laughing at—it's the utter ridiculousness of all of this, the fact that he's sitting next to me while I'm half-dressed, a dirty, wadded-up shirt in his hand, asking me to marry him. It's not at all the proposal I would have envisioned, if I'd ever really let myself imagine this.

But then again, neither was my first. In fact, the first time, I wasn't even asked.

This is an improvement, in comparison.

That laugh burns the back of my throat again, but I swallow it down. I nod, slowly, and I can see the relief on his face.

"That's a yes?" he asks quietly, and I nod again.

It's a yes—for now. Because all I can think, as my heart sinks like a rock in my chest, is that while I can accept that there are good reasons to marry Gabriel for my own protection, it won't be forever.

Once the threat is gone, I'll leave. It breaks my heart to even think it—to imagine leaving Cecelia, Danny, Gabriel, and even Agnes—but I know that I can't bear to be married to him forever if he doesn't love me.

I can barely stand it, even for a little while.

"I don't have a ring," Gabriel says quietly. "This happened suddenly. I got the call from Gio, telling me what happened, just last night. But?—"

He reaches into his pocket, and I stare at him for a moment, unsure of what he's doing. He takes out a small, flat box, and hands it to me. "I have this."

I blink, taking it numbly from his hand. "What is it?" I ask softly, and the smallest of smiles quirks the very corner of his mouth.

"Open it."

Slowly, I open the lid of the box. On the black velvet inside, there's a bracelet—a series of linked daisies, a pearl in the center of each flower. I feel my eyes start to burn as I look at it, and I wonder when Gabriel bought it. How long he's had it—and why.

"It's beautiful," I whisper as he reaches to take it out of the box, moving to clasp it around my wrist.

"That day—" His voice catches, and he stops for a moment. "The morning after we—after the first time, I wanted to do something for you. To let you know that it meant something to me. I wanted you to have something to remember it by, a tangible thing, because I knew—" He lets out a slow breath. "I knew it was only supposed to be that once. So, I decided to come home early, and I stopped at a jewelry store. I bought this, and on the way out?—"

He looks up at me, and he doesn't have to tell me the rest for me to know what happened. "Igor's men ambushed me in the parking lot. They forced me back to the mansion, where I found you and—" His jaw tightens, and I wrap my hand around his, all my conflicting feelings about the marriage I've just agreed to fading briefly with the overwhelming need to comfort him.

"I'm sorry," I whisper, and he shakes his head.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have stopped. If I'd come straight home?—"

"Igor was already there. His men already had us. It wouldn't have changed anything," I tell him firmly. "You need me to believe that you can protect me, Gabriel—I need you to believe that. Nothing about that day was your fault."'

"It wasn't yours, either."

I give him a small smile, but I know how it looks. There's no joy in my face, only fear and sadness. None of the things I should be feeling just after a proposal. "Maybe someday I'll believe that."

"We need to do this soon." Gabriel lets go of my hand, as if he knows how that will make me feel—the impending dread of knowing that something I didn't choose is bearing down on me. "A week, at most. Less, if I can manage it. I'll talk to the priest in town, figure out how to make sure it can be done quickly."

I nod. "Okay," I whisper. I can feel the fight draining out of me, because I know there's no point in it. Gabriel is right that this is the best choice. That it will potentially help more than it could possibly hurt.

Except in one way. I know he'll never hurt me intentionally. I know he would never want to.

But without meaning to, without knowing—he has. And it feels like my heart is breaking.