7. Bella

7

BELLA

W hen I wake up, I'm briefly disoriented. There's sunlight coming through one window, but it's not where it normally is in my bedroom at Gabriel's, and it makes me feel unanchored, like I'm floating in some in-between place with no idea of where I really am. A jolt of paralyzing fear slices through me as, for a brief second, I think I'm still at Igor's, in the room where he kept me for the past three days. But the sunlight is in the wrong place for that, too, and I blink slowly, my eyes feeling sticky as I slowly push myself upright in bed.

I feel groggy, with that odd sense of barely even knowing who I am that comes with a particularly hard, deep sleep. I take in the deep, wine-colored bedspread that I'm tucked under, the soft mattress, the cream-colored carpet, the dark wood paneling. And, as last night comes back to me in bits and pieces, I remember where I am.

A private jet. Gabriel's private jet, something that I'm not exactly surprised to know that he has, but that feels a little startling nonetheless. I run one hand through my hair, looking at the empty space next to me in bed, and I feel another small jolt in my chest.

He must not have gotten up very long ago. I can still see where the sheets were rumpled from him sleeping next to me, and I still smell the spicy orange scent of his aftershave. I run my hand over the soft sheet, and I find myself wishing that he were still here. That I'd gotten to wake up next to him.

That's not what this is. I yank my hand back from the sheets, reminding myself of that fact for what feels like the thousandth time. The fact is, I'll probably have to remind myself of it a thousand more times, since I'm about to be trapped on an estate in Italy with Gabriel 24/7. I'm guessing he'll have things to keep him occupied, since he talked about having business there, but based on his description of the estate and surrounding town, I don't think it's going to be the kind of business that keeps him away from home at an office from nine to five. We're going to be around each other more than ever before, right when it would probably be best for us to have some space from each other.

I bite my lip, folding my hand into a fist in my lap to keep from touching the sheets again. Last night, Gabriel made it clear where his priorities lay, and it's not starting this thing between us again. Which is what I said I wanted. What we both agreed on.

It has to stay that way. For everyone's sake.

The door opens, and I nearly jump out of my skin. I press one hand to my chest, feeling my thudding heartbeat under my palm, as Gabriel walks in with a tray of what smells like pancakes.

"Breakfast," he says, setting down the tray on the bed. There's a covered plate, glasses of orange juice and water, and tiny sealed jars of syrup next to the plate. I look at it, still feeling half-asleep.

"Did you cook this?"

Gabriel snorts. "Absolutely not. Here." He takes the lid off of the tray, and I breathe in the steam—the smell of sweet dough and butter. "Fresh pancakes and fruit."

"What about you?"

"I grabbed something while Agnes was putting this together for you. Checked in on the kids, too." He sinks down on the bed next to me, picking up a fork and nudging it into my hand. "You need to eat, Bella."

"Is it even breakfast time where we are?" I have no idea what time zone difference there is between New York and Italy, or what time of day it is right now. But the pancakes do smell wonderful, if I can make myself eat. My stomach still feels tied up in knots, swimming with nausea every time I remember what's coming for us, and the sense of dread returns.

Gabriel shakes his head with a chuckle. "No. We'll land in about two hours. So it's about four in the afternoon where we're going. Technically, this is a very late brunch. But I thought you'd like this." He hesitates. "I thought it might make things feel a little more normal for you right now. Waking up to breakfast food, even if it'll be dinnertime in a few hours."

I bite my lip, feeling my chest tighten at his thoughtfulness. He's always like this with me—gentle and thoughtful and sweet—and it makes all of the feelings that I have for him so much harder to manage. How can I not fall in love with a man like this?

But how can I let myself fall for him, when he's made it abundantly clear that love is off the table when it comes to us? When just having me here is putting him and his family in an impossible amount of danger?

"Thank you," I manage, taking the fork and reaching for the glass of orange juice. My mouth feels dry, and the cold liquid is exactly what I need. It's sweet and a little tart, and I lean back against the pillows, feeling myself relax just a little.

Up here in the air, I'm safe. I don't know what will happen once we land in Italy, or what Igor will do, but for at least the next two hours, I have nothing to fear. I need to let myself lean into that, to push away the dread for at least that brief amount of time, or I know I'm going to fall apart. No person is meant to be this afraid, all of the time. I'm tough, but even my strength has limits.

My gaze flicks to Gabriel, and I have the flicker of a thought that we could spend the next two hours together. Here, in this bed. He could wipe away everything bad that's happened in the last few days, just for a little while. That would keep me from thinking about what might happen, once Igor finds out where we've run to.

I look away quickly, before he can catch me staring at him. I reach for the bowl of fruit instead of the pancakes, something easy to nibble on, and try to think about anything other than the possibility that Igor is going to chase me all the way to another continent.

Beside me, Gabriel lets out a slow sigh. "I keep wanting to ask if you're alright," he says quietly. "And I know that's a ridiculous question to ask because, of course, you're not. You can't possibly be." He goes silent, and when I look at him again, he's pressing his lips together into a thin line.

I reach out, gently, and touch the side of his hand. "I'm better than I was yesterday," I tell him softly.

At the moment, it's true. And for right now, that's going to have to be enough.

—

The chaos of getting off of the plane once we land is enough to distract me for a little while. There's baggage to collect, and two small children to corral as Gabriel organizes getting his security together, taking them to one end of the plane to talk quietly as Agnes helps me with Cecelia and Danny, getting us all ready to deplane. I found several options for clothes in the bag that Gabriel packed for me, and I opt for a pair of jeans and a black chiffon button-down. I feel comfortable enough to roll the sleeves up, putting my hair into a no-nonsense ponytail, and I see Gabriel glance at my bare arms as I walk into the aisle. There's a flicker of relief there—he knows well enough that me showing any skin means I feel somewhat safe—and then a slight flare of heat that makes me press my lips together to keep from laughing.

This is where we're at, thanks to my hang-ups. A man getting aroused over my bare arms like I'm in a Victorian romance novel.

That bit of levity is what I need, though. We all make our way off of the jet to find two black SUVs waiting for us, and I glance at Gabriel as a couple of security guards collect the bags to stow them in the trunks.

"Bet you wish you had your Ferrari right now," I murmur softly. He glances at me with a look that warms me all over, even more than the late afternoon Italian sun.

"You have no idea," he responds, his voice low and quiet, and something jolts inside of me. I bite the inside of my lip, wondering if he's thinking of that afternoon that we parked it out in the woods, of him laying me out on the sun-warmed metal and devouring me like I was his last meal. Of all the things he made me feel, made me want , that helped me relearn how I thought about sex and pleasure.

That's what I think about now, when I think about his favorite car. But I can't tell if that's what he's remembering, or if he just wishes he had it to open it up on the winding countryside roads that I can see from here.

The truth is that it would be better, safer for him if he didn't want me. He's put himself in danger twice over now for me, and it will only be made more dangerous if emotions are involved. But my emotions are already there, and what my heart wants silently wars with what my better sense tells me would be best for all of us.

Instead of the Ferrari, we slide into the icy, air-conditioned interior of one of the SUVs—Gabriel, Agnes, Aldo, Cecelia, Danny, and I all packed into one, Gabriel's security in the other. I slide into the seat nearest the window on one side, Cecelia wedges between Agnes and me as Danny gets into the back with Gabriel, and Aldo in the passenger's seat. As the car pulls away from the tarmac, I feel a flutter of nerves in my belly, but also some that feel excited. Anticipatory.

I've never been out of the country before. Next to me, Cecelia is leaning over me to look out of the window, her excitement palpable. She's forgotten about all of the fear and trauma of what happened a few days ago, and while I'm sure it will bother her again, right now, the thrill of what's happening and where she is is overriding it.

I want to feel more like that. Hopeful. Excited. Not so damaged that all I can think about is the fact that the good moments don't last, and the bad ones always come crashing back in, overwhelming everything to the point that it's hard to remember that anything good ever happened before. Not so afraid of what's going to happen to us that all I can think about is the inevitability of this ending in grief, when Igor finds out where I've gone.

I try to focus on the countryside rolling by, the beauty of it, the green grass and rolling hills and winding paths, vineyards dotting the landscape. There are old stone and tile houses, animals cropping grass in pastures fenced with uneven stone, and it takes my breath away as I lose myself in it for a little while. I've never seen anything like it outside of movies and photos, and my fingers suddenly itch for my camera, to capture all of this.

"Your camera and your lenses are packed," Gabriel says quietly behind me, as if he could hear my thoughts. As if he just knows me that well. "I thought you'd want to get pictures of this, once you were here."

"I do." The words come out breathy, full of emotion, because I'd assumed all of that was still back in New York. The fact that he thought to bring that for me, along with my clothes and favorite toiletries and my sleeping pills, at a moment when his entire family was threatened, and he was busy picking up the pieces from the danger that I brought to his door—that takes my breath away far more than any landscape.

I can't ever deserve this man, even if he was willing to be mine. The thought makes my chest ache, and not for the first time. I wonder what it could have been like if I'd met Gabriel before all of this. Before Pyotr, before my doomed wedding, before all of the fear and trauma, and now the retribution that Igor Lasilov is determined to bring down on me—on us. If Gabriel had somehow been the man that my father had decided to promise me to instead.

My life could have been so different.

But it's not , I remind myself, as the SUV turns down a winding road, one that gradually gets rougher as we make our way down it. My life is what it is, now. And nothing can change that. I just have to get through to the other side.

Without my heart breaking into even more pieces than it already has.

"There it is!" Cecelia squeals next to me, and my attention is briefly dragged away from my own anxieties and back to the landscape in front of me. The road we're on has narrowed, two tracks winding through a treeline, to the edge of a hill. A stone house, the stones a rustic mix of creams and browns with a terracotta-colored roof, stands at the top of the hill. It has a classic Italian villa shape—three stories in the back, with a two-story section on the east wing, and then a smaller, L-shaped one-story wing jutting out in the front. Trees and bushes surround it, with an overgrown garden in the front, and I can see immediately that while most of the landscaping has been well-tended, the garden has been mostly ignored.

Agnes and Cecelia will both love that, I think, as the car rolls to a stop. Beyond the hill, I can get a glimpse of everything the house overlooks—a broad vineyard that takes up a good bit of the acreage, and in the distance, pastures for livestock, and a large stone barn far in the distance, surrounded by smaller outbuildings. Some of the pastures look newer, wood-fenced, and others have that uneven stone fencing that I saw as we drove here. In the far distance, I can see the shimmering dot of what must be the lake that Gabriel mentioned.

The sun is setting over the house, the sky awash in pastels of peach and pink, and I slide out of the car, feeling the soft warmth on my skin as I stare at the house and grounds with a feeling that approaches awe.

"What do you think?" Gabriel asks, coming up behind me, and I shake my head, speechless for a moment.

"The house in New York is beautiful," I say quietly. "But this?—"

"It's something else," he agrees. "Come on. The men will bring in everyone's bags. I'll show you around the house."

If the exterior of the villa took my breath away, the inside is something else altogether. I've always loved old things—old movies, vintage photos, first-edition classics—and the inside of Gabriel's family home tugs every one of those strings and more.

It's a house clearly in need of work. Every piece of furniture is covered in dust cloths and plastic, and every inch of it not covered has a layer of dust. All the fixtures are old, the floors in need of refinishing, the baseboards and windows, and pretty much everything else in need of a good cleaning, an update, or both. The paint and wallpaper are in need of a good dose of TLC. It's a project that hasn't been touched in years, and I feel a flood of excitement with every new room that we walk into. The feeling is a breath of fresh air, pushing away the heavy cloud of dread for a moment, and replacing it with a lightness that I haven't felt in so long.

"It's beautiful," I breathe as we walk up to the third-floor rooms at the back of the house, and Gabriel eyes me, skepticism clear on his face.

"It's kind of a dump," he says flatly. "It hasn't been touched in probably eight years. It's in disrepair. A lot of things need to be fixed. They needed to be fixed eight years ago, when my parents were still alive and putting money into it. Now, it's just the things that absolutely have to be kept up that are getting financed—the things that make money. The horses, the vineyard. The house hasn't factored into it in a long time."

"It's not a dump," I say firmly, turning in a circle in the hallway. I see what Gabriel sees—faded wallpaper, scuffed floors, doors in need of replacing—but I also see what this house must have looked like before, in its prime. I can see all the history here, and it makes my palms itch with wanting to get my hands on it. "It's a project."

"I planned to have it renovated," Gabriel says, still looking at me as if he's not quite sure what to make of my enthusiasm. "That was part of the business I was going to take care of here. But now—" He trails off, looking around the hall again. "I can talk to Agnes about working on it. I'm not sure how she'll feel about it, but she does like a good project. And since you're taking care of the kids?—"

"I'll help," I say immediately, with an enthusiasm that makes Gabriel blink at me.

"What?"

"I'll help renovate. I want to help."

Gabriel purses his lips. "Do you know anything about doing work like that, Bella?"

"Does Agnes?" I shoot back. "Anyway, are you going to bring someone else in to do it, now?"

He shakes his head. "No. I don't want any strangers around here for a while." The solemnity in his voice pushes back the lightness I felt, for just a moment, and I want to claw to get it back. I feel my chest tighten, and I shove the panic down, trying to focus on this possibility of a distraction that I suddenly want very, very badly.

"The house needs to be cleaned up, at the very least, to make it comfortable to live here." I shrug, trying to look more casual about it than I feel. "And the rest sounds like fun, Gabriel. Agnes and I will figure it out. I bet Cecelia will even want to get in on it, too."

He looks at me for another long moment. "I might have hired you as a nanny, Bella, but?—"

"Girls like me don't usually scrub baseboards and dust for cobwebs?" It's my turn to smirk at him, and it feels good—like I'm more myself. Like I really am shedding some of the fear and dread that have plagued me for the past few days. "I don't know if you've figured this out yet, Gabriel, but I'm not your typical mafia princess."

His gaze meets mine, and there's that heat in it again. Like he's remembering everything we've done together that a typical mafia princess also might not do. "I know that," he says quietly.

For a moment, I think he might close the distance between us. I wait for him to reach for me, touch me, kiss me again. I want to take back everything I ever said about this ending with just one night between us.

And at the same time, I know it's the best rule I ever laid down. Because Gabriel's boundary was no feelings , and I already know that if I were to spend too many nights with him, I'd fall hard.

Harder than I might already be falling.

He turns away from me, quickly, as if he's thinking the same thing. He opens the door next to us, swinging it wide. "This is your room," he says, his voice a little raspy in a way that sends a shiver down my spine. "Unless you want a different one. But this is the only room besides the master and the sitting room on this floor, and I thought you might want to be on a different floor from Agnes and Aldo, and the kids. Just to have a little more space of your own."

A dozen different thoughts about that flick through my head—including that he's doing this in case I have nightmares, to give me more of a chance at privacy…and that this means I'm on the same floor as him. Sleeping a few feet and a doorway away. Just him and I up here, with no one to accidentally run into in the middle of the night if?—

"Bella?" Gabriel looks at me with a hint of worry in his face, and I push the thought away. It seems like he's not thinking about that, and I shouldn't be, either.

I walk past him, into the bedroom. It's shabbily beautiful, in a state of disrepair and possibility, like everything else in this house, but not unlivable. There's a dusty hardwood floor with a faded rug stretched over the center of it, big windows covered with curtains that look out to two sides of the estate, and what looks like antique furniture under the cloths and plastic covering each piece.

"There's no household staff working here any longer," Gabriel says apologetically. "I can get Agnes to?—"

I shake my head quickly. "I can handle it, Gabriel. There's no need for Agnes to come all the way up here. I'll get it cleaned up—" I pause. "Is there anything to clean up with?"

"I had some things delivered to the hotel back in New York, to bring with us before we got on the flight here. Not much, but enough to get the place livable before anyone really digs into it. There's a small town about a forty-five-minute drive from here where we can restock. Also, where we can get groceries, clothes…pretty much anything else you need, within reason. Only a couple of shops for each thing, though," he adds with a chuckle. "It's not New York."

There's a tinge of worry in his voice, as if he's concerned that I'm going to be unhappy here. As if I could be unhappy about this, when I'm here at all because Gabriel cared enough to steal me right out from under the nose of one of the most powerful Bratva bosses in New York. On the east coast of the United States, probably.

There's a lot that I'm afraid of. A lot that makes me feel like I'm fighting panic and tears at any given moment, struggling to remain strong in the face of all of this. But being in this house, with Gabriel, is far from anything that could make me unhappy.

"It'll be fine," I reassure him. "Now, let me get to work, before we both start sneezing."

The only unhappiness I feel is the tiny sliver of disappointment that wormed its way into me when I realized that Gabriel was putting me in a room of my own, and not in his. I manage to keep any sign of it off of my face, but it digs in a little deeper when he just nods and leaves, closing the door behind him. On the surface, I know he's being a gentleman, giving me space, letting me acclimate to what is another adjustment on top of days filled with chaos, fear, and shock, compounding my already too-close trauma from my disastrous wedding that's less than six months behind me.

There are three ways to interpret all of this—how quick he was to stop touching me last night, how careful he's been with me since, the distance he's left between us, him setting me up in my own room in this house. One is that he's keeping to the letter of the agreement we made when we changed our relationship to each other, ever so briefly, from business to pleasure and back again. Another is that he's just being careful not to assume what I want—waiting for me to come to him, to tell him that I want him to touch me, that I want to share a bed with him, that I want to complicate our already messy relationship even more.

The third possibility, though, is the reason why I can't ask him for any of that. Why I can't talk to him about all of the tangled feelings rattling around in my chest. The third possibility is that the one night was enough for him. Even if it wasn't, everything that's happened since has just underlined his decision from the start that feelings aren't possible between us. That, aside from his minor lapse last night—which could have been the product of adrenaline and not real desire for me —he just simply doesn't want me like that any longer.

That he doesn't feel anything close to what I've started to feel for him.

And beyond that, there's the ever-present fact that the closer we get to each other, the more dangerous it is for everyone. That if Gabriel were to feel more for me, he might make decisions even more foolish than what he's already done. And the more I feel for him, the more likely it is that my heart will break into even smaller pieces, by the time all of this is over.

By the time dinnertime has rolled around, I've managed to get my room clean enough to comfortably sleep in. All the dust covers are taken off and stowed away, the floor swept and mopped, and the furniture dusted. Fresh bedding will have to wait—there's going to be mountains of laundry to do, but the dust cloth kept the worst of it off of the bed itself. It's made up with a dark blue embroidered duvet, and tasseled throw pillows stacked against the softer pillows behind them, and I have a sudden urge to simply crawl into the bed and go to sleep now.

Instead, I find my way downstairs to see if Agnes needs any help with dinner.

"There's enough groceries for a few days," she tells me as I come into the kitchen, catching my glance around. Cecelia is on a stepstool at the granite counter, chopping vegetables, and Danny is sitting at the long wooden table with a comic book. It could be a scene straight out of the home we just fled from, and I feel myself relax just a little, seeing it. A small bit of normalcy, clicking back into place. "Gabriel had the estate manager go and pick up some things, and have them ready for us. We'll have to take a trip into town before too long, though."

"That sounds nice," I murmur, a little absently as I look around. The kitchen is a far cry from the ultra-modern, updated kitchen in Gabriel's New York home. Agnes clearly scrubbed this room while I was working on cleaning my bedroom, but the stove and refrigerator are charmingly out of date, the floor is in the same shape as the rest of the floors in the house, and the furnishings have seen better days. The countertops could use replacing, too. "I wonder how much money Gabriel is willing to put into renovating the place," I murmur, looking around, and Agnes chuckles.

"He said something about you getting it into your head to take this on as a project. He said he was just going to ask me if I'd be willing to clean it up, but you're picturing a lot more than that." She raises an eyebrow, and I laugh without meaning to. It sounds odd as it rings in my ears, after so many days of thinking I might never have a reason to laugh again, but it feels good.

"Well, Gabriel said he wanted to renovate. And I could use a distraction." I bite my lip, looking around again. "I don't know. I think it could be fun."

"I agree, actually," Agnes says, surprising me.

"Really?" I look at her, startled, and it's her turn to laugh.

"We could all use a little distraction," she says, picking up a rolled-out pie crust and putting it into a fluted ceramic pie plate. "And I worked for Gabriel's parents, before him. I remember this place in its prime. I wouldn't mind getting it back to that."

I felt a small flutter of excitement in my stomach, and I gave Agnes a smile, one filled with camaraderie. "We'll start tomorrow, then."

—

I wake up in the morning feeling hopeful for the first time since Igor and his men barged into Gabriel's house. The night before—our first night in the villa—went well. I helped Agnes finish the steak and mushroom pie she'd been making, and then we'd all crowded around the table and dug into it, and the salad that Cecelia had helped make. Gabriel had found an excellent bottle of red wine in the cellar, and once Cecelia and Danny had fallen exhaustedly into bed, the four adults had finished it off in the kitchen, since the living room was still covered in dust cloths.

The hardest thing is not letting my mind run away with itself. It's all too easy to imagine what it would be like if Gabriel and I were moving into this new house together, if all of this were ours and not his, if we're something more than what we really are to each other. On paper, I'm an employee just like Agnes and Aldo, but he's treated me differently than even the familiar way he treats them since day one. I've never really been just an employee. And now, more than ever, it feels like I'm a part of this family.

Just not in the role that, deep down, I'm starting to wish I could occupy.

I can smell breakfast cooking as soon as I get up. I'm beginning to understand why Gabriel's house in New York has the cozy, warm feeling that's so rare in a billionaire's mansion—this villa has that same rustic warmth, and I wouldn't be surprised if his parents modeled their home in New York that he grew up in after it. I throw on a pair of worn jeans and a short-sleeved t-shirt, tossing my hair up into a messy bun, and head downstairs with only a fleeting glance towards Gabriel's bedroom door.

It was hard to sleep last night, even with the pills, knowing how close he was. I wanted more than anything to go and knock on his door, ask if I could stay, and slip into bed with him. I had a feeling he'd say yes, if only because he'd be worried about me. But I don't want him to let me sleep next to him out of pity. I want him to do it because he wants it, too. I want him to be the one to ask me.

I made the first move, when I asked for our prior arrangement. When I told him that I trusted him to be the one to help me learn to be okay with being touched again. When I told him that I trusted him to be all of my firsts—that that was what I wanted . If anything is ever going to happen between us again, I want him to be the one who asks this time.

But I know he won't.

I walk downstairs, into the kitchen where Agnes is serving breakfast. Gabriel is sipping a cup of coffee, looking devastatingly handsome and far too awake, his dark hair combed back, wearing jeans and a button-down. Cecelia and Danny have already dug into their food, which appears to be waffles, a mountain of scrambled eggs, and ham. There's syrup, a dish of what looks like honey mustard for the ham, and carafes of orange juice and water next to a pot of coffee and a ceramic crock of creamer.

Home . It's what I think of, the moment I step into the kitchen, and the thought makes my chest ache. In a relatively brief amount of time, Gabriel's house in New York became home to me. I hadn't expected it, but it did. And now, this brings that feeling rushing back, all over again.

It makes me want to roll up my metaphorical sleeves and put some elbow grease into fixing the villa up even more than I already did.

I sink down into one of the chairs, automatically putting food onto my plate, even though I don't know how much I'm going to be able to eat. I've eaten like a rabbit for months, ever since my almost-marriage to Pyotr. Picking up running again and the workouts that I did with Gabriel in his basement gym made me eat a little more, increased my appetite, but after what happened with Igor, I'm finding it hard to eat again. Every time I take a bite, I feel my stomach twist into knots, that feeling of dread never far behind any of the good feelings that flicker in and out.

I can feel my cheeks heat, just a little, thinking about those workouts with Gabriel. About what else we did down in his basement. I can also feel him looking at me, and I don't dare look up, because I feel sure that he'll see what I'm thinking in my face if I do.

"What are you going to do today?" Gabriel asks, glancing between Agnes and me. I stare at my plate, trying to push the thoughts of being alone with him away, and focus on the distraction of the project ahead of us instead.

Anything other than wondering what Igor is doing right now, if he's already found out where I've gone, or if he's setting plans in motion already to come and take me back.

We talked a little about the house, last night in the kitchen over wine. Agnes told Gabriel that she and I were both going to work on the renovations, and Gabriel repeated his insistence that we didn't have to commit to doing that. But I was pretty sure I saw what looked like at least a little bit of relief on his face.

"We'll do a walkthrough first," Agnes said. "See what needs to be tackled the most, and go from there."

"We should probably focus on the spaces that we use the most," I add, finally looking up from my plate. Gabriel's expression is neutral—I can't read anything of what he's thinking on his face. He's been immeasurably calm about all of this, and I wonder if he really doesn't fear what might happen, or if he's just hiding it for my sake. "Living room, bedrooms, etcetera. And then we'll tackle the other areas that don't get as much traffic."

"Sure." Gabriel nods. "Get whatever you need. I trust you both to do whatever's best."

I glance over at Agnes. "I'll put off my usual run until this evening. We can get started on the house after we clean up from breakfast?"

She gives me an agreeable smile, and I feel a small flush of warmth, a feeling of belonging that I never had with my own family. I didn't know my mother, and my father has always been the furthest thing from ‘warm' that anyone could possibly imagine. The closer I get to Agnes, the more glad I am to have someone like her in my life.

After breakfast, Gabriel leaves to explore the estate and touch base with his employees here. Agnes and I clean up the remains of breakfast—with help from the children—and then start the process of taking inventory of what needs to be done to renovate the villa.

While we do it, Danny is kept occupied by letting him run his cars up and down the wood-floored hallways—they all need to be refinished anyway, so Agnes and I agree that he can't possibly do that much damage. I pull up a website with paint colors and another with wallpaper samples for Cecelia to look at, telling her to make notes of what she likes as we make our way through the house. With both of the children adequately occupied, Agnes and I start to discuss what we think ought to be done with the house.

With every room, I fall a little more in love, as we talk about colors and tiles and furniture, and how to keep the vintage, rustic Italian heart of the house while still updating it to feel modern and habitable. But I also can't stop the flickers of imagination that spring into my mind with every room—visions of a life here with Gabriel. Of what it could be like if he and I were something more. If things were different, if they were safe, if he felt capable of falling in love again. If I wasn't flooded with guilt every time I think of what a relationship with me has already cost him, and what it could still cost him in the future.

Before Igor turned my life upside down for a second time, I thought I was fine with the arrangement that Gabriel and I had come to. My plan was for him to be the first, but not the only man I'd ever be with—someone trustworthy but emotionally unavailable to help me get comfortable with intimacy again before I tried to find Mr. Right. But that was before. Before I realized, in the wake of Igor's upheaval, that Gabriel is who I want when everything is falling apart.

My psychologist might call it trauma bonding. She might say that the emotions of losing my virginity, mingled with all my worst fears coming back to call, have made me get attached to Gabriel in a way that doesn't have anything to do with love.

But I think I would have fallen for him regardless. I think it was already starting, before he ever touched me. And I think that I'm going to have a very, very hard time finding a man who can meet the bar that Gabriel has set for other men.

If I ever have a chance to try for that at all.

Maybe that's for the best, I tell myself as Agnes and I look at the cracked vintage bathroom tiles in one of the guest bathrooms and try to decide if it's salvageable. I'm in Italy for the time being, and I'm in no hurry to let someone else into my life. I don't even know if I can believe that I have a chance for the kind of future I'd begun to allow myself to hope for. Thinking about whether or not I'll ever find someone who meets the high standards Gabriel has set feels like putting the cart too far before the horse, at this point.

Right now, all I can hope for is that we'll all survive this. That I won't cost Gabriel even more.

Those thoughts spiral, the worry growing more insistent, and I start to feel fidgety and anxious as the day passes. When Agnes announces that it's time for her to go and make dinner, I go upstairs, change into my running clothes, and go for a run, needing to work out some of the excess emotion. I don't venture far, finding a dirt path that heads down towards the vineyards and loops back to the house. I don't want to explore too much until I know more about who else is here. But just being so far from New York has made me feel freer, safer, than I've felt there in months. I wore a short-sleeved top and leggings to run in, and the warm Italian sun on my arms makes me smile, drawing in a deep breath of the fresh countryside air.

A part of me already wants to stay. If it wasn't for Clara?—

Clara . I realize with a jolt that I need to call her. The last few days have been full of so much chaos and trauma that it didn't even occur to me to think that she's probably panicking, wondering why I haven't called her. This is the longest stretch of time I think we've ever gone without talking. It's possible that Gabriel thought to clue her in—but I don't want to assume that, especially with so many other things having been on his mind. And even if he did, she's bound to be worried by now, since I haven't called.

I head straight up to my room as soon as I get back to the villa, still sweaty from my run as I dig through my bag to see if Gabriel packed my cell phone. I find it in one of the side pockets, and quickly plug it in while I shower, since it's stone-dead.

The shower feels incredible. I scrub myself down until I'm pink and the entire bathroom smells like warm peaches, and I wash my hair twice after both walking through the house all day and going for a run. I throw on a pair of sweatpants and a loose t-shirt, and grab my phone. It's only one in the afternoon back in New York, so Clara is at work, but her boss is pretty lenient, and I have a feeling she'll find a minute to step away.

She answers on the first ring.

"Oh my god, Bella! What's going on? I've called and texted—I don't even know how many times. I thought something happened to you."

"I know. I just got my phone on and saw all the missed calls and texts. Something did happen." I sink down onto the edge of the bed, running a hand over the newly laundered comforter as I give Clara the shortened version of what's happened over the past few days. I don't want to tell her all of it—the horrible things that Igor threatened that I still can't bring myself to say aloud or the absolute depth of my fear of what will come next, but it's a relief to be able to tell her any of it at all. Ever since I told her the truth about Pyotr, my wedding, and the reasons for all of my neuroses since then, I've felt like a weight has lifted off of my shoulders.

"Bella. That's terrifying," Clara whispers. I hear the sound of her getting up, her footsteps on the tile, and then the click of a door behind her. "I went to one of the quiet rooms. Are you safe now? Where are you?"

"I'm in Italy. Gabriel's family has a villa here, and he flew us out to it. I don't know if I'm entirely safe, but it's safer than New York, at least." I hesitate, not wanting to tell her how dangerous it really is, but not wanting to lie, either. "For now," I add. "But Gabriel promised that he's going to make sure we're safe." My heart trips in my chest, although I manage to keep my voice calm. I'm not sure that I believe that Gabriel can. Not because of him, but because of how terrifying Igor is. I don't know if anyone would be safe from him.

Clara whistles, laughing softly. "Well, if you had to be on the run and hiding out, at least you're doing it in a billionaire's villa."

"It needs a lot of work." I laugh, too, unexpectedly, and it feels good. A wave of homesickness follows it—not for New York, but for my best friend. I have the urge to ask her if she could fly out here, but I bite it back. The possibility of someone following her out here or tracking her to get to me is slim, but it's still a possibility. And if she were here and Igor found me—I can't even let myself begin to think about it.

"But it's a good project. Something to keep my mind busy." I force my mind back to the house, to topics that don't involve the possibility of Igor harming the people I love.

"So you're renovating a billionaire's villa. First the nanny, now on to construction. You're really wearing a lot of hats these days, Bella." Clara's voice is light and teasing, and I feel myself relax a little more.

"I'm sorry it took so long for me to call?—"

"Don't be," she says immediately. "With what you had going on, you have nothing to be sorry for at all. I'm just glad to know you're safe."

"I'll be able to keep in touch now," I promise her. "The time difference might make it a little difficult, but I'll do my best. I'll text you, at the very least. Things will be a little more normal, now that we're settling in." I try to sound as confident as I can, to convince myself as much as her.

"Just do whatever you need to in order to feel okay," Clara says firmly. "Don't worry about me. Just text me whenever you have time." She hesitated. "I've got to get back to work. Have fun in Italy, Bel."

"I'll try." I laugh softly. "Talk to you later."

Just that short conversation has me feeling better. The familiar sound of Clara's voice is another little piece of home clicking back into place, and I feel the fear recede a little more, a little bit of hope flickering to the surface that maybe everything will be okay.

Gabriel promised me that he would make sure we were safe. And as afraid as I am to trust in the possibility that it could be true, I also want to cling to that flickering bit of hope.

I'm so tired of being afraid. So tired of feeling as if I'm on the verge of falling apart. For a brief span of time, back in New York, everything was better.

I know how much it will hurt, to lose that again. But I also want to feel it, at least for a little while longer.

Maybe especially if I'm going to lose it again.