Taking my backpack off my shoulder, I drop it on the bed beside me and unzip the main compartment. More than a dozen velvet boxes of various sizes are inside. Tears gather in the corners of my eyes as I pull out the packages, one by one. No wonder the damn backpack was so heavy. Rafael sent me home with several pounds of jewelry. And . . . My hand wraps around a smooth bell-shaped object at the bottom of the bag. A single fig.
I carefully pull it out, but it’s beyond saving. Almost fully squashed by all those jewelry boxes he piled on top. My old phone is also beneath the loot, fully charged. I unlock the screen and find Rafael’s name in the contacts list. My finger shakes a little as it hovers above the call button. I swipe to the right and press the phone to my ear.
“Vespetta,” his husky voice answers immediately. “Is everything alright?”
“Yes. We landed a couple of hours ago.”
“I know. Guido told me.”
I take a deep breath and lean the back of my head on the wall behind me. “Why weren’t you on the plane with me?”
“I never said I would be. You made that assumption on your own,” he says. “Do you like the ring?”
My eyes dart to the simple, thick band. Quite a change in aesthetic from his prior presents. “A parting gift?”
“Well, that depends on you.” A small pause follows. “It’s one of mine,” he continues after a breath. “If you don’t like it, I’ll take it back and buy you something prettier. If you decide to return.”
“Just like that? You dumped me on the plane, while I was unconscious! You sent me home without even a goodbye. What if I just decide to stay here? What then? Why did you do it?”
Nothing but silence on the other end of the line.
“Why, Rafael?”
“Because, if I’d have waited for you to wake up, if I held you in my arms even a second longer, I never would have let you leave, Vasilisa! I would have found a way to keep you with me. I would have lied and spewed empty threats against your family! It’s the only thing that ever swayed you.”
“Did it never occur to you that I may have wanted to stay with you? That you didn’t need the fucking threats?” I bury my face in my hand. “Jesus, Rafael.”
“Don’t you ‘Jesus, Rafael’ me, Vasilisa. I’m not delusional. Why the fuck would you want to be with someone like me? I hoped that buying you pretty things would somehow help diminish the ugliness you were exposed to while being at my side. To somehow lessen the hideosity of waking up to a fucking beast in your bed every morning. It was the only way I could outmatch all the other perfect men who would take you from me. So yes, you’re right. I pressured you to stay because I was afraid that given a choice, you would never choose me.”
A loud crash, something big and heavy, sounds through my phone’s speaker.
“So I did it. Kept you caged. You—the most precious thing in my world. And it didn’t matter a lick that it was all because I’m in love with you. I’ve hurt you, manipulated everything to make you stay. I’ll have to live with that. Will have to keep pushing the air through my lungs while the truth punches me in the gut every day. Because I do love you, whether you believe me or not, and I realized that I would rather let you go than force you to stay with me when it’s not what you want.”
More crashing sounds come through the line, as if he’s demolishing everything in his vicinity.
“You said you want the freedom to make your decision, vespetta. I simply granted that to you. So choose,” he growls. “My plane is still at the same airfield where it landed. Waiting for you. You have until seven tomorrow night to make your decision. If you’re not on board by then, it will depart without you. And I’ll take that as your answer.”
He cuts the call.
My vision blurs with unshed tears. I throw the phone on the bed and rush into the bathroom so I don’t wake Yulia. Sitting on the closed toilet lid, I press my hand over my mouth to keep the whimpers from escaping. God! I thought all that damn jewelry he’s been showering me with was nothing more than his way of flashing his wealth. A tactic to show off how much “better” he is than everyone else. It never occurred to me that he actually viewed himself as somehow lacking. As if he wasn’t good enough. How could I have been so blind and didn’t realize that?
I swallow the bile that’s threatening to choke me, and give in to the ugly tears. They burn like acid down my cheeks while my heart feels like it’s being squeezed inside my chest.
He loves me.
He wants me.
Why did I not see his pain?
I never saw him as anything other than drop-dead gorgeous. That’s my only justification for being so oblivious to his insecurities. And he hung up on me before I got the chance to tell him that. To tell him that I’m in love with him, too.
And that I am coming back.
“Vasya?” My mom’s voice drifts in from inside my bedroom. “Where are you? I thought you—” Her words get cut off as soon as she opens the bathroom door. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I wipe my nose on my sleeve, then smile. “I’m returning to Sicily.”
My mother goes eerily still. “What?”
“I’m in love with him, Mom. I’m in love with Rafael.”
Mom rushes to me and crouches by the toilet, wrapping her arms around me. “Hush. You’re just confused, baby. It’ll pass.”
“I’m not confused, Mom. This is the first time in months I’m thinking clearly.” I squeeze her arm. “I’m going back to him.”
She rears back and grabs my shoulders. “What? No. I won’t allow it.”
“I don’t need your permission, Mom.” I wipe the tears off my cheeks, then meet my mother’s frantic gaze. “You of all people should understand that when your heart chooses someone, there’s no coming back from that.”
“You can’t fall in love with someone in two months, Vasilisa!”
“Oh? How long did it take you to fall in love with Dad?”
“That was different.”
“Yeah. He blackmailed you into marrying him! Twice, I might add.” I snort. “He says you fell for him within a day.”
“Absolutely not! It took me at least a month.”
