05: Anything For Him.

Barbara.

**

"Dante, wait, please!" I yelled, and my voice broke in the middle of his name.

He was already walking away, and I ran after him without thinking.

I did not know how I got down those stairs, or whether my foot twisted on the way, or whether it hurt, because none of that mattered.

The only man I loved was about to believe that I had been playing with his own half-brother, and I could not let him drive away with that picture in his head.

I was so stupid.

How could I be so careless?

He had already been hurt that day because of me, and here I was giving him a new reason to be angry.

His feelings were fair.

I always found a way to make him feel bad when he was the one person who never did that to me.

I got outside just as he opened his car door, and I grabbed the edge of it before he could climb in.

He let out a long, tired breath and looked at me.

"Barbara, not today..." he said. "I need to leave."

I took his hand with both of mine and held on tight. "I am so sorry, Dante, I promise it is not what you think."

He turned, stepped close and took hold of my jaw, tightly enough that I felt his fingers press into my skin.

He lifted my face until our eyes were only inches apart, and I could feel his breath on my lips. "Then tell me what that was." he said quietly.

I opened my mouth, but I closed it again, because the truth was that I had been smoking with Graham on my bed, and I could not tell Dante that.

He hated women who smoked, and that would be worse than anything he thought he had seen.

My mind started to race, searching for something he would believe, and then I realized that lying would only dig me deeper.

Graham was out there, and I did not know what he would say if Dante pushed him.

What if he tells the truth just to watch me burn?

I did not want the two brothers sitting me down for a trial, so I decided to say less and apologize more.

I lowered my head. "I am sorry, Dante, I was down and broken, and he offered to listen to me, but nothing happened. You know I have never cheated on you since we started this relationship, and I would not start on our wedding night."

He laughed, and it was not a happy laugh. "Oh, so it is our wedding night now. I thought you had moved in with your new husband and both of you were about to have a lovely honeymoon."

I rubbed my face with my hand, because he was right to think about it in such a way.

Anyone would have thought the same, and I had been foolish to listen to Julian's perspective instead of going home alone.

"No, that is not what happened..." I said. "I never wanted him in my house, I only..."

He raised his hand to cut me off. "Keep your explanations, Barbara. I am going where I am needed, since I am clearly not needed here."

Panic shot through me, and I grabbed the front of his shirt. "No, Dante, please do not go. I am sorry, please do not do this to me, you know my heart is already broken today. I can fix this, just tell me what you want me to do, I will do anything."

He stopped.

He turned back slowly and took both my hands in his, and when he spoke again his voice had dropped so low that only I could hear it. "You know I love you, Barbara. Everything I try to be in this life is for you. I am trying to be a better man because I never want to see you cry, and now look at you. You know I hate your tears, so wipe them."

I nodded and wiped my cheeks with the back of my hand, and relief poured through me so fast that my knees shook.

That was why I loved him.

Even when he was angry, he was the one person in the world who could turn around and calm me down in the middle of my worst moment.

He pulled me against his chest. "I was already trying to make things right with you tonight," he said. "I wanted to take you out, and then go to that karaoke place you love, and sing until our throats hurt, and let all those little people know we are really married, in our own way. And then I came and saw you with my own half-brother in your room, and it broke my heart."

I shook my head against his shirt, because there was no way I would ever let Graham touch me. "Dante, nothing happened, I swear....Nothing happened. I am still yours, and yours alone. I am so sorry."

He looked at me for a long moment, and then, to my surprise, he smiled.

He reached into his pocket, pulled out a cigarette and lit it.

I stared at him, and then the smoke reached me and I coughed and frowned.

"You smoke?" I asked.

"Not until I found out you are into men who do." he said.

"I am into men who smoke?" I asked in confusion.

He lifted his head, and I followed his eyes across the yard to where Graham was getting into his car, ready to drive off.

I rolled my eyes and hit Dante lightly on the chest. "Dante, stop it, I do not like this."

He did not laugh.

He stepped closer, until I felt the heat of his body, and the cigarette smoke curled between us. "You said you would do anything for me, right?"

I swallowed hard, and my eyes moved over his face on their own.

I looked at his eyes, at the line of his jaw, at the way one corner of his mouth lifted, and my stomach tightened the way it always did.

I did not know what I was doing, but he was my fiancé, so what I felt was normal, even right.

I snapped back to reality and nodded, because I could not trust my voice.

He lifted his hand and ran his fingers slowly along my neck, down to my collarbone, and my skin woke up under his touch.

He leaned in until his lips almost brushed my ear, and he whispered, "Then you know what to do."

My heart pounded against my ribs, because I knew exactly what he meant, and I could not look away from him.

Somewhere deep inside me a small voice kept whispering about the marks on his neck, about the woman in that house and about the name Lydia White, but his hand was warm on my skin and his voice was in my ear, and the whisper grew quieter.

I only knew that I had agreed to do anything, and that the night ahead would force me to ask myself a question I did not want to answer, whether what I felt for this man was love or only the need to be chosen by him.