Page 194 of Salvatore

“This.” He gestures wildly between us. “Pretend the world isn’t out to get you. Sit on my fucking hands when I should be out there taking the lives of those who want to hurt you.”

“Salvato—”

“I’ve never been so fucking scared in my life,” he sneers. “It’s unacceptable.” He shoves a hand through his hair.

“Salvatore—”

“I won’t live like this. I fucking refuse.” He gets in my face, all wild and unruly, his volatility so deliciously chaotic I want to curl up in it and make it my home. “Marry me.”

I falter. Blink. Wait for the punchline.

Wait foranyline.

But when no forthcoming clarification of his insanity is offered I lean into a half-hearted laugh, trying to appreciate his attempt to lighten the mood. Only the starkness staring back at me doesn’t lessen.

“Marry me, Ivy.”

My lungs fill with lead, the heavy weight seeming to drag my internal organs to the soles of my feet.

His eyes narrow to menacing slits. “That man dared to threaten you?—”

I shake my head. “He didn’t threaten?—”

He wraps a hand around the back of my neck. Claiming. Comforting. “He approached you. Heintimidatedyou. Whatever his plan, it wasn’t innocent. Nobody would even dare to talk to you, let alone touch you, if they knew you were my wife.”

My heart gallops wildly beneath my ribs. “Salvato?—”

“Don’t placate me,” he warns. “Don’t lessen this. Don’t pretend it wouldn’t have destroyed my world just as much as yours if he’d killed you.”

I swallow, caught up in his vulnerability and not entirely sure how to deal with it. “You’re unsettled. You’re probably in shock. Once the adrenaline wears off you’re going to laugh about the craziness of proposing. And I’m not going to let you live it down.”

His nostrils flare, his jaw ticking as his hand falls from my neck, the retreat of contact feeling more than physical.

The air between us thickens, charged with everything unsaid, everything he’s holding back.

“Fine,” he growls, sliding a hand around my waist and leading me toward the house. “We’ll discuss this later. For now,you need to get inside. I want you to lock yourself in your room and get the gun I gave you the night you arrived.”

“Why? What are you going to do?” I plant my feet and wait for him to follow suit. “Are you going to continue hurting the guard?”

He stops and meets my gaze without answer.

“Salvatore?”

“There’s only so many times I can make you an accessory,” he snarls.

I shake my head. “You don’t need to do this.”

“It’s both neededandwanted,mi bella reina. And if what you desire is full transparency, then know this—I will torture him. Not only for answers, but for pleasure. I will repay the torment of that split second when I glanced out the window and found him in your face with his hand on his weapon. I will teach him what it feels like to have his soul ripped from his body, because that’s exactly how it felt thinking you would be taken from me. Then I’ll grant him the mercy of death—because I want to be able to sleep tonight knowing there’s one less person out to get you.”

His words hit me with the energy of a storm, wild and chaotic, but there’s also an unruly, empowering undertone. One that comes from having someone fightingforme instead of against.

He gets in my face, eyes hostile, features carved in fury. “That guard will become the cautionary tale people whisper about for years, Ivy. He’ll be the proof of what happens to anyone who dares to lay a hand on the woman who carries my child.”

41

IVY

My wife.

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