Page 56 of Wicked Sinner
As I leave the meeting, my mind is racing. The possible threat of Matvey Slakov adds a new urgency to everything, but it doesn't change my fundamental situation. I still need Bridget to agree to marry me, still need to find a way to make her see that we belong together.
But I'm running out of time, and I'm running out of options. I realize that all my tactics have failed for the same reason. I've been trying to force her to want what I want, to be who I need her to be.
But Bridget can't be forced. She can only be won.
And I have a feeling I’ve been playing a losing game since the moment I asked her to be my mistress instead of simply being mine.
I drive all the way home, a dozen different thoughts turning themselves over and over in my head. By the time I reach my parking garage, I know it’s not just that I’m playing a losing game—I’ve lost.
Maybe there was a moment when things could have worked for Bridget and me. Maybe if I hadn’t needed to find a wife so quickly, if I’d had time to find out about the pregnancy organically, if I’d come back to her garage just to see her again—maybe it all could have been different.
But that’s not the way it happened. And now, I’m finally seeing that this was never going to work.
Bridget isn’t going to give in, regardless of whether she wants me or not. She’s not going to say yes. She’s not going to marry me. And I can’t force her to be complicit in any part of this, not unless I’m going to keep her captive forever and eventually take her child from her.
I’ve done plenty of brutal things in my lifetime. I can be a cruel man, if I need to be. But that’s a level of cruelty that I’m not able to face—that I can’t bring myself to be a part of, much less spearhead it.
I want her more than I’ve ever wanted a woman in my entire life, but I’ve never been the kind of man who forces a woman. I can’t believe that I’ve temporarily lost my mind enough to be the kind of man who keeps a woman prisoner.
I know what I have to do. It’s not what I want. But it’s the only thing that’s right.
I have to put an end to this. And I have to let Bridget go.
15
BRIDGET
I'm staring at Caesar like he's grown a second head.
"What did you just say?" My voice comes out hoarse, disbelieving. I've been fighting him for weeks now, refusing every demand, every threat, every attempt at seduction. I've made it crystal clear that I will never willingly marry him, never willingly stay in this gilded prison he's created for me. And now he's just… agreeing to let me go?
Caesar runs a hand through his dark hair, and for the first time since I've known him, he looks tired. Not just physically tired, but soul-deep exhausted, like something inside him has finally broken. "I said I'm letting you go, Bridget. You can leave. I’ll have Marco and Bryce escort you back home to make sure you get there safely. We can arrange a settlement amount for you and the baby. And I’ll make sure that no one hurts you. I’d like to leave security with you, at least for a while, but…" He trails off. “That’s up to you. I’m going to keep eyes on you, though. That’s nonnegotiable. And if you were willing to leave Miami, that would be best. I know you don’t want to.”
His voice is flat, all of it delivered like he’s rehearsed it already. Like he doesn’t want to say any of it. I stare at him,wondering if this is somehow a trick. Some new manipulation, some game I don't understand yet. Caesar Genovese has given me no indication that he’s the kind of man to just give up on things he wants, and he's made it abundantly clear that he wants me and this baby badly.
"Why?" The question slips out before I can stop it, and I hate how small my voice sounds. I hate that I'm even asking, that some part of me needs to understand what's changed.
Another part of me, one that I don’t want to examine too closely, hates how broken he sounds. How defeated. That whatever there was—is—between us brought us to this.
He looks at me for a long moment, his blue eyes dark with something I can't quite read. Pain, maybe. Regret. "Because I can't keep doing this to you," he says finally. "I can't keep you here against your will forever, Bridget.”
"Since when?" The words come out sharper than I intended, all the anger and frustration of the past weeks bleeding through. "Since when do you care about what I want? You kidnapped me, Caesar. You locked me in a room and told me I was going to marry you whether I liked it or not. You've spent weeks trying to force me into submission, and now you're just… what? Having a change of heart?"
Something flickers across his face, something that looks almost like shame. "I never wanted to hurt you," he says quietly. "I know you don't believe that, but it's true. I wanted you to see that we could have something good together, that I could give you and our child everything you could ever need."
"By keeping me prisoner?" I laugh, but there's no humor in it. "By threatening me and manipulating me and trying to break me down until I had no choice but to give in?"
"Yes." The simple admission catches me off guard. I was expecting him to argue, to justify his actions somehow. Instead, he just looks at me with those tired eyes and nods. "Yes, that'sexactly what I was doing. And I can't do it anymore. I was wrong, alright? I thought you would come around, eventually. That you just needed to see things differently, that you just needed time. But I was wrong. I’m sorry."
I stare at him, searching his face for any sign that this is another game, another manipulation. But all I see is exhaustion and something that might be genuine remorse. It doesn't make up for what he's done to me, not even close, but it's more honesty than I've gotten from him since this whole nightmare started.
"I don't understand," I say finally. "What changed? Yesterday, you were telling me that I belonged to you, that you'd never let me go. Today you're just… done?”
Caesar moves closer, and I tense automatically, but he stops a few feet away, his hands hanging loose at his sides. "Yesterday I was still telling myself it could work," he says, and his voice is so quiet I have to strain to hear it. "I thought if I just kept trying, kept pushing, eventually you'd see that I wasn't the monster you think I am. That you'd realize we could be happy together."
"And now?"
"Now I realize that the only way I can make you stay is by being exactly the monster you think I am." He looks down at his hands, and I can see the tension in his shoulders, the way he's holding himself like he's fighting not to reach for me. "I could keep you here forever, Bridget. I could keep the three of us here together, or I could take the child away eventually and raise them at my father’s old mansion. I could tell them whatever story I made up about what happened. I could keep you here and never let you go, or I could make you disappear.”
