Page 40 of Seduced by Her Fake Husband
His chest rose and then his black eyes locked onto hers.
“Do you love me?”
“More than life itself.” If Gennaro hadn’t already known it, the panic that had gripped him when he’d forced Leonardo to chase after the car driving Luisa out of his life would have sealed it. It had been a terror like nothing else on this earth.
She studied him intently for the longest time. “Gen… The man I fell in love with is the man who out of nothing but kindness bought a shy little girl the best gift she could ever have received. He’s the man so determined to be nothing like his tyrant father that he’s denied himself the best things life has to offer out of fear of hurting others. He’s the man who is so intensely protective of his brother that he’s given up a week of his life to be amongst a crowd of people he detests for his brother’s sake. That’s the man I love. That’s the husband I want. Just you, exactly as you are.” She swallowed. “It’s not going to be easy. It’s going to take time but we can build something special, but for that to happen you’ve got to have faith.”
“I have faith in you,” he said simply.
She continued studying him, gazing into his eyes, peering into his heart, peering into his soul. He didn’t take a single breath until her hands slid around the back of his head and cradled him closer to her. “And I have faith in you, and if we have faith and love in each other then that’s all we need.”
“I do love you,” he whispered. “More than anything.”
“And I love you. My heart’s been yours since I was a little girl.”
“I will keep it safe,” he promised solemnly. “And protect it always.”
Slowly, the soft smile on the face he found more beautiful every time he looked at it broke into a wide beam and suddenly she was laughing with a joy that was so infectious that the last of the weight in his heart lifted and Gennaro laughed too, and then they were kissing with the same joy, kissing until neither of them had any air left, oblivious to all the drivers beeping their approval as they sped past them.
Epilogue
When Luisa had first arrived at the BolognaFiere Exhibition Centre, she’d soaked in every little thing, spending hours studying the Illustrators Wall – which really should be called the Illustrators Maze – and squealing to find her own illustrations on it. Now she left it without any awareness of her surroundings or of her legs or feet moving. She felt like she was floating. Jules Chambers, a children’s author whose books Luisa provided the illustrations for, seemed to be in as big a daze, and they wordlessly embraced their goodbyes.
In the distance, a tall, imposing man unfolded himself from the back of a large black SUV.
The soles of Luisa’s feet regained their substance but the disconnect between them and her brain remained until she was gazing into her husband’s black eyes.
“Well?” he asked expectantly.
No one had more faith in Luisa’s career and talent than Gennaro. He’d insisted on coming with her to the conference centre so they could go straight out afterwards and celebrate what he had absolute certainty was a done deal with achildren’s publisher for Jules and Luisa’s magical adventure book for small children.
She burst into tears.
Swearing, he pulled her into a tight embrace. “I’m so sorry, my angel. They are fools. I will buy the publishing house and sack the whole idiot team. They wouldn’t know talent and exciting storylines if –”
“No,” she choked out, wriggling out of his hold and cupping his bristly cheeks. “They didn’t turn it down. They want four of them.”
“Four?”
“With the option of more.”
She watched his clever brain process this before a huge smile transformed his face from gorgeous to heartbreakingly gorgeous, and then she was being swung in the air much in the same way he swung their young daughters, except the kisses he always gave their daughters when he finally put them down was nothing like the kiss he gave Luisa when he finally put her down.
“See, didn’t I tell you,” he grinned before devouring her with another deep kiss. “I knew they’d bite your hands off for it. You just needed faith.”
She burst into laughter and threw herself back into his embrace. In the six years since the renewal of their wedding vows, the one thing her husband had been unswerving in was his faith in her. Gennaro was her biggest champion. Where he was still aloof and inscrutable with the outside world, in the privacy of their home he was a loving husband and father, and when he accompanied Luisa to parties connected with her work, he was charm personified and promoted her talents with a greater zeal than even her agent managed.
Cuddled into him on the drive back to their hotel, she thought back to the shy little girl who’d been so morbidly fascinated with him that she’d quailed just to hear Gennaro’s namementioned. When under the same roof as him, that little girl had followed him around like a moon orbiting its sun, always positioning herself as close to wherever he happened to be as she dared.
Gennaro was still her sun; would always be her sun.
And she would always be his too.
THE END
