Chapter 22
Lucia
Aweek passes so fast that I barely remember what day it is, let alone how many days I have left to earn the funds I need to deposit into Edoardo’s account next week. I’m wading through water so high it’ll swallow me whole if I stop to breathe.
Every morning I wake up with the same resolve: Find a job, then use it to claw my way out of this mess. But every night I go to bed exhausted by the same disappointments.
The job hunt is going horrendously. I’m running out of places to look and excuses to convince myself that I’ll find a solution before everything falls apart.
I’m grasping at straws, and even they continually slip through my fingers.
An easy solution would be to accept the money Dante is offering for watching Camille. I need the funds, God knows I do, but taking it is admitting defeat. It screams that I can’t stand on my own two feet and that I’m once again dependent on a man.
Yet, at the same time, part of me thinks the opposite.
I’ve worked with Camille every day this week, and even though I’ve loved every second of our time together, the truth can’t be ignored. I’dbe earning real money if Dante hadn’t acquired all the strip clubs in the country like the massive expense was a minor inconvenience to force me to be his child’s nanny.
Dante is also adamant that the money is mine. Every evening, he leaves the three neatly stacked bundles on my bed as if I hadn’t returned them to him each morning.
His actions are confusing. The money screams,You can fight me all you want, but I’m not letting you drown, but his professional stance the past week says the opposite.
Watching Camille greet him each evening with explosive, unfiltered joy is the highlight of my day. Her happiness clears away some of the pain in my chest, but it also makes me a little envious. She gets to run into the safety of Dante’s arms, and I’m shunted to the sidelines like I’ll always have to pay for the privilege to be part of the team.
Though I’ve felt like an outsider on occasion the past week, the sexual chemistry between Dante and me is still palpable. I can’t look directly at him without losing my balance. I’m just no longer the only one throwing up barriers. Dante is holding back too. His actions aren’t cruel. More restrained, like he’s leashed himself so he won’t accidentally cross a line he drew in the sand.
Sometimes I wonder if he stopped trying because he achieved his goal. He wanted me to be Camille’s nanny. He was honest about that from the start. He got what he wanted, so maybe he doesn’t feel the need to chase anymore.
Maybe he doesn’t needmeanymore.
We’ve talked a handful of times over the past week. Although he’s a natural flirt, our conversations are more an employee–employer dynamic than two people experiencing a mutual attraction so intense it burns.
I should be happy. This is what I wanted. No attachments means it’s easier to move on, but for some unknown reason, I feel miserable even contemplating that.
It could be because this month will be the first time I’vemissed the payment date Edoardo agreed to for me to have contact with Gabriele, but that’s taking the easy way out.
I’ve earned over thirty thousand dollars in less than two weeks previously.
I simply need to remember my place.
It isn’t at the table with men like Dante and Edoardo.
It isn’t even in the same realm.
When I flop onto my bed, too exhausted with confusion to stay upright, the bedding puffs up around me. With its waft comes the unmistakable scent of Dante’s cologne. It’s comforting and clean and clings to every surface of my apartment like an unwanted houseguest who refuses to leave.
I returned the money this morning before Camille even woke, but the bedding smells like he drenches the bundles in his cologne each night before delivering them, which means every night I fall asleep surrounded by his scent.
It’s made my dreams extremely vivid the past few nights. For the first time in years, I wake sticky from something other than nightmares.
Shamefully, I lift the bedding to my nose and inhale deeply. My pulse thuds in my neck when I catch traces of his cologne clinging to the stitchwork.
Before my head can warn my heart that it’s setting itself up for failure, I suck in another big breath. My actions are pathetic. I know this, and I hate myself for it, but my bedding is the closest I get to having everything I want, even with my greatest desires only a few feet away.
When I flatten the blanket over my face, Dante’s cologne is stronger than the lies I tell myself about not wanting him. It’s so powerful that with a few whiffs, I formulate the perfect way to untangle the knot twisted low in my stomach.
Self-care isn’t self-indulgent.
It’s self-preservation.