“Stop it. This doesn’t prove shit about us, or some complex you’ve had about what we’ve been for the last five fucking years,” Corrado said, his tone roughening enough to make Ginevra startle against the wall. She looked down their way just in time to see Corrado step forward fast enough to force Alessio back a step, making the man press against the doorjamb. “It doesn’t change the fact that I love—”
Corrado didn’t get to finish his sentence before the inevitable happened. She’d been watching it from the time they came into her view—the way both of them seemed like one was going to strike out at the other. Only, Alessio didn’t strike out the way Ginevra thought he would.
This all felt violent.
Anger overflowing.
Pain spilling out in words.
And yet, Alessio struck out at Corrado with affection. If one could call the kiss that he leveled on Corrado as affectionate. Ginevra didn’t know if she would, not considering the force of the kiss pushed Corrado back until he was the one with his spine against the doorjamb, and a hand was at his throat.
She heard Corrado hitting the wall, saw the way Alessio’s lips dragged against his, fingers curling into a suit jacket, and another fisting into leather. Somehow, though she didn’t think there was any room left between them, the men moved closer. Their kiss wasn’t soft or easy. Certainly not slow, or sweet.
Vicious, maybe.
Bruising, definitely.
And oh, so painful.
Painful, she thought, because one of them seemed to be fighting to leave something behind while the other was refusing to let go.
Ginevra sucked in a sharp breath, her heart aching as a whisper of heat shot through her body at the same time. It would be impossible for someone to see that sight, those beautifully haunted men showing love in their hurt, and not feel something for it. She simply didn’t think she should feel something for it.
This was not the time for that. God knew, she had her own reasons to be mad here, and that was enough to make her want to slip out of the hallway and leave those two to their ... mess.
Because fuck, she could see it was a mess. Somehow, she’d been put in the middle.
But still ...
She couldn’t look away.
This wasn’t for her to see. Their moment—their fight. None of it was for her, even if it had been brought on because of her. She didn’t have any business being privy to something that felt far bigger than her.
Because wasn’t that much obvious?
It wasn’t just her.
Alessio pulled away first, his face still darkened by the shadows, but that didn’t stop Ginevra from noticing the way his jaw trembled when murmured, “Don’t, Corrado.”
Corrado dragged in a ragged breath. “Les—”
“Don’t you fucking dare say that to me,” he interjected, swift and harsh, his voice straining with every word. “Not right now, not after everything and all this time ... don’t you dare do that to me. You never wanted to do it before, so you don’t get to do it tonight. You don’t get to use it now. You don’t get the right to use those words when you did this, too.”
“I’m not trying to say it to use it like a weapon—”
“You are because you know what it means.”
Corrado released a rough sound that echoed down the quiet hallway. “Let me explain, please.”
“Except you can’t, can you?”
“Or you don’t really want me to, Les.”
Alessio nodded. “Don’t do that, either.”
“If you’re going to throw my shit at me, then at least look at your own.”
“Fuck you, Corrado.”
As fast as Alessio had moved to corner Corrado, he stepped away, moving into the hallway with his back facing Ginevra. Although, she didn’t think he knew she was there. She should move—now would be the right time to do exactly that—but she couldn’t. Her feet might as well have been cemented to the floor.
Stupid, foolish girl.
“Just ... stay,” Corrado said, “calm down, and then maybe we can talk without this. It doesn’t have to be like this.”
“Nah, I wouldn’t want to intrude, you know?”
Alessio said that, and the same time, tipped his head to the side. Ginevra stilled against the wall, her eyes growing wide when the man pointedly looked her way. He’d known the whole time she was standing there, it seemed.
He didn’t appear bothered by it.
Corrado sighed, his stare following Alessio’s path until it landed on her. Still, he said nothing, and he didn’t move when Alessio turned around, and headed down the hallway. He met her gaze, and held it even as he came closer, and didn’t drop it as he passed.
“You really found a mess here, girl, huh?” Alessio asked her.
Ginevra looked away.
He wasn’t wrong.
Silence echoed in the penthouse long after the slamming of the front door reached the far hallway. The hardwood floor suddenly became a hell of a lot more interesting to her, because it was easier than watching Corrado drag the pad of his thumb over his bottom lip.
Like he was still feeling that kiss.
Too many things warred in her mind, and her heart. All the things she’d clearly missed, and others that still didn’t make sense. Oh, she had questions that needed and deserved an answer, sure, but some of them probably weren’t her place to ask.
She’d been lied to.
She’d been hurt, too.
And still, all she could think to ask in that moment was, “You didn’t think you should tell me about him?”
A hoarse sound left Corrado, but she continued her perusal of the floor. It was still easier than looking at him when she wasn’t even sure how she felt right then.
“You should have told me,” she whispered. “Maybe then, this wouldn’t have happened.”
He laughed, then.
Hard, loud, and bitter.
God, so dark.
Like someone ripped it out of him.
Ginevra looked up to find him staring at her in that way again. So intense, and pensive.
“You think that would have changed what happened here tonight?” he asked, shaking his head as he turned to go back into the office. Over his shoulder, he added, “In case you didn’t figure it out, this was a long time coming. This was years in the making—you just happened to help it along.”
“You still could have—”
“I should have done a lot of things, Ginevra. I don’t need someone else to point it out to me, and I certainly don’t expect you to understand me, or him, or this.”
Ouch.
That hurt.
“Or is it because I’m just a job to you, Corrado?”
His next step into the office hesitated, his shoulders tensing before they visibly dropped, the same way his head dipped down, too.
Did that hurt him?
Good.
He should know how she felt, too.
She didn’t give him the chance to respond before her feet finally decided to start working again, and she slipped down the hall out of sight.
There, she could hurt.
And he wouldn’t see.
29.
Corrado
“And how long has it been since you had contact with him?”
Corrado’s molars ached from how hard he continued clenching his jaw through this entire fucking conversation. How Cree was even able to understand half of what Corrado said to him was a goddamn mystery.