Chapter 3 - The Confession in the DarkThe black armored SUV barely had time to put its wheels on the interstate before the heavy glass partition between us and the driver rolled up with a sharp clack. The interior was bathed in deep shadow, illuminated only by the neon streaks of Chicago streetlights flashing across the tinted windows.
I sat glued to the far door, my chest heaving, the silk of my crimson dress pulling tight across my ribs.
Enzo sat beside me, but the polite distance he had maintained for three years was gone. He sat turned toward me, his broad shoulders blocking any escape, his dark eyes burning into my profile with a smoldering intensity that felt like physical heat.
"You didn't have to cause a scene," I whispered, staring straight ahead at the leather partition, refusing to let him see how much his sudden shift was tearing my composure apart. "You could have handled him like a gentleman. Like a businessman."
"He looked at you," Enzo growled, his voice dropping into a harsh, ragged register.
"People look at me all the time, Enzo!" I snapped, turning my head to glare at him, my voice cracking with years of accumulated resentment. "Or have you forgotten? I’m your wife. I’m the decoration you put on your arm when you need to impress a judge or a politician! For three years, you haven't looked at me twice. You sleep in a chair, you hide in your study, you treat me like a piece of expensive furniture! Why do you care if Marco Russo looks at me? I’m already invisible to you anyway!"
The words flew out of my mouth before I could stop them—three years of silent agony, lonely nights, cold breakfasts, and secret tears finally boiling over into the confined space of the car.
Enzo didn't interrupt. He didn't shout back.
He simply reached out, his large, warm hand cupping the side of my face, his thumb tracing the curve of my cheekbone with a tenderness that completely disarmed me.
"You were never invisible, Ava," he whispered.
My breath caught. "Don't lie to me. Not tonight. Not after everything."
"I’ve never lied to you," Enzo said, his voice raw, stripped of all the armor he wore to rule the underworld. He leaned in closer, his forehead coming to rest gently against mine. I could smell his cedar cologne mixed with the sharp edge of adrenaline. "Do you think it didn't kill me every single night to walk into our bedroom, look at you sleeping in that white silk, and force myself to turn away? Do you think it didn't tear me apart to sleep in that damn chair?"
I froze, my heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. "Then why? Why did you do it?"
"Because of who I am," Enzo confessed, a bitter, self-loathing edge cutting through his tone. "My father was a monster, and my enemies are everywhere. The moment I married you, I painted a target on your back. If I touched you—if I let myself love you the way I wanted to from the first second I saw you—I would have made you my weakness. And in my world, weakness gets you killed."
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Tears spilled over my lashes, hot and sudden against his thumb. "And Marco Russo?"
Enzo’s jaw tightened, a dark, dangerous fire reigniting in his gray-black eyes. "Marco didn't just look at a woman. He looked at my life. He thought because I kept you at a distance, I didn't care. He was testing the king to see if the queen was unguarded." Enzo’s hand slid down from my face to grip my neck, his fingers tangling in the dark hair at my nape. "He thinks he can take what’s mine. He has no idea what I’m willing to burn to keep you."
