Brutal Husband (Brutal Hearts #3)

Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Nero

R ieta is beaming as we drive home. “Did you have a wonderful time at lunch? I had a wonderful time.”

I smile to myself. I’m happy she had a good time, but wonderful isn’t the word I’d use for being grilled about my intentions. I still feel the remnants of my irritation toward Laz Rosetti, but I can’t be too angry about it. Laz and Mia care about Rieta. It’s understandable that they’ve been suspicious of me because of the way Luca treated her in the past.

“It was good for all of us to talk,” I tell her, reaching over to squeeze her hand, and then I caress her leg and curve my hand around her inner thigh. “But I’m looking forward to being home with you even more.”

She rolls her head toward me on the headrest and smiles. “Home. Such a beautiful word. I can’t wait to be at home with my husband. It seems like a fairy tale or impossible dream.” She strokes the back of my hand in her lap as I drive. “Listen to me. I think I’m high on pregnancy hormones.”

Maybe it’s the pregnancy. Maybe it’s the fact that we’ve beaten the odds, and we finally get to live as husband and wife.

As soon as we get inside, I spread my arms wide, and Rieta jumps up, wrapping her arms around my neck and her thighs around my waist. I kiss her as I walk slowly down the hall with her in my arms.

“Can you carry me upstairs?” she murmurs between kisses.

“Why would we go upstairs when I can fuck you down here?”

“Nero!”

I chuckle darkly seeing the red in her cheeks. My married, pregnant woman is still so sheltered, and it’s so delightful to scandalize her.

I carry her into the living room. Loosening my grip, I let her slide down my body until she’s on her knees at my feet. I’m so fucking hard as I unbuckle my pants.

“Show your husband how sweet you can be.”

Rieta smiles, takes my cock in her hand, and licks slowly up my length.

As she sucks on me, I tip my head back with a groan. “You’re so fucking good at that.”

Rieta pulls my cock out of her mouth. “I am? How good?”

“You want praise, do you? I’m not in the mood for giving praise yet. You’ve got the sluttiest little mouth, and it’s crying out to be filled with cock.” I tighten my fingers in her hair and shove my cock past her lips once more. “Take me good and deep.”

It’s so tempting to come like this. Her lips are so wet and red and I long to see my cum coating her tongue, but I don’t want this to be over so soon.

I pull my wife up and lay her on the sofa, and reach beneath her skirt to take off her underwear in one smooth motion. She’s so wet for me already, and I lean down for a taste.

Rieta moans as she feels my tongue against her swollen clit. I keep licking her like a starving man. Her fingers are clenched in my hair, and her trembling thighs are wrapped around my neck. Have I thought enough today about how much I love my wife? I fucking love my wife. Rieta comes with a scream that could rattle every window in a cathedral.

When I lift my head, her hands are covering her mouth, and her eyes are wide with shock.

“Do you think the neighbors heard?” she whispers, as if whispering could undo all the noise she made.

“Oh, cara mia . Of course they did.” Without giving her a chance to recover, I sit up, line myself up at her entrance, and sink into her tight, wet heat.

“Nero,” she cries out, gripping my shoulders with her nails and forgetting all about whether the neighbors can hear.

I stare down at my cock hammering into her. Her body is so beautiful, and she’s all mine.

“I love fucking you while you’re pregnant, Mama. Knowing I’m already deep inside you. That you’re such a good girl for me. I’m going to fuck you every day and watch your body change and your belly getting bigger and bigger with my baby.”

Rieta whimpers with need as I finally give her the praise she craves.

“These already feel bigger.” I squeeze her breasts together and run my tongue across both her nipples.

“You know what I love?” she says, running her nails up and down my biceps.

“What’s that, cara mia ?”

“The sounds you make. The way you pant and gasp when you’re about to come.” She smiles wider. “The way you moan, and you call me the horny slut?”

I give a choking kind of laugh and go on thrusting into her. “It’s true. I’m such a slut for my wife.”

“The way you can’t shut up, and the way I don’t want you to.” Rieta cups both her breasts and squeezes them.

“I’ll never shut up about how much I love… ah fuck …my wife .” I thrust deep as I come, and then gather Rieta into my arms and hold her tight.

I feel my wife smile as she presses a kiss to my throat, right over my thundering heart. “I love you too.”

Rieta is nineteen weeks pregnant and her belly pops in the tight dresses she wears. She looks like a goddess. Like a queen. I’m captivated every time I look at her.

I’m making dinner for us one evening while Rieta sits at the counter and browses on her laptop for baby things. Suddenly she cries out.

I whirl around, my heart pounding in my chest. “What is it? What’s wrong? Are you in pain?”

Is it her? Is it the baby? We’re too happy. Something was bound to go wrong.

Rieta grasps my hand and flattens it against her belly, staring down at her bump with wide eyes. “The baby kicked.”

“What? What do you mean—” I’m still panicking, and it takes me a moment to realize what the fluttering is that I feel beneath my palm. I put both my hands on her belly. “That’s the baby? Baby, was that you? Can you hear me, baby? I’m your daddy.”

The baby goes on kicking for a little while longer while Rieta and I stare at each other in wonder.

There are happy tears in Rieta’s eyes. She reaches out and pulls my mouth down to hers, but when she breaks the kiss, her expression is troubled.

“I have a confession to make. Sometimes I have nightmares that I’m holding you, but you turn into Luca. I see your eyes change. When I wake up, I have to keep pinching myself to remember this is real and that you’re the man I’ve always wanted. It feels like a betrayal to have these dreams when I know how hard you fought to come back to me.”

She lived with Luca for many more months than she’s lived with me. For now. But I’m outstripping him, day by day. I’m going to win. I’ve already won.

I kiss each of her eyelids, tasting her warm, salty tears. “I’d fight my way back to you again a hundred times if it means I can be with you.”

Rieta goes into labor on a Wednesday evening. We’re cozied up together on the sofa together watching TV. She’s eating toffee ice cream, and the bowl is balanced on her belly. There’s a large, melting spoonful in her mouth when she suddenly makes a noise in the back of her throat.

“Mm!”

I was just starting to feel sleepy, my eyes drifting closed as the pack of zombies on screen closed in on the doomed side character.

I drag my eyes open. “Hm?”

“Mm!” she says again, more urgently this time, and points at her belly. She’s trying to swallow.

I sit up, finally catching on. “The baby? Is it coming?”

She nods rapidly, and finally swallows. “I think so. I’ve been feeling restless all evening, and I—”

Wide awake now, I jump to my feet. “Your go bag is packed. I’ll get the phone chargers. Do you want to take some snacks?” First, I charge toward the stairs, and then I change my mind and head to the kitchen.

“Call the hospital,” she reminds me. “They’ll be able to tell us when we should come in.”

Of course, I forgot. I can barely think straight. I’m about to become a father. Me. What do I know about parents and children? Nothing. Less than nothing. I’m going to make a horrible mess of this.

I speak to the hospital while Rieta writes down the time and length of her contraction. We’re told not to come in yet, but they’re going be ready for us when we do.

I hang up and take a deep breath. We have a plan. I start to calm down.

Meanwhile, Rieta is as cool as a cucumber and settles herself onto the sofa. She even finishes her ice cream.

After her fourth contraction, she starts pacing around the living room, but she’s smiling as she goes, her hands roving over her belly. “We’re so excited to meet you.”

She looks so beautiful that I can’t help but go to her. I put my arms around my wife, her big belly pushing against mine. “I can’t wait to meet our baby, but I’m going to miss you like this.”

“You’ll have to get me pregnant again right away,” she says with a laugh.

“Fuck yes.”

“I was joking.”

“I’m not.”

A few hours later, we arrive at the hospital, and things start to move quickly after that. Everyone’s attention is on Rieta, including mine as I grip her hand. It must be past three in the morning, but I feel wide awake.

Finally, close to seven, our son is born. He’s placed skin to skin on Rieta’s chest and my sweaty, exhausted, but happy wife cradles his little body in her arms.

“Look at him, Nero. Isn’t he perfect?” she sobs. “A little boy.”

My son. Our son. I have a family.

The nurse shows me how to cut the umbilical cord and then rub the baby as it lays on Rieta’s chest. As I look at his little features and tiny fingers and toes, I feel hopeful. I feel so much love for our baby. I lean my forehead against Rieta’s as we watch him with rapt attention and wonder.

“What do you think of Marco?” Rieta whispers.

“Marco. That’s his name.” I lean forward and kiss Rieta. “I’m so proud of you, Mama.”

“I’ve got a surprise for you.”

I’m putting our four-week-old son down for a nap in his crib when Rieta comes into the nursery. It’s such a pretty room, and it’s all my wife’s doing. Well, I helped, but I was following her directions about how to assemble the white wooden crib, where to place the wicker rocking chair, and where to paint clouds across the walls.

My wife practically skips toward me, an eager smile on her face, and puts a velvet box into my hands. Curious, I open it, and see a gold wedding band.

“It’s not the ring I put onto your finger when we stood at the altar, but it’s a new ring without any of the bad memories.”

Luca was wearing that ring when I dug him up out of the back garden, and I destroyed it in a furnace separate from his body.

Taking the ring out, I see that the inside is engraved with our wedding date. And daisies. Half a dozen pretty, happy daisies.

I haven’t worn a wedding ring since Luca ripped it off my finger on my wedding night. Rieta and I talked about getting me another several times while she was pregnant, but there was always something more pressing to do. I was filled with so much regret that I’d let my brother take that ring from me. Deep down, I didn’t feel like I’d earned the right to wear a wedding ring.

But Rieta is giving me this ring with so much warmth and love in her eyes, so maybe I can believe that I’ve earned it.

She’s watching me closely, noticing my hesitation. “Do you like it? If you want, we can get you a different one.”

I look from my sleeping baby in his yellow romper, tufts of dark hair on his head, to my beautiful, hopeful wife. I’m happy, I realize with a burst of surprise. I’m happy for the first time in my life, and it’s all because of them.

“It’s perfect.” I hold out the box to her. “Will you put it on my finger?”

She takes my hand in hers and slides the ring onto my hand. I stare at it, captivated by the way it’s shining right alongside hers on her own finger. It feels right. It feels perfect.

“This is the last piece. I’m finally your husband again.”

“What do you mean, again?” Rieta takes my face in her hands and presses her mouth to mine. “You have always been my husband, Nero Lombardi.”

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