Ruined in Vows (Marchetti Family #3)

12. Luca

Chapter 12

Luca

I gnoring the big crowds gathered around the famous Bellagio fountains, I stagger through the people, trying to focus on evening my breathing out. I don't know how I ended up here, I just knew I felt stifled and needed to get as far away as I could. From Vincenzo. My wife. Everything .

How I managed to leave unnoticed I don't know. I half expected to be hauled back by now, to the world I don't recognize but hate, and instructed to go make nice with my wife. It’s slowly killing me, no matter how hard I try to immerse myself into my old life. I feel trapped. Suffocated. Like a damn caged bird. All I want to do is find some familiarity, some freedom. But it's proving harder with every day that passes. Will I ever remember anything? Who I am. My life? It seems impossible.

“Easy man,” a deep masculine voice barks, pulling me out of my reverie.

Glancing up, I find a man glaring at me as he holds a woman protectively as he rubs at her arm. Did I walk into her? Hurt her? I don't know. I'm so disorientated, fucked up, and freaked out, I’m about ready to do something stupid. Something I can’t come back from.

“Sorry,” I mutter my apology, stepping around them to a less crowded area. Hopefully it will give me time to gather my thoughts and work out my next step. I don't know what that is, I just know I need to break free of the god forsaken invisible shackles tying me to this world I'm told is mine.

Leaning against a wall, I inhale, exhale slowly, willing my mind and body to calm. I don't know how long I stand there, but eventually, I start to breathe a little easier, feel less... trapped. More relaxed. Which is a ridiculous notion considering that when I look up the crowds seem to have multiplied.

Dramatic music starts, just as the fountains start to perform their famous show. I look around at all the people engrossed in the performance. It's such a mundane, touristy thing, but at this moment, I think it's exactly what I need. Moving closer, I blend in with the rest of the crowd, watching the way the water moves in time with the music. It’s a good show, I will give it that and when the six minute performance ends, a collective of oohs, ahhs, and clapping hands fills the area.

Smiling, and finally feeling a little lighter, I turn to leave, only to freeze when my eyes lock on someone. My whole world seems to turn on its axis at the vision of a woman walking through the crowd. With her dark hair and the face of an angel, she is absolute perfection. Ethereal even. Surely, she cannot be real. Frowning, I begin to think that I have conjured her up in my mind and she isn’t real. It would explain it. She certainly does not look like she belongs on earth. She looks like my savior. An angel.

I blink. Then blink again. Expecting her to disappear. But no, she is still there, as real as anything. And from the way my heart pounds painfully in my chest, there is no way I have made her up in my mind.

A calm feeling washes over me, as I watch her. And for the first time since I awoke, the chaos in my head and life seems to settle as I stare at her. It’s an odd sensation, unexplainable really, but it’s there all the same as the voice inside my head tells me to go to her. To take her. To never let her go.

I shake my head.

What the actual fuck is going on?

My gaze shifts, taking in the two women on either side of her and the men surrounding them. I’m lucid enough to know they look exactly like the men Vincenzo has roaming the casino. Guards. These women are important enough to need protection. My eyes shift back to the women, taking them in. The oldest of them, looks like my angel. Her mother maybe?

Moving my attention back to the vision who has turned my world upside down in a matter of minutes, I rake my gaze over every inch of her. I shouldn't be looking at her, in this way, considering I have a wife, but I couldn't stop the visceral response to her if I tried. I'm drawn to her. Inexplicably enchanted. Considering I have no recollection of my past life, I can’t be sure, but I can't imagine me, or any other man has ever had this kind of reaction to a woman before. It just feels more. A once in a lifetime experience.

She starts to move out of my line of sight and panic grips me. Pushing through the people, I watch as her entourage moves down the strip toward the Paris Hotel and Casino. My self-control snaps. And like the complete stalker I seem to have turned into in the last couple of minutes, I follow them. It’s irrational, a bad idea, but at this point the need is so strong, I couldn’t stop this even if I wanted to

Ducking and diving through all the people, I pause when they come to a stop again. The brown-haired girl takes pictures of herself. And though my angel laughs at her antics, she seems... off.

Narrowing my gaze on her face, my heart pounds in my chest at the emptiness in her blue eyes. She looks how I feel. Lost. My throat tightens with unexplainable emotion as I watch her, and I briefly wonder what could make such a beautiful girl look so sad. I may not know this gorgeous angel, but that emotion should never be associated with someone like her. Frowning, I speculate why, after rejecting my wife for weeks now, do I suddenly care so much about a stranger. And despite not being able to explain why I am feeling this way, everything inside me tells me not to question it.

It just is.

This feeling.

This woman.

It simultaneously feels familiar yet unknown.

But right.

Needing to get closer, I move toward her, careful not to alert her security team that a strange man is closing in. The scent of her perfume hits me first. Inhaling her sweetness, I let myself soak in the floral, spicy smell as if it is the air I breathe.

It’s then that our gazes meet.

Her eyes widen.

Her mouth drops open in what can only be described as shock.

My heart kicks up to an unnatural speed, as I watch her reaction, but I can’t help but notice that she is even more stunning up close.

That is, until she turns an abnormal shade of white.

She looks like she has seen a ghost.

Looks like she is going to be sick.

The commotion around us turns to white noise and I cock my head to the side as I study her features.

It’s... weird.

This whole situation feels strange.

Like deja vu.

And despite being surrounded by people, it’s just me and this angel that exist in this moment.

Then she speaks, her voice a balm to my soul, soothing every uncertainty I have been feeling.

But then as if a bucket of ice-cold water has been poured all over me, she breaks the spell by calling out another man's name.

“Dante?”