“Maldição.” The soft curse seemed torn from him. “What is it?”
“Hormones,” she said brokenly.
“No. Tell me, what is it that you want?”
She couldn’t reveal what she secretly yearned for. It was foolish to spill everything inside her heart. Because even though it was clear Leonardo wanted and already loved their unborn child, it was equally plain he didn’t love her. She’d been gone five months, and the only reason he was standing in front of her was because he found out she was pregnant.
“I have to go.” She turned back to the table to pick up her belongings.
“We can talk later.”
“We will talk now. We never talk.” He took her gently, but firmly by the arm and turned her back to face him. “What do you want, Alexa?”
She pulled back, but his gentleness was her undoing. “I want you to love me.” She couldn’t retract the words, and even though he looked stunned, confused, it was a relief to tell him how she truly felt. “You’ve never said it.
I’ve never heard you say you love me, Leo.”
“I didn’t think I needed to. I thought giving you everything you wanted was proof of my love for you. I worked hard to provide for you.”
“You’ve always worked hard, and you know I don’t care about those things,” Alexa said.
His expression became bleaker. “I know … and yet …” He shook his head as his words trailed off.
“I can’t let you go, Alexa.”
“You already did,” she whispered. “You only came back because you found out I was pregnant, and I won’t subject my child to the life my brother and I had to endure as children. I won’t fight with you all the time in front of our child, and I won’t let you ignore our child so you can spend all your time at work. I already know what it feels like, and I won’t do that to my baby.”
She spread protective fingers across her stomach.
Leonardo’s gaze followed the gesture. “Your pregnancy isn’t the only reason I returned. It just caused me to return sooner.” He lifted his eyes to her face. “My work is important to me, but you’re more important. When I moved to Rio three months ago, I wanted nothing more than to take you with me, but I realized I would be subjecting you to the same treatment as before. I had to spend the time necessary to launch our Latin American headquarters.
“Before our first separation, I was working like a man who wasn’t married, and that wasn’t fair to you. It’s all I know, querida. It’s what I saw my father do all his life. I was five when my parents divorced, so I didn’t fully understand why my mother left.”
He stepped closer to her. “I’ve spoken to my mother, and I understand now. I’ve changed. I don’t work the same hours, and I’ve been making preparations for you to come live with me. Everything isn’t ready, but I had to come get you as soon as I found out about your pregnancy. I’m not giving you a divorce, and I’m not leaving without you.”
Leonardo took her face in his hands and looked down into her water-filled eyes. “Meu amor,” he murmured, pressing his lips against her cheeks to kiss away her tears. “How could you doubt how much I love you, when I can’t even sleep without you beside me?”
Alexa’s eyes widened in her face.
“Eu te amo, querida,” he whispered. “I love you so much, that if you don’t come back to stay, I think I’ll die this time.”
Alexa couldn’t believe it. Finally, the words she longed to hear were released from the lips of the only man she’d ever loved. Getting up on tiptoe, she flung her arms around his neck. “I’ve waited so long to hear you say that.”
“I’ll say it every day for the rest of our lives.” Leonardo rained little kisses across her eyelids, down her nose, and across each cheek, warming her insides. “Eu te amo. Eu te amo. Eu te amo.”
Alexa looked up into the eyes of her husband. She believed him. He’d changed, and she would, too. She had been afraid of turning into her mother.
She had been worried her marriage would mirror the unhappy mess her parents’ had been.
She would no longer hide her feelings, and she would let Leonardo know if she felt neglected. She couldn’t expect him to know what was wrong if she wasn’t vocal about her needs.
She pulled down his head and pressed her lips against his. “I love you, too.”
Epilogue
Alexa’s bare feet padded softly across the tile covering the rooftop patio where Leonardo was reclining, the cell phone glued to his ear as he conducted business in Portuguese. The sun was low in the sky, but it was still warm in Rio de Janeiro, where they’d been living for the past year.