Chapter 7 - A King on His Knees
Dante felt the floor disappear from beneath his feet. Every excuse, every calculated rationale he had rehearsed during the six-hour drive from New York, evaporated into ash.
""I was blind,"" he choked out, hot tears finally spilling down his rugged, scarred face. ""I became drunk on control. I thought I had to be invincible to keep you safe, and all I did was poison the only pure thing in my life.""
He did something Clare had never seen him do in all their years together.
Dante Romano, the man before whom governors trembled and crime bosses bowed their heads, fell to his knees on the wooden floor.
He didn't reach for her. He kept his hands clasped against his chest, bowing his head before her as if waiting for an executioner's strike. ""I am not asking you to forgive me today. I am not asking you to come back to New York. But do not take yourself out of my life completely. Strip me of everything I own. Take the company. Take the properties. Leave me with nothing, but do not make me live in a world where I cannot look upon your face.""
Clare looked down at him, her chest aching with a pain so sharp it stole her breath. She had spent days wanting him to suffer, wanting him to feel an ounce of the humiliation she had endured when Bianca Foster smiled beside table twelve. But seeing him shattered on the floor didn't bring her joy; it only brought a deep, echoing sorrow for the years they had wasted chasing shadows.
""Stand up, Dante,"" she whispered.
""No,"" he rasped. ""Not until you know that I would tear down every stone of the Romano name with my bare hands if it meant erasing the look of disappointment in your eyes last night.""
Clare walked over to him, her bare feet silent against the pine floorboards. She knelt down beside him, lifting his chin with trembling fingers until his bloodshot, tortured eyes met hers.
""You broke something very precious, Dante,"" she said softly, a tear slipping down her cheek and landing on the back of his hand. ""Something that took nine years of blood and devotion to build. You can't fix that with a theatrical gesture on your knees.""
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""Tell me what to do,"" he begged, leaning his forehead against hers, breathing in the scent of cedar and sea salt that clung to her skin. ""Give me a trial. Give me a century. Just tell me how to earn you back.""
""You don't earn me back by fighting wars, Dante,"" Clare whispered, her fingers trailing lightly over the scar on his temple. ""You earn me back by learning how to live in peace. And that begins with you walking away from the mob forever.""
