Chapter 21: My Mother's Table

Giulia's POV

At five in the morning, the kitchen of my mother's house in Bridgeport smelled of coffee and cold lemons.

Declan stood at the stove in his undershirt with his back to me.

The scar from the bullet showed white and puckered on his left shoulder.

I leaned in the doorway and watched him for a while.

He had been in this house half of every week since October, and I had not tired of that view once.

"You're staring, Donna," he said without turning.

"I'm allowed. It's my kitchen."

"Then come and do something about it."

I crossed the floor in my bare feet and wrapped my arms around his waist.

I put my mouth against the scar and he went still.

"Giulia."

"Turn off the stove."

He did.

He turned in my arms, and the look on his face made my knees go.

"I'm starting it," I said. "Take me on the table."

"Your mother's table?"

"She would have liked you."

He laughed, low and unsteady, and lifted me onto the scrubbed wood.

I pushed his shirt over his head and kissed the scars on his ribs one by one.

He pulled my nightgown up my thighs, over my hips, and off, and left it on the floor with the dish towels.

The light through the window was grey and soft, and it was on both of us.

"I'll never stop looking at you," he said. "I want you to know that now."

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