Hey, loves! We’re back for the regular Friday outtake. This has been a particularly popular request for me directly ever since these three released. And now with Chris out in the world, it seems like the curiosity for after Corrado, Alessio and Ginevra’s HEA has grown. I promise you’re going to get a ton of info and love for them in their companion novellas coming out next year. But just because I wanted to and I love to give you all what you want, this outtake was born. However, you’re gonna have to wait for more.
Do enjoy.
*
Did It Ever
A Corrado | Les | Ginny Outtake
Corrado POV
Late at night, or very early in the morning depending on how one wanted to look at it, was Corrado’s favorite time of day. When everyone else was sleeping, he could be free to walk the halls, let his thoughts wander, and process anything without minding anyone else into the mix as well. Despite how he lived his life, filled with people and family and those that he loved, there was still a part of him that very much enjoyed being alone.
His twin said it was because Corrado just was who he was.
Gian liked to say maybe Corrado needed it.
Everybody had a different opinion.
They usually did.
Les and Ginny, though?
They never said a thing.
No, they simply let him have his nights of walking the halls far too late and alone. Except lately, he hadn’t been the one doing any of that at all.
It was Les.
Corrado noticed the further into Ginevra’s pregnancy they got, the more Les … well, paced. The thing was, he wasn’t like Corrado. Alessio didn’t make it known that he had shit going on in his head and needed a moment away to figure it out. His demeanor told them one thing; his behavior at night when he thought the rest of the house was asleep told Corrado something entirely different.
And he didn’t like it.
Oh, Les had his moods. So did Corrado. Hell, even Ginny went through spells but Corrado blamed that more on the hormones than anything else because usually, she went about her life as pleased as could be. Nonetheless, when Les went into a mood—everybody could tell.
Not lately.
He’d rather hide it.
That was the problem.
The floorboard down the hall from their master bedroom creaked, and Corrado let out a quiet sigh into the darkness. A few seconds later, the creak happened again. It was almost rhythmic in nature, and he could guess exactly where Alessio was standing based on the amount of time it took for the creak to echo once more.
The next time, Ginevra shifted on the bed beside Corrado, drawing his attention to her. Her hand had come to rest of the top of her twenty-three week swell and the over-sized T-shirt she’d thrown on for her had ridden up just enough that he figured she would soon be stealing a blanket because even though she pretended to enjoy sleeping without one … more often than not now, she woke up with one.
And didn’t complain about it.
Reaching over, his hand found the spot overtop hers. His thumb stroked the curve of her midsection, slowing just enough to appreciate the firmness of their child growing. Another one of his favorite things—though new, it still seemed as though it had always been.
Or maybe it was just always meant to be.
“Is he pacing again?”
The soft question had Corrado dragging in another heavy breath as his gaze found Ginerva’s. Had he not touched her, he bet she would have stayed sleeping. As she should. If pregnancy taught him anything besides what it felt like to sometimes walk on eggshells, it was that a woman needed her rest. Growing a baby was exhausting.
In the darkness of the bedroom, she watched him.
Waiting.
Eventually, Corrado nodded, saying only, “Yeah, babe.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
It’s what bothered him the most.
Everything was good.
Better.
Always getting better.
After everything, all that they shared could have been changed in ways that would have ruined all they worked for. Instead, despite his selfishness and the hurt between the three of them, they came on top. Even Les had told him—more than once—this had never been better.
More complicated, sure.
But better.
“Go,” Ginevra whispered against the pillow.
As though she just knew …
Corrado made himself stay put—Les didn’t suggest he should do otherwise. Then again, how could he when he was doing his best to hide that anything was wrong in the first place?
She did know them best, though.
Lifting his hand from her swell, Ginevra wove their fingers, squeezed, and repeated, “Go.”
How could he tell her no?
He learned that wasn’t his job.
With either of them.
By the time Corrado managed to pull on a pair of sleep pants and get down to the office, he found Alessio was no longer pacing. Instead, the man had found a seat in the window bench while he overlooked the small rear property of their brownstone.
Les passed him a look over his shoulder—there was no surprise about his arrival, and frankly, Corrado hadn’t bothered to even try. He also didn’t make an attempt to ease into the fact that something was clear wrong and he wanted to know what it was.
“Something you need to say?” he asked Les.
Stormy eyes watched him from across the room.
Corrado waited his lover out.
"It snowballed," Les muttered.
Corrado arched a brow. "What did?"
"These thoughts. The doubts. Every little answer to every question I might have about this baby or being a father or—it just ... one after another, you know?"
The choppy, confusing statement might have made someone else scratch their head, but Corrado got it. He understood exactly what Alessio was trying to say without really saying it. He took a moment to consider how he wanted to respond--Alessio wasn't known for his doubts and fears; not when he was constantly the most fearless of them all, it seemed.
Sad how their baby--something that would only bring them love--was the thing that scared him the most.
"Have you talked to anybody about it?" he decided to ask.
Because that was the thing he'd come to learn about Les although there had been a time, before Ginevra, when Corrado thought he knew everything there was to know about the man across the room. And one of those things was that, while he wasn't always aware of it, Alessio had more people than Corrado realized who he used as a support system and network.
People he trusted.
People that weren't Corrado.
Which was fine.
It was the familial aspect of the people Les surrounded himself with in his life that made Corrado think it was worth something deeper to Les. Those he called when he needed a laugh, or just a too-late chat about fucking life or whatever else it was that put him into a spell every now and then. He found fathers in the generation that came before him. A mother in Corrado’s own. Siblings that doubled as friends. Those people weren’t his blood, and he really had no family to speak of, but he’d managed to create his own.
Corrado wasn’t even sure Les realized it.
“Well?” Corrado asked when Les stayed quiet for too long. “Did you talk to somebody—or were we not the only people you were trying to hide it from?”
"Hey.”
The word was sharp.
It almost stung, but not quite.
From across the room, Les tipped his chin a fraction higher, his gaze never leaving Corrado’s when he said, “I want this—more than anything. I just didn’t want you—or her—to think differently because I had stupid shit in my head. That’s it, that’s all.”
Of course.
That was just so very Les.
“And I did talk to people,” Alessio muttered. “Too many people. Cree said shit was normal--Dare told me I was being ridiculous. He’s like a goddamn emotionless rock anyway, so the whole conversation just went to total shit. Fucking shocker."
A chuckle escaped him.
He couldn’t help it.
Les grinned at the sound.
Corrado didn't think to ask what those doubts were that Les was feeling--maybe his worth as a father when he'd not really had one; maybe something else entirely. Who was Corrado to say?
Things like this were complicated.
Trauma stayed close to the surface.
God knew Les had a lot of trauma surrounding things like family, parents, abandonment, self-worth, and even love. As sad as it fucking was. It still was. Corrado would spend the rest of his life making sure he never added to Les’s trauma for those things.
He’d already done enough.
"Your father told me it would be great," Les added quieter.
Corrado's shoulder found the doorjamb while he leaned there, replying, "And what do you think?"
"I think they're all right."
"Does the rest matter, then?" he asked.
Did it ever?
"I'm terrified, Corrado."
He nodded in the doorway.
"Me, too, Les."
“It’s slightly less terrifying with you and her, though.”
“Good to know.”
He wouldn’t soon forget it.
Komentar
Posting Komentar