If Loving You is Wrong

18: Exclusive

"What does she look like?" Liana asked the following day as she and Antonio lounged together in the pool.

"Excuse me?" he asked with clear confusion as he swam over to where she rested at the poolside. She wrapped her legs around him as he got closer and held them both up by resting his hands on the side.

"Olivia...what does she look like?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Nothing, I just wondered."

"That is not important," Antonio said, clearly annoyed but Liana didn't care.

"Its not but I'd like to know. Does she look like me?"

"No, she doesn't. Satisfied?"

Liana narrowed her eyes at him,

"Why don't you want to talk about her?"

"Why do you want to talk about her? she's my ex, why would you want me to discuss her?"

"Because you're so reluctant to!"

"And that's a problem?"

"Yes,"

"If you're going to make mountains out of molehills then we can forget this right now because I don't need more of that in my life right now!"

Liana went quiet as the forcefulness of his words hit her. he was really annoyed by this and while she understood the logic of his response, it didn't stop the feeling she had that something was wrong why he was so unwilling to discuss her.

"I just don't understand why you got so weird when she was brought up...it made me curious."

She admitted her feelings in the hope that he would respond to it and thankfully he did. Antonio said and ran his wet hand through his hair before looking down at her,

"I loved her dearly and she betrayed me. I do not want to talk about why, but she meant a lot to me and I don't wish to discuss her, so we can we drop this, please?" Liana nodded before sheepishly adding,

"Can I ask one last thing?" Antonio rolled his eyes but didn't say no,

"Do you love her now?"

----

The question took him off guard but even as it registered, he knew the answer.

"No...I do not love her anymore."

Despite loving Olivia because of the woman, she had been; the woman he'd fallen in love with and planned to spend the rest of his life with, he hated the woman she'd become.

He hated living with someone who blamed him for her accident, who continued to blame him for her limited existence and who wouldn't help herself even a little bit.

Seeing Bella yesterday had been the last straw in finally admitting that he no longer loved his wife the way he should.

Even when he'd first started sleeping with Liana, despite knowing all the reasons it was wrong; he'd had it in his heart that it was just a phase. It was an ongoing mistake, that once he'd had enough of, he would go back to Olivia and be the husband he had promised to be all those years ago.

He was allowed one slip, up wasn't he?

He'd been faithful for ten years! Surely, he wouldn't be condemned for this one act of infidelity considering the circumstances?

Seeing Bella had highlighted to Antonio that while Olivia had lost her previous way of life, he had lost all his dreams of a wife and family along with it. He would never have children with her and he wouldn't ever divorce her, so he was stuck.

"I'm sorry," Liana said quietly. "I just felt...insecure."

Antonio looked down into her beautiful young face,

"Why on earth would you feel insecure Liana?"

"The way Bella turned away from me like I couldn't compete with Olivia...it just took me by surprise that's all especially since..."

"Since what?" Liana immediately looked embarrassed and looked away from him,

Antonio brought her face back towards him with a finger under her chin,

"Tell me," Liana shook her head, so he kissed her gently, "Tell me."

Liana looked down into the space between them as she shrugged her shoulders and said,

"Especially since you're not mine."

Oh, Dear God!

"Liana..."

"Don't, don't say anything," she rushed out, looking up at him. "I know what we agreed."

"But you've now changed your mind?" he enquired and once again she shrugged,

"Not changed my mind as such. I still understand why we must be discreet, but I still don't know what this is. Are you seeing other people, am I allowed to...?"

Antonio saw red as he brought her chin up to him again and looked her in the eye,

"Are you seeing another man?"

"No Antonio of course not!"

His heart stopped racing for the moment, but it was enlightening how the idea of Liana with someone else had instantly made him feel...

"If I was, you couldn't really say much,"

"Try me." He said simply, his eyes suddenly as cold as steel but Liana just giggled in that way that sent signals to his groins.

"Antonio, you couldn't say anything, we're not exclusive...are we?"

She'd got him.

In the short time they'd known each other he'd managed to avoid the 'what are we' question but she'd well and truly got him.

He was well within his right to ask her to be discreet because of the reasons they'd already discussed but she wanted to know what in fact she was hiding; and rightly so.

If he said they weren't exclusive, then Liana could very well start seeing someone else.

The only way that was going to happen was over his rotting corpse, so the answer seemed crystal clear,

"Yes...we are exclusive."

Technically, he wasn't sleeping with anyone else, so he wasn't lying...

Liana threw her arms around his neck and kissed him thoroughly. Within seconds, the heat between them had risen considerably and she was fumbling to get him out of his swimming shorts. She freed him and guided him into her as he held them afloat in the water.

She felt exquisite; so warm and tight around him as she used the water to grind fluidly onto him.

She blew his mind with her mind; her body and spirit and he knew then that he was lost in this young woman.

He was going to keep her as long as he could, his wife and her father be damned.