Page 72 of Break For Me
He fills me. The sensation is overwhelming fullness. My hands press against his chest for leverage. His hands hold my hips—right and left, the whole hand and the repaired hand.
I begin to move. He meets my thrusts. He is careful at first, testing the limits of his healing ribs. His jaw tightens with the effort. The Madonna flexes under my palm. I set the rhythm and he follows. The surgeon rides the enforcer.
His right hand slides up my chest. His thumb finds the hollow of my throat. He holds me there. He is not squeezing. He is holding.
"Stay," he says. The word is heavy. A plea.
"I’m not going anywhere."
The rhythm builds. The sound of our breathing fills the quiet room. The pleasure climbs through my body in hot stages. I let it come without counting the seconds, without measuring the depth.
He comes first. The sound he makes is a total surrender. A deep, shuddering exhale that vibrates into my chest. His hips press upward hard, his hand tightening on my neck with a gentleness that contradicts his brutal construction.
I follow him over the edge. The orgasm moves through me like a systemic shock. This obliteration is entirely voluntary. I chose it. I chose him.
We lie tangled in the bed. The sheets are ruined. His splinted hand rests heavy on my stomach. My head rests on his shoulder.
His heartbeat is slow against my ear. Fifty-eight beats per minute. Resting.
I trace the faded blue lines of the Madonna with my fingertip.
I am in a compound owned by the Italian mafia. I am in bed with an enforcer who has killed men with his bare hands. My sister’s safety is still uncertain. My medical license is revoked.
I have traded one cage for another. The walls are different.
But there is a critical difference. This cage has a door. And the key is in my hand.
I close my eyes. His thick arm tightens around me. His breathing deepens.
I sleep. No counting. No measuring. Just the quiet of a room where the mechanic and the hammer finally rest.
Chapter Twenty-One
ROCCO
I reachfor the glass of water on the bedside table and it falls.
Not the glass—my hand.
The signal leaves my brain. It travels down my arm, a clean, familiar electrical impulse, and dies somewhere between my wrist and my fingertips. The fingers don't close. The custom splint holds my fourth and fifth digits in a gentle curve that's supposed to protect the nerve repair, but the signal that saysgripgets lost in a swamp of damaged tissue and swelling.
The glass tilts off the edge of the table. It hits the hardwood floor and explodes.
Shards scatter across the wood like crushed ice. The water spreads in a dark, creeping stain.
I stare at the broken glass. The pieces catch the morning light pushing through the heavy curtains. They are sharp, clean, useful edges.
I can't pick one up.
The bed is warm behind me. I can hear the soft, even rhythm of Adrian's breathing. He's still asleep—on his stomach, one arm thrown over the pillow. The sheets are tangled around his hips. His bare back rises and falls. The knobs of his spine are visibleunder the pale skin. His shoulder blades are sharp as folded wings.
I touched him last night with hands that worked. This morning, the hands don't work. The distance between last night and this morning is the distance between the man I was and the thing I've become.
I flex my left hand. The fourth finger twitches, a pathetic, jerky spasm. The fifth doesn't respond at all. Dead meat.
I stand up. The floor is freezing against my bare feet.
Through the window, I can see the reflection of the corridor outside. A guard is stationed at my door—standard rotation, Alessandro's protocol. But the man on duty isn't one of the regulars. He's older. Thick-shouldered. He stands with his back to my door, which means his eyes are on the hallway, not on me. Or it means he doesn't want me to see his face.
