Page 13 of Wicked Mafia Mistake
"No. Look at me." His voice turns rough, commanding, and every nerve ending in my body responds. I open my eyes and find his burning into mine from inches away. His pupils are blown wide, dark swallowing whiskey, and the look on his face is barely leashed control. "Stay with me. Don't you dare close those beautiful eyes,tesoro."
I obey. How can I not when he has full control over me? My body finds his rhythm. The pain dissolves and pleasure rushes in to fill every space it left behind. His hand is on my throat and his mouth devours mine. Every thick inch of him strokes inside me, and I am falling apart beneath a man whose name is lodged behind my teeth like a prayer I'm not allowed to speak.
The second orgasm builds fast. Harder than the first. His thumb presses gently against the side of my throat and his hips drive deeper and I shatter with my mouth open and a name clawing up my throat. His name. The one I'm not allowed to say. I clamp my teeth down on my bottom lip hard enough to taste copper and swallow the syllables whole. The sound that escapes instead is a raw, broken cry that fills the bedroom.
"Fuck." He groans into my neck and his control snaps. His hips drive harder, faster, and I wrap my legs around him and take everything he gives me. His hand stays on my throat. His mouth stays against my skin. His breathing turns ragged and desperate against my collarbone. I watch his face as he comes apart above me. His eyes squeeze shut. His brows crush together. His jaw goes slack and the low, guttural groan that tears from his chest vibrates through my body. For one unguarded second he looks vulnerable. Open. Wrecked. My Massimo. And the sight of this powerful man breaking apart while inside me is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
For one fleeting moment I let myself wish there could be a next time. Because if there were, I would want nothing between us. No barriers. No latex. Just his skin against mine and the raw, slick heat of him filling me with nothing held back. The thought sends a pulse of want through my already wrecked body so strong I clench around him.
A low groan rumbles through his chest and he buries his face against my neck, the wordtesoromuffled and broken against my skin. His body goes heavy, spent, and he rolls to the side and pulls me into him in one motion. His arms wrap around my waist and his lips press into my hair, breathing me in with a long, slow inhale that I feel all the way down my spine. He holds me tight against the solid wall of his chest, his grip firm enough that I couldn't slip away even if I wanted to.
I don't want to. I find I can't do anything other than obey his silent command. My cheek presses against his chest and his heartbeat thumps steady beneath my ear, slowing as his body cools against mine. Our legs are tangled together, his calf heavy over my ankle. His fingers trace lazy patterns on the small of my back and my eyes drift shut and for a few perfect minutes I let myself pretend this is real.
He presses a kiss to my forehead and untangles himself from me. The loss of his warmth is immediate and I curl into the sheets that carry his scent while I listen to his bare feet pad across the hardwood. Water runs in the bathroom. A cabinet opens and closes.
He comes back with a warm cloth in his hand and the sight of this man, naked and unhurried, kneeling beside the bed for me does devastating things to my heart. He's on his knees again. The way he kneeled to unbuckle my heels. The way he kneeled beside me on a cold floor when I was fifteen and the world was falling apart. This man keeps dropping to his knees for me and he doesn't even know he's doing it.
"Open for me." His voice is quiet. Tender in a way that makes my throat tight.
I let my thighs fall apart and he presses the warm cloth against me, gentle, careful with the soreness I can already feel blooming. The heat soothes the ache and I exhale, my body sinking deeper into the mattress. He takes his time, wiping the inside of my thighs, cleaning me with a patience that makes my eyes burn. When he's done he leans down and presses his mouth against my still-throbbing clit in a single, soft kiss that sends one last shiver rolling through my entire body.
I suck in a breath. He smiles against my skin. I feel it.
He tosses the cloth onto the nightstand and climbs back into bed. His arm hooks around my waist and he pulls me against him, chest to back, and reaches down to drag the sheets up and over both of us. The fabric settles warm and heavy around my body, smelling like his cologne and clean cotton, and for the first time tonight I am completely covered, completely held, completely safe.
His lips brush the shell of my ear. "In the morning we can talk. Right now I just want to hold you close to me."
My heart cracks. A clean, quiet break that I feel behind my ribs.
Because in the morning I won't be here. And even if I wanted to stay, even if I wanted to curl into this man and let the sunrise find us tangled together in his sheets, I can't. Because he's holding a stranger he chose and not the woman who chose him a long time ago. Those aren't the same thing, no matter how badly I want them to be.
His breathing evens out and slows. His arm grows heavy around my waist and the tension drains from his body one muscle at a time. The sharp line of his jaw softens. The furrow between his brows smooths flat. The man holding me is warm and loose anddeeply, completely asleep, and his face in the moonlight looks younger. Calmer. Free of whatever weight he carries during the day.
I lift my head from his chest. Study his face in the pale light. The dark hair falling across his forehead. The beard covering his jaw. The tiny scar at the corner of his left eyebrow I never noticed at dinner parties. The slight part of his lips as he breathes.
My fingers move before I give them permission. I trace the tiny scar at his eyebrow with the pad of my thumb, feather-light, barely a graze. His lashes twitch but he doesn't wake. The rough grain of his beard drags against my fingertip as I follow the line of his jaw down to his chin. Warm skin. Steady pulse beneath it. I pull my hand back and press my fist against my mouth to keep from doing it again.
I'm memorizing him. Every line, every shadow, every detail I never got to study from across a dinner table. Because this is probably the only time I will ever be this close to his face and I refuse to waste it.
Massimo Santoro. The man who just held my face in both hands and asked me to tell him if anything hurt. The man who called metesorowhile inside me and didn't know he was talking to the girl who used to steal glances at him while he talked with my father about business.
"You really have no idea, do you?" I whisper it so quietly the words barely exist. "You have no idea how long I've wanted you. My prince." I pause. "No. My king."
He doesn't stir.
I need to leave.
The clock on his nightstand glows red. 3:47 AM and sunrise is less than two hours away. If I'm still in this bed when daylight fills this room, he'll see my face clearly. The freckles, the jaw, the baby blue eyes he's looked past at a hundred dinner parties. He'll know I'm Harrison's daughter and everything about tonight will curdle into shame or regret.
"Okay, Whitmore. Time to go." I barely mouth the words. My chest aches with a deep, physical hurt that makes my ribs feel too tight for my lungs. I slide out from under his arm. His fingers twitch against the empty sheet, grasping at my warmth. He murmurs in his sleep and I freeze, bare feet on cold hardwood, holding my breath until he settles.
I pick up my dress from the floor and slip into it. The fabric is wrinkled and smells like his cologne and my skin and the heat of what we just did in that bed. After tonight I'll never be able to wear it again. Scratch that, it will become my night shirt until the day I die.
I look at him one more time. Moonlight paints silver edges across his shoulders, the viper tattoo stark against his skin, his hand resting open on the pillow where my head was. Palm up. Fingers relaxed. Still reaching for me even in sleep.
Lord. That image is going to haunt me for the rest of my natural life.
I could stay. Climb back in. Let the morning come. Tell him the truth.
