Page 151 of Auctioned to the Mafia Don
Then he bites gently below my ear, and the sound turns into something else.
He carries me to the bed without breaking contact. The mattress gives underneath my back. Stefano braces himself above me, looking down with an expression I know too well now.
Possession.
But something different sits beneath it.
Fear.
Not fear of me.
Fear of losing me again.
I touch his face.
“You are here,” I whisper.
“Yes.”
“You aren’t leaving.”
“No.”
His mouth closes over mine before I can ask whether he means it.
This time, he is slower.
The anger is still there, threaded through every touch, but he gives me time to feel the choices in it. His fingers trace the line of my hip. His mouth moves over my neck. He pauses whenever my breath changes, watching me with that dark, unblinking attention that has always made me feel seen too clearly.
I pull his shirt over his head.
The sight of him nearly steals my breath.
He is all sharp lines and dark ink, bruised knuckles and the body of a man made for violence who is holding himself over me with care. I run my hands over his chest, his shoulders, the familiar ridge of muscle underneath my palms.
“You are staring,” he says.
“You are very vain for someone who claims to hate compliments.”
“I do not hate them. I distrust the people giving them.”
“That is worse.”
His mouth curves.
Then his hand slides beneath the waistband of my pants.
The smile disappears from my face.
He watches every reaction as his fingers slide beneath the lace, through the slick heat that betrays exactly how much my body missed him. His touch is knowing, unhurried — two fingers stroking me open while his thumb finds the swollen center of me— and my anger doesn't leave. It changes shape. Turns hot and grinding. Fists itself in his hair as I ride his hand.
"A month," I breathe, furious even now. "You left me for a month."
"I know." He curls his fingers, and my vision sparks. "Take it out on me."
I do.
I pull his hair. I bite his shoulder hard enough to leave a mark, and he takes it, groans like it's absolution, works me faster until the coil snaps and I break against his hand with a sound I muffle in his throat — angry, wrecked, alive.
