Page 1 of Forgotten Vows

1

ADRIANA

The sounds of my eighteenth birthday party drift out across the manicured lawn behind my father's mansion, all the way to the garden nook where Lachlan and I are secluded.

I feel like I can hardly breathe. For months we've been sneaking moments in every closet and corner we can, the risk only adding to the rush of desire as we kissed and touched nearly every inch of each other's bodies—but only ever over clothes.

He wouldn't do more until tonight. Lachlan is two years older than me, and he felt guilty even kissing me to begin with, but neither of us has been able to help it. It was foolish from the start, the risk unthinkable from the moment we first ended up in a dark corner together, lips hovering closer and closer until we kissed for the first time… but we couldn't stop.

My father will kill us if he finds out. Both of us. I'm a daughter, not even an only child, worth only the alliance he can use me to make one day. And every touch of Lachlan's, every brush of his fingers against my skin and caress of his mouth, will have chipped away at my value in my father's eyes.

No mafia boss, be they Italian, Irish, or Russian, wants to marry a woman someone else has touched. AndGod, Lachlan has touchedme so many times, the need building with every passing day until now.

His lips are on my throat, his breath quick and hot against my skin as his hands slide under my shirt. "You're sure?" he whispers against my ear, the ragged sound of it telling me exactly how hard it would be for him to stop if I said no… but I know he would. He'd never make me do anything I didn't want to.

He's the only person in this world who doesn't.

If anything, I've been the one pushing us. Lachlan has asked me before every kiss, every pass of his hands over my body, making sure that he's what I want, even though he's never put his hands under my clothes before. And now that we're finally here, now that I'm finally eighteen and his conscience can let him go further, he's still making sure.

I wriggle under him, conscious that there will be grass stains on the silk dress that I bought for the party, but we planned for that. My drink is sitting on a bench a few feet away, and I'll spill it on my dress after and then claim that I tripped and fell in my heels and dropped my drink on myself. I'll go change, and no one will be the wiser.

And in a few weeks, before my father can finalize any marriage plans, we're going to run away together.

We both know we should wait for this until then, until we're far away from my father and all the things he could do to us, but we can't. That's never been clearer to me than in this moment, as Lachlan's hand slides up my thigh and pushes my dress higher, my legs spreading to wrap around him as he groans.

"We can't stay out here forever," he whispers. "I wanted to take this slow, but?—"

"I don't want to." I clutch at his shoulders, pressing my mouth to his throat. I have no idea what I'm doing, overall, but this I know—how much he likes the feeling of my lips on his neck, how hard he gets when I suck the spot where it meets his shoulder. I made him come like this once, without either of us touching his cock, while we were hiding in the corner of a linen closet in the mansion. "I want it now, Lachlan. Don't make me wait.Please."

"Okay," he groans. "Okay." His hips rock against me, only his jeans and the thin silk of my panties separating us. His fingers slide between us there, nudging my panties to one side, and I gasp as they stroke my clit. He makes a thick, low sound deep in his throat when he feels how wet I am.

Lachlan is nothing like the men I'm surrounded by every day, men like my father and brother and their associates. Lachlan isn't mafia, and he doesn't come from money. He's the son of one of my father's low-level soldiers—a rider in a motorcycle gang that runs protection and does dirty work for Giovanni Santoro. Lachlan's father isn't even anyone important in the gang, not a president or vice president. To my father, Lachlan is no one, lower than something on the bottom of his shoe, good only for killing or dying.

To me, he's everything.

"It's your first time," he murmurs against my mouth. "It should be good, Adri. I should be making you come over and over, getting you ready, making you feel cherished, loved?—"

"Ido," I insist. "Please. I want you. You promised me, my birthday present?—"

Lachlan lets out a rough laugh. "God, do you have any idea what you do to me? Begging for my cock for your birthday present." He brushes his nose against mine. "Begging forme. Fuck, little princess, you're going to be the death of me."

For a split second, fear clenches at my heart. "Don't say that," I plead, tugging his mouth down to mine. "Just please… please, Lachlan?—"

"Okay." I hear the sound of his zipper as he uses his other hand to undo his pants, the one holding my panties aside still rubbing gently at my clit. It feels so good, and I'm gasping under him, wound tight with the anticipation of what comes next.

"We don't have time to work you up," he murmurs. "It's big, Adri, it's going to?—"

"I know," I breathe. I've felt him pressed against me a hundred times by now; I know how big he is. And I feel it, a moment later, thebroad tip of him separating my soaked folds as he presses his cock against my entrance.

"Fuck," he groans, his eyes fluttering shut. "Shit, we need a condom—" His hand goes to his jeans pocket—jeans now pushed down around his hips—and he freezes.

"Dammit, it must have fallen out." He presses his forehead to mine, breathing hard, and I feel a flood of panic—not at the thought of doing it without a condom, but at the thought of him stopping.

"It's okay." I reach down, my fingers brushing against his naked cock for the first time, and his entire body jerks as if he's touched a live wire. He's hard and soft at the same time—stiff as an iron bar against me, but the skin is so silky smooth, and sohot. He feels like fire against me, like he'll burn me up, like we'll burn up together. "My period ended two days ago. I don't even think I can get pregnant right now. And anyway?—"

Something stirs in me at the thought of having Lachlan's baby, of there being something that can't ever separate us. It's silly and immature—neither of us is ready for a child, especially when just this, what we're doing now, is enough to get us both killed. But at the thought of his baby being inside me, my belly swelling with it, him seeing me carrying his child, holding our baby—my heart suddenly feels too big for my chest, and I want it almost as much as I want him right now.

I want him forever. And nothing is more forever than a baby.