Page 29 of Driven By Impulse

Commanding.

Nicco tracked her with his eyes, the amusement on his face in the tiny curve of his lip, the crease at the corner of his eyes, the need in the depths of his gaze. “Think outside the box, Leone. Not everything is either or.”

Hanna’s words came out on a rush of breath. “You prefer the both and?”

Nicco held her gaze. “When the occasion calls for it. When the…partner calls for it.”

Hanna’s words were catching in her throat, a tangle of complex, curious desire that seemed to be dragging her deeper and deeper into the shadows. It was like being pulled out to sea in the dead of night, deadly, but enticing because of that, not despite it.

“Tell me…”

Nicco licked the damned full lip of his. “You aren’t afraid of anything, are you?”

Hanna shook her head. “That’s where you’re wrong, Captain. I’m afraid of so much. I just promised myself that it would never stop me.”

“Then you tell me first. Why do you hate Ralston so much?”

Hanna looked down at her feet, at the crisscrossing pattern of her heels over winter-pale skin, at the burst of red on her toes.

“It’s not my story to tell, Nicco,” she whispered. “You’ll have to ask him.”

The only him between them was Ash, the man who was somehow bringing them both together in the dark night and forcing them a million miles apart. Because no matter what happened, no matter what urges they gave into or sins they tasted, Ash would always be right in the middle.

And I don’t hate the idea of that.

Nicco circled her wrist and held her gaze. “I can understand that. But you’d tell me if it came to it, right?”

Hanna didn’t hesitate. Ash hadn’t been in her life for a long time, not really, but Nicco had been the one watching out for him, giving him a path forward, something to hang his hat on. She knew he only asked because he cared as much as she did.

“I promise,” she whispered. “If it comes to it.”

Nicco nodded. “Then far be it from me to back down from my side of the bargain. I’ve only played the game on occasion, Leone. It’s not like it is for Dante and the others, not for me. I don’t need it, but…” The hitch in his voice was deep, a growl that resonated down to Hanna’s toes, made her swallow. “But I do want it…” His voice somehow dropped even deeper. “All of it.”

Chapter Eleven

What was it about Hanna Van Rijn that made Nicco want to flay himself wide on the altar of honesty and truth? There were so very many secrets he kept close to the chest in his life, secrets that would most certainly upset the delicate ecosystem he had created, secrets that hinted at deeper truths than Nicco ever wanted to acknowledge.

And she was pulling each and every one of them from him with expert precision, teasing things he had promised he would never tell another living soul.

Maybe it was because he liked her bravado, the way she didn’t let fear or worry drive her, how she held her head up high even when staring into the face of two men she truly seemed to hate. Maybe it was because he liked how she went to battle with Ash, pulling out the fiery, impassioned side of his best friend, the side Nicco had been missing these many months.

Maybe it was that damn dress that clung to her curves and teased at hidden, shadowed spaces, keeping Nicco thoroughly distracted all night long.

Or maybe it was just her, the bright, unyielding ball of flame and impulse that called to something within him that Nicco hadn’t even realized was missing.

He didn’t just have to tell Hanna the truth, like she was some kind of hypnotist plying his secrets for her own amusement. He wanted to, wanted her to know the things about him no one else knew, just to see how brave she really was.

Just to see if she’d still want to stick around.

“Nicco…” Her voice was low and rough, colored by need that sent bursts of desire through his own body. His cock had been stirring to life from the moment he’d seen her battle-ready in her green dress staring Ash down, and it had rediscovered a will to survive when the word Daddy had slipped out of her unapologetic lips, but now, with the wreck of desire on her own face…Nicco was finding that he was still very, very alive.

“Leone…”

She took a shaky breath. “One secret. Before we have to go back to all of it. Can you tell me…just one?”

He wanted to give her all his secrets, because he knew she’d keep them safe. Because he knew she’d understand. But they didn’t have the luxury of time on their side.

Instead, he stepped closer to her, so aware of the curve of her breasts in the moonlight, of the single loose red curl that stroked her throat the way he wanted to stroke her throat.