Page 21 of Sacred Sin

I stripped and got in the shower quickly because there was one thing I needed more than a nap. With one hand on the wall for support, I gripped my length in the other. My cock was painfully hard and in need of relief. It was impossible to stay focused when images of Niki’s naked body in Marko’s bed appeared unbidden in my thoughts.

The images kept shifting from Niki in Marko’s bed to her tears, then to her pouty lips as she bit back a retort, until I blew my load into my hand.

After a quick clean-up, I dried off and climbed into bed. My last thought before sleep claimed me was that bringing Nicolette into my home had been a mistake.

Unfortunately, it was a mistake I already knew I wasn’t willing to correct.

Chapter 7

Nicolette

After Gio slammed my door and left me alone in the guest room, I sank to the floor and cried because the loving man I’d left behind now hid behind a wall of cold cynicism I didn’t know how to reach. It had been too long since I’d been in his sphere, listening to intense dinner conversations in the Vitale mansion, and way too long being on my own.

Marko had changed too, like he’d traded up from jeans to custom-made Italian suits. His outward appearance had changed, but deep down, his character hadn’t. The added toughness and take-no-prisoners attitude made me hungry to be taken by him. Back at the hotel, I’d drunkenly crawled into his bed, needing the comfort his strong arms had always offered. I pushed for more, needing to reconnect with him on a purely physical level. He’d gently declined my advances, then thrown an arm over me, falling quickly back to sleep.

When my eyes grew too heavy to resist anymore, I’d fallen asleep with his heavy arm sinking me into a blissful place of peace and safety I hadn’t felt in a long time. Gio finding us that way in the morning was both a blessing and a curse.

Hail Mary full of grace.

The familiar prayer drifted through my thoughts the way it always did when life felt too heavy to carry alone.

His anger showed that he felt something for me, but it also revealed the depth of the wound I’d left behind. Twelve years had passed, and somehow I’d managed to hurt the one person who had always tried to protect me.

Maybe that was why it hurt so much to look at him now.

Not because he was angry.

Because I understood why.

I hadn’t fought his demand for my return home, knowing that he would ensure I lived through my final performance. Now, I wondered if being so agreeable and compliant was such a good idea. I’d put my life into the hands of a very angry man whose reactions I could no longer predict.

Frustrated and upset, I finally went to the one place that offered freedom from hurtful thoughts and scary feelings—dance. It didn’t matter if I was in class or rehearsal or just dancing on my own; nothing burdened me. Dance brought solace to my soul, and it was in those moments that my world made sense.

I’d always danced as a child, at least until my mother passed. Afterward, if my father caught me dancing, he would always punish me. He hadn’t been able to cope with losing my mother, and her death had destroyed the human part of him, leaving a nasty enforcer behind to raise their daughter.

Moving and switching to a school that offered performing arts had been a huge blessing. I spent hours in church thanking Mary for my luck changing for the better. That would have been enough to help me float in an attitude of gratefulness for the rest of my life, but I’d also found Gio and Marko.

They’d become my family and the entire Vitale clan along with them. Guilt settled heavily in my chest at how much pain running away must have caused, especially when coupled with the death of Luciano, Gio’s father.

So many times, I wished I could reach out to Isabella, but each time I pressed the buttons for the house number, I’d hung up. What would I say? How could I explain my reasons for leaving to the only person who’d been like a mother to me, even more than my own had ever been?

Screw it! I changed into a tank and shorts and grabbed my shoes. I tiptoed down the hallway to find Gio’s bedroom. The blanket was thrown back and I couldn’t help staring at his body and the changes in it since I’d last seen him naked. He was muscular, but far from bulky. Gio had always been way too handsome for his own good, drawing women like bees to honey.

His legs were larger, stronger than before, his chest widened and tapered to a sexy V at his trim waist… His long, thick cock lay against his inner thigh, a sleeping beast calling to me to touch it. Before I could give in, he moved onto his side, hiding the temptation from sight.

Tiptoeing back the way I’d come, I headed outdoors and into the sun. The brightness of the day mocked my inner melancholy, and I almost went back inside. But doing so would just sink me back to the buzzing thoughts of doubt and introspection I longed to escape.

I sat down on the edge of the stage and put on my shoes, flexing and pointing until they felt just right. I put in my AirPods, a gift from my sponsor, and found my warm-up playlist.

I worked through plié, ronde de jambe en l’air, and a host of classic warm-up poses until I felt sufficiently ready to leap and twirl. The play we would be performing in a few weeks was a modernized, bastardized version of Firebird called The Debt, the script having been rewritten by my director, Sergei, the supposed great-grandson of Sergei Diaghilev, a talented man who helped to bring Firebird to the stages of Russia and Europe at the turn of the last century.

I imagined myself as a bird with magical abilities. The comparison came far too easily.

Gio had always been the great hunter. Relentless. Focused. Impossible to distract once he’d decided what he wanted. Marko was different. Softer. Patient. The prince who looked for solutions while Gio looked for battles.

And me?

I’d spent most of my life trying to escape cages only to discover I’d built a few of my own.