2. Salvatore
2
Salvatore
For better or worse, he’ll live.
I kick Lance over with the toe of my boot. He croaks a pathetic whine, fingers knotted in his wet, matted hair. Head wounds always bleed like a bitch. He looks up from beneath his curls as the blood finds a snaking path down his face. He holds a trembling question in his dazed eyes—wondering if I’ve given him the worst of it. If I’m done with him yet.
The girl is still on the floor. Like a model, her lipstick smudged against those plush lips, her already short dress riding up the creamy length of her thigh. Her dress is ripped, and she struggles to keep her tits from bursting through the hem.
Fuck, I want her alone.
“Lance,” I say, the name soft and dangerous on my lips, “One more drop of blood on this carpet, and it’ll be your body we roll up in it when we replace it.”
The kid has enough sense left to lurch to his feet.
“Yes, sir,” he slurs. He stumbles like those drunks out on the dance floor, but he makes it out the door. Glass crunches under my feet as I regard the mess.
The girl gathers herself, smoothing out her dress. She looks good like that—a little frazzled. It puts a wildness in her eyes. She studies me with the same intensity I give her, the two of us sizing each other up. For a half hour, the club security cameras have been trained on Contessa Lovera. Not the tills or the entrances and exits. Only her on a dozen grainy screens.
Sometimes, the universe solves your problems for you.
“Lance has a bad habit of touching things that don’t belong to him.”
“Oh,” she says, the word soft and sweet. I want to taste it on those lips she keeps worrying between her pretty white teeth. “Well, I don’t belong to anybody. Maybe he thought I was free dibs.”
I can almost pity her naivety.
She couldn’t be more wrong about that.
“I won’t tell anyone what happened,” she adds, a little too fast, eager to escape. “Not that anything really happened.” She steps closer, oblivious that she isn’t out of danger; she’s approaching it. “Will he be alright?”
That’s a hell of a question.
“What do you care if he lives or dies, after that?”
She doesn’t come up with an answer. Does she really care about the well-being of some fatherless bastard who just had her pinned against a wall like a cheap, dispensable whore? No wonder daddy dearest isn’t handing over the keys to the kingdom to her.
Slowly, I close the door to the freedom she thinks I’m giving her. Her eyes move between me and the exit. Realization starts to set in. She takes as many steps back as she can until she finds herself against the corner, the pitch of her voice rising as the distance closes.
“What are you doing?” She asks. “I told you; I won’t tell anyone—”
My silence finally drives her mad.
“What do you want? You saved me just so you can take your turn?” she asks. “I’ve had enough trauma for one evening, thanks.”
I don’t answer. The truth grows weighty and loud around us, her expression changing.
She finally realizes—I know exactly who she is.
Contessa Lovera, the only child of Gio Lovera, head of the Lovera family and their long-standing criminal empire. She is my biggest rival’s greatest weakness, and she has hand-delivered herself to her family’s enemies. Her once bewildered stare changes to a cold, resolved understanding.
Maybe if she wasn’t so beautiful, maybe if she didn’t carry her pedigree like a war banner in the features of her soft, gorgeous face, I wouldn’t have recognized her on a security screen.
But there’s no mistaking who this woman is. We are two wolves sensing each other among a pack of domesticated dogs. One glance and I knew her immediately.
She is the solution to all my problems, wrapped up in one perfect, gorgeous package.
Lance has good taste and shitty luck.
She cranes her neck up to look at me and meet my gaze. She doesn’t cower, but she doesn’t dare breathe either. Her eyes glitter darkly—and it isn’t just fear I see there.
I want to know what that emotion is, want to see if I can taste the heat of it on her slightly parted lips.
Just the sight of this girl turns my thoughts dark and hot, pouring heat through my veins. I always take what I want. By necessity, that is my nature—and now, I want one thing. I want her . I want her spread open, pinned down, ruined. I want to see how those pretty eyes roll back when she comes, feel how her thighs shudder when she’s pushed to the brink. I want her broken in my arms and riding on my cock.
“I’m not like Lance.” I take her by the chin, scrub my thumb over her soft jaw. She surprises me when she doesn’t flinch away, studying me beneath those long eyelashes. I lean close to her ear, drinking in her scent, the closeness of her body. “I’m worse .”
“Salvatore Mori,” she says coldly.
I don’t smile often, but when I do, I can feel the stretch of the scar her father left me. A faded reminder of the past that stretches from the cheekbone to the corner of my lip. I feel it now as the recognition dawns on her face, reflected in those big, expressive eyes. Eyes that show too much; too soft and earnest.
“How is dear old dad, by the way?”
“Peachy. Probably getting ready to kill you,” she answers lowly.
“Well, everyone needs a hobby. . .” Her fear is quickly evaporating in the heat between us. “You’re starting to sound like a Lovera. You like this, don’t you?”
A telling blush crawls up her neck and flushes her cheeks.
“No,” she lies.
My hand curls between her thighs, fingers skirting against the wetness of her pussy. A woman’s cunt always tells the truth. She isn’t wearing panties, and my fingers drag across her warm, slick folds. She gasps and rocks against my fingers. The muscle in her throat works, lips opening in shock. She stares into my face, caught somewhere between shame and interest.
“ Yes ,” I correct her.
Her cheeks turn pink, her eyes darker.
“You don’t want this fight,” she gasps, the edge in her voice growing sharper as I stroke my fingers against her. “Please. It could be like none of this happened, please . Oh! ” She lurches against me, trembling as I barely touch her.
Disagreement rumbles in my chest.
She searches my face, looking for a way to play me. She probably wants an avenue for sympathy, or some get-out-of-hell free card that she won’t find. Not with me. “I don’t know what your father told you about me, but if he told you anything at all, then you should know—I always get what I want.”
“And what do you want?” She asks, as if she can negotiate.
Her breath hitches as I withdraw my hand.
The moment trembles.
“The one thing I don’t have. A bride.”
That renders her speechless. Finally, she bites out a bewildered laugh. I don’t blame her.
The girl doesn’t know how I operate yet. She doesn’t know that I’m an all-or-nothing sort of man, and that once I make a decision, it’s made for good.
“A man like you—just write a fucking check and get shipped one,” she says. Technically, I could.
“I’m afraid they don’t have what I want in stock.”
She finally gives up the fight with her ruined dress, tits out and swelling with every breath. I cup one in my hand just to watch her gasp.
“Don’t—”
“You come to my territory, you play by my rules, princess. Everything here belongs to me. Now, that includes you.”
“My friends—”
“Will be able to leave here completely unharmed. That’s the best deal that I will offer you, Contessa.”
“Tessa,” she spits and knocks my hand away, “It’s just Tessa.”
“Always knew you’d grow up to be embarrassed by that name. Contessa suits the heir of a dying dynasty, don’t you think? Nobody considers your family royalty anymore. So daddy has to go and name his daughter after a royal fucking title. The last desperate breath of a dying empire trying to remember its glory days.”
“Look, I don’t know about any of that! I don’t care about my father’s business. We don’t talk. I’m not the leverage you think I am. This is a waste of your time, so just—”
I push her against the wall again. A soft gasp leaves her lips, tinged with a vulnerable whimper.
“Is that why you want someone to take charge of you so badly? Daddy failed in his duties and now this is what turns you on?”
She doesn’t answer, trembling and flushed with both fear and arousal. My sheer presence affects her. Being powerful doesn’t do it for me much anymore. Once you climb to the top, people’s fear and respect become expected. The norm. But there’s something in the way she looks at me, like she can’t resist her own wanting. That look is better than a drug.
“You don’t know anything about me,” she whispers.
“I know you want me to fuck you.”
She doesn’t deny it. The tension that stretches between us had grown heavy and electric.
We stand on the edge of a storm that is about to start churning and throw our worlds into chaos.
I hold out my hand. One last chance.
“Come on, princess. I’ve been the monster under your bed your whole life. It’s about time we got to know each other.”