Chapter 5
Chapter Five
O N THE DRIVE INTO town, they’d shared a companionable, thoughtful silence. On the drive back to the mansion, it was less companionable, and considerably pricklier. At least, it felt that way to Willow.
Her mind kept ticking over his comments, his obvious perception of her relationship with Tom, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that he was right. Which only made her angrier. It wasn’t Francesco’s fault. In fact, the part of her brain that was capable of rational, objective thought could even see that as a friend, he had a sort of obligation to be brutally honest with her about what he saw in their relationship.
But his comments had come out of nowhere, slamming into her like a freight train. It probably had more to do with Meredith, and how wearing Willow found spending time with her stepmother. While she’d developed a sort of game to handle Meredith’s judgmental attitudes, it hadn’t really helped with the hurt. It had made it, on some level, more bearable, but at the end of the day, she had to live with the fact that she wasn’t—and never would be—accepted by the other woman. And her father didn’t care.
As they approached the wrought iron gates to her family’s estate, Francesco slowed down and pulled his car to the side of the road, then angled his broad, man-mountain body to face her. He took up so much of the car, suddenly she found it hard to breathe.
“Willow.” His voice was low and raspy, stern, like he was going to reprimand her. “Look at me.”
She dug her teeth into her lower lip, keeping her gaze belligerently ahead. “Why?”
“You’re angry. Or upset.”
She chewed her lip harder.
“And now you’re not even looking at me.”
She huffed out a breath then turned to face him. And instantly regretted it. He was close. Or maybe it was just that the car was so small-seeming. She couldn’t say. But separated by only a few inches, with his startlingly beautiful eyes, all darkly rimmed and perceptive, his angular face, and full, sweeping mouth, her stomach dropped right down to her toes.
“What is it?” he pushed, his expression neutral, even as his eyes scanned her.
What could she say to that? Where could she even begin? “Nothing. I’m fine.”
His lip quirked to the side. “Clearly.”
She huffed out another breath. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
He reached up then, his hand touching her cheek, sending shockwaves of awareness through her. Need. Or neediness? That awful, familiar desire for reassurance that stemmed from the black hole of feeling utterly and completely unloved and wanting someone—anyone—to clog it. She swallowed hard, past the lump that had suddenly developed right at the base of her throat, like she’d got a lozenge stuck there or something.
“Your relationship with Tom is none of my business.” It was the worst thing he could have said. Worse than making her feel like Tom hadn’t loved her enough was Francesco acting like he didn’t care either.
She glanced away quickly, but his hand stayed where it was, lightly brushing her cheek. A moment later, it dropped to her shoulder, at the same time he let out a small breath. A sigh?
“You were right. I’m no expert in relationships.”
She ignored the familiar pang in her chest and tried to grab hold of that. Of anything that might anchor them back into the present, and the reality of who and what they were—old friends.
“Are you really admitting you don’t know everything, Francesco?” She tried to infuse a teasing note into her voice, and smiled, for good measure, glancing back at him.
And his beautiful face. His dark eyes, like gemstones in his too handsome face.
She pressed her teeth into her lip, harder now, willing the pain to take away from all the other emotions that were swirling through her.
She wanted him to kiss her.
She wanted to feel those lips on hers.
But it would be a mistake. It would be a kiss borne of her need for reassurance, an attempt to shovel something into the emptiness inside her chest. The black hole that could never, seemingly, be fixed.
And to try to fix it with Francesco would be the worst mistake she could make, because in a life that was somewhat emotionally barren, her friendship with Francesco was something real and important, a touchstone that mattered to her.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” she murmured, frowning a little.
“ Perche non? It’s true. My track record speaks for itself.”
“Why?”
His eyes ran over her face. “Because I’ve been with a lot of women.”
She willfully ignored the stretching feeling inside of her chest, the strangely elastic sensation of her ribs expanding to the point of no return.
“One could argue that makes you very knowledgeable about relationships.”
“Except we both know my relationships are intentionally short lived and shallow. Though no less satisfying for that, I’ll grant you.”
Now the sensation in her chest morphed into something else. Jealousy. Anger. Frustration. All of the rage she usually kept tamped way, way down, deep inside of her.
“Possibly even more so,” he added, unhelpfully.
She made a soft noise, a sound of disdain. Or want. She could hardly tell.
“You are annoyed again,” he murmured, momentarily unnerving Willow for how well he could read her.
She shook her head. His hand lifted back to her cheek and Willow’s eyes widened. “I’m curious,” she said softly. “How does it work?”
He was silent, waiting. Watchful.
“You meet a woman in a bar, take her back to your place? Or hers? And then, what?”
He arched a thick, dark brow, his lips quirking in a teasing, half-smile. “What do you think, cara ?”
Her cheeks flushed pink, and her heart did a funny little squishy thing at his repeated usage of the term of endearment.
“We enjoy one another.”
Her skin prickled all over. Her breath seemed to be coming too hard and fast. “Enjoy one other,” she repeated, just to feel the words in her mouth, to appreciate them to their fullest.
His response was a sort of growl. A throaty noise that indicated agreement. Her pulse leapt.
“Okay,” she said, though what she meant by that, she didn’t know.
“Have you never been with a man just because you wanted to, in that moment?”
She swallowed, that damned lozenge sensation in her throat getting stronger.
“It’s just sex, cara. Beautiful, addictive, fun, pleasurable sex.”
“You make it sound as simple as slipping on a pair of shoes.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s more than that,” she said, struggling for words. Struggling to understand her own feelings, then, because he was muddling her up so completely.
“Not if neither party wants it to be.”
She massaged the inside of her cheek, trying to calm her rioting nerves.
“So, you only fuck women who are as cavalier about this stuff as you are?” The curse was satisfying to throw at him in that moment. It cheapened the conversation, the concept of sex; it was crude and base, and it felt damn good.
“I only fuck women who know what I am offering,” he threw it right back to her though, and damn it if hearing the word in his accented voice didn’t make her stomach go all twisty and loopy.
“One night.”
“Two, three, four. Maybe a week.”
She let out a low whistle, hoping it sounded scathing, or sarcastic, or something that would conceal the way her insides were fluttering and heating.
“You think this is problematic?”
“It’s none of my business.”
“I never had you pegged as a prude.”
“I’m not a prude,” she retorted quickly, her insides flashing with something like pain and embarrassment. Memories of high school, parties where boys tried to kiss her and she demurred, flooded Willow’s brain. It wasn’t that she hadn’t been interested, but Meredith had made sure she knew how precious her reputation was. Even then, she’d known she was expected to come home, meet the right sort of man and get married. But she garnered a reputation as an ice queen, and those silly high school boys had loved to try to prove they had what it took to seduce her. She blinked away. Francesco wasn’t one of those guys. He wasn’t a jerk. He was her friend, and this conversation was entirely inappropriate. She forced a smile, made herself look him in the eyes. “We should get back to the house now.”
But frustration was clearly visible on his face. It was written in the way his features tightened and his eyes darkened, in the way his lips pulled slightly to the side, and a muscle throbbed at the base of his jaw. It was a wave, rushing towards her, a tide she couldn’t outrun.
“You have a habit of doing that, you know.”
She didn’t know. She didn’t follow, at all. “Doing what?”
“Shutting things down when it gets too real.”
Her brows shot up. “I disagree.” Her eyes dropped to the console between them, more spaceship than car. “You know more about me than pretty much anyone.”
“Sure. I have an academic understanding of the things you are happy to share. But when it comes to actually getting in here, you push me away,” he said, tapping a finger to the side of her head before letting it drop a little lower, to her cheek. She drew in a deep breath, as he moved it sideways, to her mouth, and let his fingertip just hover there. Goosebumps tingled over her spine.
“We’re friends,” she disputed, a little unevenly. “What do you want from me?”
An excellent question. And an excellent point. They were friends, and he’d always been glad for that. As for what he wanted from Willow? Well, that was both easy and hard to say. Because he knew, on a physical level, that he wanted to drag her body against his and kiss her senseless. But she wasn’t just some woman in a bar. She wasn’t just someone he could kiss and flirt with a little, take to bed and make love to all night and then say goodbye to without a backwards glance.
This was Willow, she of the magic wand wielding, family friend, supported him in his darkest days fame. They had a long history. An important history. She was more to him than sex.
Except in that moment, when she was looking at him with those huge eyes of hers all confused and uncertain, mirroring back to him everything he was feeling. Which meant, what? Because Francesco didn’t want to open this door. He really didn’t want to go down any kind of road that might lead to hurting Willow, or raising her expectations, making her think there might be a relationship in the future for them, because that was the absolute last thing Francesco wanted.
“I mean it, Francesco. What do you want?”
If only she hadn’t asked it again.
If only she hadn’t forced his warring brain to settle on the truth of what he did indeed desperately want.
“This.” And the word was hoarse and gruff, even to his own ears, punctuated by impatience and need, by the fire in his belly that was demanding he reach out and claim her, sense and rational thought be damned.
His hand moved quickly, sliding from the side of her lips to the back of her head, his fingers tangling in that long, spectacular hair that her stepmother seemed to take such issue with, gripping her there, holding her for his inspection before pushing her forward at the same time he moved his whole body, to close the gap between them.
“What do I want?” he asked, when his lips were just a whisker from hers. “Isn’t it fucking obvious?”
He felt her shiver. A tremble that rocked her whole body, that made his cock hard against his pants, so he suddenly wished they were anywhere but in a car, just outside her family’s estate. But the last thing he wanted to do was put the brakes on this, even to find a more suitable location, because common sense would not be kept at bay forever.
Thanking God for darkly tinted windows, he gave into this feeling; he kissed her. Not a gentle kiss. Not an uncertain kiss. Not a kiss like two friends should share. He pushed his mouth against hers, separated her lips, and kissed her hard. Kissed her until he felt like their bodies were morphing, kissed her until she was moaning into his mouth, saying something that might have been his name, pushing her body hard against his, her breasts all soft and round against his chest. His fingers moved to the hem of her shirt, parting it so he could touch the bare skin of her hip. Now it was his turn to groan, as he felt her warmth and a shudder rolled his whole body.
He swore into her mouth, releasing his grip on the back of her head just so he could reach around behind himself for the seat controls and push his back, creating a decent enough amount of space that when he unhooked Willow’s seatbelt, she could move, somehow making it look like a choreographed dance to shimmy across the centre console and into his lap, her mouth seeking his once more, her body pressed to him in a different way now.
He saw the moment she felt his hardness, saw the way her eyes widened, and her cheeks flushed, felt the way her body shivered, and something like delirium overtook him. Or madness.
And even if he’d wanted to pull back, to try to find that thread of common sense he knew to be buried inside of him, somewhere, Willow made it impossible. She shifted in the seat, laughing a little against his mouth because it was far from spacious for the two of them. But somehow, she arranged herself so she was straddling him, her body over his, and then it was Willow who was reaching down for the controls and pushing his seat backwards, all the way back, so he was essentially lying down, her body on top of his.
“Better,” she murmured, leaving him wondering where the hell her sanity had gone. Because last time, Willow had been the one who’d put a stop to this. Willow had been the one who’d pointed out that he wasn’t in his right mind, that he’d been drinking and he was in grief. Had he been counting on her to be the sensible one, yet again?
Or was he glad that she was as willing to surrender herself to this as he was?
He opened his mouth to say something. Anything. To lay down some ground rules, to make sure they were both on the same page, but then she ground herself against his cock and any concept of thought flew from his mind. He was driven then purely by an animalistic need to have and take, to bury himself inside of her.
Had he really thought he just wanted a kiss?
Had he thought that would be enough?
“Fuck, Willow,” he ground, throwing caution utterly and completely to the wind, as his fingers dug into her hips and held her low on his body. “Do you have any idea what I want to do to you?”
Her eyes widened and her lips parted, her hair tousled over one shoulder. She stared at him for so long he thought he might have actually scared her, but then she shook her head, leaning down and kissing his lips, before dragging her mouth over his chin, towards his jaw and throat. “Tell me,” she implored, her teeth nipping his flesh there, her tongue lashing out to run across his collar bone, while her fingers worked the buttons of his shirt, separating them until she could hungrily trail her fingers over his torso.
“I want to fuck you,” he said, simply. Truthfully. “Hard. I want to take you right here, right now, with no care who might drive by and see us. I want to bury myself inside of you, and watch as you fall apart at the seams. I want to make you scream my name, until your voice is hoarse and your whole body is trembling.”
She lifted her face and stared up at him, then ground her hips down, in a silent, ancient, primal invitation to do exactly that, so he swore softly because the venue was hardly ideal. Nor was the fact Willow was wearing pants.
But he was not a man to be put off by idle challenges, and wild horses wouldn’t keep him from taking what he wanted—needed—in that moment.
“Do it,” she said, softly, putting words to the movement of her hips, to the silent invitation she’d issued. “Do it,” she repeated, so he groaned, as his hands found the waistband of her pants and began to push them lower, in concert with Willow bending her legs, folding herself first one way and then another, laughing as her foot collided with the steering wheel and the horn made a low, passionate sound of agreement.
He didn’t laugh. He was concentrating too hard on holding it together. On keeping common sense at bay, on ignoring the voice in the back of his mind that was telling him this was a crazy ass idea. That he should stop this, right now, before it went any further.
But then, Willow—beautiful, gracious, elegant Willow—was naked from the waist down, and her hands were fussing with his belt, her teeth digging into her lower lip as she concentrated on undressing him. Her fingers, though, were shaking, and after a minute he brushed her hands aside, impatience flooding him. “Allow me.”
He worked quickly, undoing his belt, button and zip almost in one motion, reaching into his boxers and gripping his cock, groaning because of how good it felt just to touch. How much his whole body felt aflame for her. For this.
“You’re sure about this, cara ?” he asked, and he couldn’t believe he had the presence of mind to double check with Willow, given the way he was already spilling a little of his seed with urgency to possess her.
“What the hell do you think?” she muttered, moving her hips to straddle him properly once more, her eyes latched to his. “And yes, I know this is a stupid idea, and yes, I know we’ll have to talk about it afterwards, but I couldn’t care less about any of that right now. Fuck me, Francesco. Fuck me like I’m any other woman to you.”
He didn’t need to be told twice.