Chapter 20
Chapter
Twenty
ISLA
I struggle not to flinch, my pulse in overdrive, my skin alive from his touch.
“Why?” My voice is raw, my throat desert dry as I push to my knees.
He stiffens, as though proximity itself is a provocation, his internal conflict so visceral I can feel it in the air between us.
“Because what we were progressing toward two years ago isn’t an option.
And having you look at me with anything other than hatred tortures me with something I can’t have. ”
My sternum aches like it’s splitting down the middle.
“Tell me you understand.” His other hand rises to my hair, his fingers tangling through the strands, making my scalp tingle. He touches me as if mesmerized, cataloging a treasure he’s already decided to discard.
“I do.” The words are a whisper of surrender to the inevitable heartbreak as he strokes my jaw in a slow, devastating line of adoration.
His thumb drags lower, grazing my chin, brushing my bottom lip. My heart hammers a frantic rhythm against my ribs, my stomach a tight knot of anticipation.
“There’s no future for us, Isla.”
A low, helpless sound escapes me.
His nostrils flare. “This is exactly why you should stay away from me.” His thumb presses harder against the seam of my lips, daring me to open for him.
“Then stop touching me,” I plead.
He drags my lip lower, feeding the fire as his gaze rakes over my face like he’s a man at war with himself, every line of his body taut while his eyes scream with ruin. “I don’t know how.”
My chest heaves, the confession brutalizing.
His attention drops to my mouth, and the air stills.
The conflict in his features solidifies, growing darker, more absolute. A pure, undiluted hunger that matches the thrum burning through me.
“Fuck it.” He leans in, voice rough. “I’m under your control, la mia rovina. But tomorrow it stops. Tonight, I’m not strong enough.”
His lips claim mine.
It’s not the chaotic, anger-fueled collision from earlier. This kiss is slow devastation. Calculated carnage. It steals my breath, branding every inch of me with savage precision.
I moan, a willing victim to his mastery.
I claw at his shirt, desperate, while he controls the pace, the depth, the destruction.
He fists my hair, angling my head, deepening the contact. His tongue sweeps over mine in the sweetest dance of pained worship.
The perfection of it burns my lungs.
He releases me, his hands driving a scorching path down my body, searing my hips, palming my ass. He grips tight, pulling me flush against him, the hardness of his body unforgiving.
I gasp as he lifts me and tugs on the restrictive material of my skirt, hitching it higher until I can wrap my legs around him.
“This can’t continue.” He spins us, dropping onto the daybed with me straddling his lap, my skirt bunched indecently around my hips. “Once morning comes—”
“I know.” I cut him off with another kiss, not willing to endure a lecture on how he’ll move on.
It’s bad enough that I’ll have to walk away. Entrust the Cavallo portfolio to someone else. Only see him at work functions and galas, where we’ll pretend this never happened.
But right now, he’s mine. And for one brief moment, I get to be his.
I grind against him, his cock hard and adamant between my thighs. I become lost in the drag of his mouth. The scrape of his teeth. The harsh grasp of powerful fingers.
He groans my name, the sound a gut-deep ache that resonates in my soul. “Non sono più io, quando ti tocco.”
“English,” I beg.
His arm wraps around my waist as he maneuvers us, laying me down, pinning me beneath him. “I’m not myself when I’m touching you.”
My heart skips violently, my pulse a frantic, struggling beat.
“I’ve never been able to look at you without wanting you, Isla.”
I cling to him. “Say it in Italian.”
His lips hover over mine, the darkness in his eyes brimming with lust. “Non sono mai riuscito a guardati senza desiderarti.”
God, I believe him. With all that I am and everything I’ll be.
“Non ci sarà mai un’altra.”
I shudder, enraptured by his words, his voice, the way his palm slides possessively up my thigh. My body throbs beneath his, every inch screaming for more.
His hand skims higher, all rough fingers and calloused skin. He delves beneath the scrunched material of my skirt, grazing silk.
My breathing fractures, the heat in my belly coiling as he drags his knuckles over the delicate barrier.
“Raffael—” I choke out.
“La mia rovina.” He kisses me again, slower this time. His tongue sweeps mine, tasting, taking, consuming while his fingers slip beneath my underwear to where I’m wet and desperate.
He groans. “Cosi fottutamente perfetta.”
“Oh, God, you need to speak Italian more often.” I clutch at him, nails digging into his shoulders. “Please—”
His thumb finds my clit, stealing all my sense and reason.
I whimper, grinding into the press of his hand.
He works me with his fingers. With grazes of teeth and guttural curses that vibrate into my bones. And still it’s not enough.
“I need more,” I rasp.
“I’ll give you all I have.” His hands leave me only long enough to tug his belt loose and lower his zipper. “Whatever you want, Isla, it’s yours. Without question.”
But only for tonight hangs in the silence, slicing me with cruelty.
He hovers above me, anguish etched in the shadows of his face—regret warring with desire neither of us can bury.
“Are you sure you want this?” he asks.
I nod, my body trembling with urgency as I shimmy out of my panties. “Without a doubt.”
He lowers his attention to my pussy, gaze ablaze. “Bene.” His fingers slide down my entrance, teasing, coaxing. “Non sopravvivrei se mi negassi.”
I drown in the seductive drawl as his weight returns between my thighs.
And then the hard length of him sinks inside me. Not rushed. Not angered or punishing like before. A single, devastating stroke—slow and deliberate—forcing me to feel him, to take him, to stretch around him until pleasure and pain bloom into sweet torment.
I bite back a cry. Half bliss. Half heartache.
I wrap a leg over his hip, demanding more, anchoring him deeper. He answers with merciless authority, steady consuming thrusts that build into a fevered pulse.
Each stroke is ruthless. Relentless. Crafted to make the world disappear so I feel, and think, and breathe nothing but him.
He maintains the rhythm like a weapon, refusing to give me the frenzy I crave. Instead, he drags it out, every drive meticulous, every withdrawal calculated to keep me trembling on the edge.
My moans sharpen, growing louder, but he silences them with his lips, his kiss plundering with the same hunger as his body until he eventually pulls back for air.
He watches me, his stare devouring while I writhe beneath him.
“Christ,” he rasps. His hands capture mine, pinning them above my head, our fingers lacing with an intimacy that threatens to shatter me. “The way you take me…”
I bite my bottom lip, rolling my hips, already close. “Harder.”
The feral rumble of his approval vibrates against my chest as he obeys.
His forehead brushes mine. “I want to see you this time. I want to watch you come undone around my cock.”
I shake my head, the pleasure building. I’m not ready for this to be over. Yet my climax stalks me, prowling closer.
“Voglio scoparti finché non dimentichi il tuo nome, mio tesoro,” he growls, low and filthy, in my ear. “Se fossi mia, vivrei per adorarti.” His grip on my fingers tightens while he thrusts harder, faster. “Se soltanto fossi mia.”
“Raffael—” I gasp, my back arching, my toes curling.
“Se soltanto fossi mia, tesoro mio,” he repeats, the words haunting, each drive of his hips a deliberate, maddening claim.
I can’t take any more.
I come undone with his lips against mine, every logical, self-preserving reason to walk away tomorrow simply vanishing.