Epilogue #2
‘On the bed, Mia, now!’ he growled as he stalked towards me. ‘I have waited long enough.’
I backed up, forced to sit on the bed, then waddle back as he climbed up onto it too, to cage me in.
I lay back, my bikini doing nothing to disguise my need. He plucked at the strings, and within seconds I was naked, the yearning becoming turbo-charged.
‘Who made you the boss of me?’ I whispered, recalling the arguments we’d once had as I pressed my palm to his stubbled cheek and let my affection for him show.
He clasped my hand and dragged it away from his face to wrap it around his huge erection.
‘You did, Mia,’ he murmured, then leaned down and kissed me, thrusting his tongue deep in the dance of dominance and submission I adored.
As he explored my slick folds with knowing fingers, brushing my needy clit and making me ride his hand while I stroked him, he whispered, ‘As you are the boss of me, too.’
The rush of love was as overpowering as the rush of endorphins scenting the air while I climaxed.
He flipped me over, drawing me onto my knees so he could thrust himself deep while I was still clenching, spiraling upwards. He rode me to that glorious oblivion again and again as he cupped my breasts, stroked my belly and gave us both what we needed.
Hours later, after we’d showered and dined with Evie on our suite’s private terrace, he took me to bed again. And as we lay together, exhausted, his hard chest pressed against my back, his hands stroking the mound of my pregnancy, the baby kicked.
‘Il bambino is restless tonight,’ he murmured against my hair.
‘I think maybe you woke him up, Mr Insatiable,’ I announced, loving his deep chuckle of response.
‘I think maybe he is concerned that his mother is not fully mine yet…’
It took me a moment to make sense of the rumbled words through the endorphin haze, but when the meaning of them registered, I heard the regret in his tone, as well as the demand.
I shifted around so I could see Vito’s face in the moonlight coming through the terrace doors. ‘What do you mean, Vito? You know I’m yours, always.’
He clasped my cheek to brush my sweaty hair back from my face.
‘We must be married, Mia, for you to truly be mine always.’
I stared at him, not sure what to say.
It wasn’t the first time he’d demanded I marry him.
But I’d put him off, not because I wasn’t sure about him or about my love for him, but because I knew we both had a lot on our plates at the moment.
He was still figuring out how to deal with Dante and end the blood feud his father had started so long ago, and I was concentrating on the birth of our baby.
A wedding on top of that seemed like too much.
‘Vito, I…’
He pressed his finger to my lips. ‘Do not tell me no again, Mia.’
I shook off his finger, not liking that dictatorial tone of voice. ‘I didn’t tell you no. I just said we should wait until…’
‘If this is about a wedding,’ he interrupted me, ‘that can wait until you are ready, but I want to declare you as my wife, Mia. In front of man and God, before the baby arrives, and we are running out of time.’ His hand slid down to my belly to stroke the distended flesh, his thumb cruising along the line which had appeared bisecting my belly button.
‘I brought a priest with me from Rome for us to exchange our vows tomorrow night.’
I sat up in bed, frowning, the prickle of irritation growing that he wasn’t giving me a choice, that he was pressuring me. ‘So, are you asking me to marry you, or telling me, Vito?’ I demanded.
He sat up too, but instead of meeting my anger with anger of his own, he clasped my neck to drag me to him.
He covered my mouth with his, stifling any more protests.
The kiss was deep, demanding, forceful, and as possessive as always, but when he dragged his lips away, leaving us both panting, both aching, he pressed his forehead to mine and rested his hand on my belly.
‘If you are truly mine, Mia, why is this wrong?’
The gently asked question and the confusion on his face were my undoing. And all my objections dissolved in a rush of pure, unadulterated love.
Tears scalded my eyes. And my bottom lip began to quiver. ‘I guess…it isn’t,’ I managed, conceding defeat, even as joy wrapped around my heart. ‘I want to be yours, always. Let’s make it official.’
‘Brava ragazza,’ he murmured, a sensual smile making my heart pulse hard in my chest. He kissed me again, licking the tears off my cheeks, then wrapped his arms around me to lift me against his broad chest and hold me tight.
The next evening, we were married in front of Evie and Lorenzo and several of his other men, while the household staff arranged a feast for everyone.
I said my vows in my faltering Italian, and then the priest—who I suspected Vito had probably strong-armed from Rome—blessed us both.
Later that night, Vito sealed our union by taking me in slow, sensual waves, rocking into my body again and again, filling my heart and soul to bursting as he brought us both to a shattering orgasm.
I was a mafia don’s wife, and I couldn’t have been happier.
Vito
Three hours later
The sound of banging had me waking up too fast, shattering the blissful dreams of Mia, my wife.
‘Shhh…’ I heard her stir beside me.
I threw off the bed sheet and stalked through the suite, ready to eviscerate whoever the hell it was hammering on the door. But when I tugged it open, Lorenzo stood there with a machine gun in his hands, his eyes wild.
‘What the hell is going on that you would disturb our wedding night?’ I demanded.
‘It is Dante, padrone,’ Lorenzo said, his voice shaking with anger.
Dante? What the fuck?
‘Tell me!’ I demanded.
‘He escaped, during the wedding we think. We do not know how. He tied up the men guarding him and then waited.’
‘Dante is loose on the island?’ Fury blindsided me, especially when I heard Mia’s shocked whisper from behind me.
‘D-Dante’s escaped?’
I turned to see her standing in the moonlight with a thin wrap covering her nakedness.
‘He stole a boat and got away ten minutes ago,’ Lorenzo said. ‘We fired on him, but then we had to let him go…’
I grabbed a shirt from the dresser, the fury making my head feel as if it was about to explode. ‘Why the fuck did you let him escape?’ I said, tugging on the clothing, then reaching for my gun.
‘Because he had Signora Rocco’s sister tied to him.’
‘He’s kidnapped Evie!’ Mia’s cry had me swinging round. I lurched forward, catching her before she could crumple to the floor.
I scooped her into my arms.
‘Vito, you have to get her back!’ she cried, the distress in her eyes tearing my heart out. ‘I should have let you kill him when you had the chance…’ she said, the fear in her voice crucifying me.
‘Do not worry. We will get her back. He will not hurt her,’ I said, determined to believe it.
I could not be sure what that bastard would do to her.
But Dante was an intelligent man, shrewd and smart as well as wild.
Even if he had kidnapped her simply to make good his escape and use her as a shield against my men’s bullets, he would surely also know that hurting her would be signing his own death warrant.
And a part of me could not believe even now, that a boy who had once defended his mother so zealously would deliberately hurt a defenseless woman.
But when Mia spasmed in my arms, and I heard the deep moan of pain and felt the gush of water against my pantleg, Dante and Evie’s fate was propelled to the back of my mind.
‘Vito!’ Mia cried, gripping my shirt. ‘I think… I think the baby’s coming…’
‘Lorenzo, get the doctor out of bed.’ I threw the demand over my shoulder, making a promise to myself that if anything happened to Mia or my child tonight, Dante would not live to see morning.
Mia
Four hours later
I lay shaking, sore and exhausted, my arms so tired I could barely lift them, as Vito cradled me and our baby against his chest and kissed our son’s damp head.
‘He is beautiful, Mia, just as you are,’ he whispered.
I looked up at my husband, tears stinging my eyes.
The birth had been much swifter than expected, and predictably excruciating, with Vito threatening the poor doctor and his nurses with all sorts of retribution if they did not take my pain away, until I’d finally managed to convince him to let them do their jobs.
I stared at our son, his tiny fists clasped tight, his face screwed up in protest, before he let out another series of tired wails. I pressed my nipple to his mouth, and he latched on greedily.
He was three weeks early, but according to the obstetrician Vito had hired weeks ago, our son was healthy and more than large enough to survive without an incubator.
His lungs were certainly in good working order.
‘Wh-what’s happening with the search for Dante and Evie?’ I asked.
I’d managed to push the terrifying thoughts about my sister’s safety to the back of my mind while I had concentrated on bringing our baby into the world, but now he was safe and well—and beautiful, I thought, blinking back more tears—the fear returned.
Vito brushed my hair back from my face and placed a kiss on my forehead. ‘Do not worry, Mia. I am confident we will get her back unharmed. I promise you, he will not hurt her.’
‘How do you know that?’ I asked.
‘He is a bad man, a wild man, a dangerous man, but not one who would hurt a woman, I think. And she is…how do you say…his trump card. He has already sent a text on her phone, saying he wishes to negotiate a truce for Evie’s safe return.’
‘He… He has?’ I asked, hope surging. ‘But if he’s willing to negotiate now, why didn’t he do that before?’
‘Because he was a prisoner here. He wished to bargain from a position of strength. Taking your sister, escaping from here was part of his plan. This is why he has refused to sanction any deal for so long, I think.’
I nodded. Trying not to let my fear swamp me.
All I could do was hope now that Vito was right. And Dante wouldn’t hurt Evie.
I stared down at my baby…at our baby…clamped tight on my nipple, sucking voraciously. I smiled a watery smile. I trusted his daddy, implicitly. Not just to rescue Evie, but also to be honest with me about the threat Dante represented.
‘All we must do now is wait for him to decide what it is he wants. Then the negotiations begin.’ Vito said, pressing his large hand to our baby’s head.
‘And you, Signora Rocco,’ he said, his voice heavy with pride, ‘your job is to rest and recover after giving me the most beautiful son in the world.’
I yawned, so totally drained, emotionally as well as physically, it felt impossibly good to have Vito’s muscular arms around us both.
‘For once, I think I might do what you tell me to without an argument,’ I murmured, and he let out a husky laugh of approval.
Capturing my chin between his thumb and forefinger, he lifted my mouth for his kiss. ‘Brava ragazza.’
I felt the love flow between us as his lips covered mine. I swallowed down the lump of panic lodged in my throat as exhaustion overwhelmed me.
Tomorrow we would concentrate on getting Evie back and ending this bloody feud once and for all, but tonight was for us. And our baby boy. And our love. Which was the bedrock of this family now.
Hopefully one day soon, Dante would realise that, too.