Chapter Eight #3
I crash my mouth down on hers, a hungry kiss that’s all teeth and tongue and need. I am not gentle or kind. I am taking what I want, what she has been offering me all night.
Her hands fly to my chest, her fingers digging into my shirt, holding on as I plunder her mouth. She kisses me back with a wildness that matches my own, a ferocity that tells me she is as hungry as I am.
I break the kiss, my lips moving to her jaw, her throat. I nip at her skin, tasting her, marking her. She moans, a low, throaty sound that goes straight to my cock.
I want to hear that sound again.
I want to hear her scream.
One of my hands leaves the wall and slides down her body, over the curve of her hip, her thigh. I grab the back of her knee and lift her leg, wrapping it around my waist.
She gasps, her head falling back against the wall as I grind my hips against hers, the hard length of my cock pressing against the thin fabric of her pants.
"Mario," she breathes.
I am going to ruin her.
And she is going to let me. Eager for it, in fact.
I kiss her again, my tongue delving into her mouth, tasting her.
Then I roughly push away from her and let out a stream of curses in Italian.
She stares at me, dazed, lips swollen, chest rising and falling quickly.
“What?” she breathes.
I drag both hands through my hair and turn away before I put them back on her.
“This is exactly what I said I would not do.”
Her laugh is shaky and disbelieving. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“I’m taking advantage of you.”
“You are not taking advantage of me.”
“You are exhausted.”
“I am also an adult. A consenting one.”
“Yes.” I turn back to her. “An adult who nearly slept in her car tonight because she was too tired to drive.”
Instead of submission, the anger fires up in her eyes again.
She pushes off the wall and walks up to me, drilling her finger into my chest.
“Do you know why I’m so tired?” she demands.
Her finger is still pressed against my chest, small and furious and shaking.
“Huh?” she continues. “Do you know what’s been keeping me up at night?”
“Your work—”
“No,” she spits out. “Not work. Work doesn’t keep me up at night.” She drills into my chest again. “I’m tired because of you!”
I narrow my eyes.
“Me,” I repeat.
“Yes, you! You,” she says, “have been keeping me up at night, Mario. I am tired because of you. So you don’t get to use that as an excuse.”
Her fingers dig into my chest every time she says the word “you.”
I grab hold of her hand and hold it still.
“Explain,” I growl.
“I have not slept a full night since I met you,” she says. Her words spill out now, breathless and furious. “The dreams are driving me crazy. I have been waking up in the middle of the night thinking about your hands, your mouth, what you would feel like on top of me, inside of me.”
I still.
Everything in me stills.
The admission is so raw, so unexpected, that for a moment, I don’t know how to respond.
But she's not done.
"And you know the worst part of it? That it never even happens. That's right. I'm the only woman in the world having sex dreams without the actual sex! You come, you do… something, and then I wake up before it gets good. It’s the most frustrating thing I’ve ever experienced in my entire life.
“So don't stand there and tell me we are not going to do this because I'm tired, because I am going to lose my goddamn mind. I've already lost it. This is me losing it. Right now. Do you understand?”
I stare at her, stunned into silence.
I think it might be the first time.
She is breathing heavily, her chest heaving, her eyes blazing.
The woman standing in front of me is not the composed, controlled lawyer from the conference room. She is not the exhausted, vulnerable woman from the garage.
She is something else entirely.
She is a force of nature.
A whirlwind of frustration and desire and need, all aimed directly at me.
And I am… floored.
She has been dreaming of me too.
She has been lying in her bed at night, thinking of me, wanting me, just as I have been thinking of her.
The knowledge is a punch to the gut, a jolt of triumph.
And a wave of possessiveness so strong it almost knocks me off my feet.
My grip on her hand turns from restraining to something else entirely. I yank her toward me, my other arm wrapping around her waist and hauling her against me.
Her gasp is swallowed by my lips crashing down on hers.
Her arms wrap around my neck, her fingers tangling in my hair, pulling me closer. She meets my aggression with her own, her tongue dueling with mine, her body arching against mine.
I rip my lips from hers and move to her ear, my breath hot against her skin.
“You want me to fuck you, Victoria?” I growl. “Is that what you’ve been dreaming of?”
“Yes,” she whimpers. “God, yes.”
She lets out a cry of surprise as I throw her over my shoulder in a single, fluid motion. She is light in my arms, her soft curves pressing against my back.
I carry her up the narrow stairs, my steps quick and sure.
I am done waiting.
I am done talking.
I am done being noble. Fuck being noble.
She wants this.
She wants me.
And I am going to give her exactly what we've both been dreaming of.