Chapter Nine #2
His hand slipped down her back to her waist, and he pulled her roughly towards him. She was tall enough that his erection dragged against her belly. He felt his hips instinctually buck against the cushiony softness of her belly, seeking more.
A breathy gasp fell from her lips, her fingers locking around his neck. She pushed into his body with an eager, open abandon that made renewed heat punch through him. Cristo, she was going to bring him to his knees… “My control is thin tonight.”
The tip of her tongue swiped over her lower lip, making it glisten. “You’re distressed,” she said, her gaze searching his. “About more than just their bad behavior.”
“Sì.” He scoffed. “Although distressed is the wrong word.”
“Right,” she said, opening her mouth and then closing it.
Renzo watched, fascinated by everything she did. Slowly, her shoulders straightened. “These last two months, you’ve been so good to me. And as your partner, I want to do something for you today. I mean, I’m cleared for everything.”
“Cleared for what?” he said, doubts pricking at his throat like thorns. Cristo, what was wrong with him tonight?
Her throat rippled with her swallow. “Rough sex might still not be the greatest idea, but…” She opened her glistening lips in an O and made a popping sound. “I haven’t gone down on a man before, but I’ve always been a fast learner. If you don’t mind walking me through it.”
If the world had turned upside down at that moment, Renzo would have been less shocked. In one swooping movement, he lifted her and perched her on top of the glass table. Then he buried his face in her neck, inhaling her scent deep into his lungs.
Emotion he didn’t understand overwhelmed him.
It was both comical and touching how she wanted to soothe him, to give him an escape from reality. No one, not even his mother, had ever wondered if he needed respite and relief from all the burdens they placed on him.
Cupping her shoulders, he pulled back and considered her.
Then, slowly he undid her braid, until the soft tendrils kissed her cheeks, making her look even more innocent than usual.
“You thank me one moment and insult me in the next, bella. When did I give you the impression that I expect sexual favors for being a decent man?”
“You’re more than a decent man, Renzo,” she said, pushing a lock of hair back from his forehead. He didn’t miss the possessiveness in the gesture. “Also, wanting to do something good for you after everything you did for me…isn’t that how we build this relationship? Beyond just loving Luca?”
Her hands stayed on him all the while, and that definitely soothed his raw edges. Maybe their relationship was transactional in nature at the fundamental level, but this way, they had the right expectations of each other. Maybe this was the only way their relationship could thrive and grow.
Still, it pricked him that her desire came from something so…polite and decent at the source. He wanted her as mindless with desire as he was for her.
Shifting closer to her, he spread his hands on her silky-smooth thighs. Her eyes grew wide and molten as he nudged her knees apart.
Bracing herself on her palms by her sides, she bowed her long neck then arched up to look at him. “Renzo?”
“When I said my control was thin, I didn’t mean I would get rough with you physically, bella. I would never hurt you, Mimi.”
“I know that,” she said breathily.
“I meant that I’m in a devouring mood.”
Her silk top pulled across her breasts, calling his attention to the tight nipples beading against it. “What do you mean?” Her breath gushed out in a pant as he swiped a knuckle over one proud peak.
Under his hand, her hip was lush and thick. He let his gaze wander over her, from her smooth golden skin to the lushness of her curves as a result of the pregnancy. Everything about her…glowed, inside and out.
And Renzo had the recurring thought that she wouldn’t have crossed the orbit into his life if not for the surrogacy. Colored by his own prejudices and his ego, he would’ve never given her another glance. Never acknowledged the simmering connection between them.
And yet, as he looked at her now, staring up at him with achingly naked desire, sharp resentment at his own inadequacy pricked him.
She was too good for him, too smart, too self-sufficient, too…capable. That was at the root of his frustration, his anger. She made him wonder if there was anything he could offer her that would bind her to him. Other than their son.
Nor was he so full of honor that he would give her up.
“Renzo?”
“You’re eager to soothe me? To talk me off the ledge of this dark mood?”
“Yes. I’ll do anything.”
“Then let me bury my face between your thighs and taste you.”
It was the last thing Mimi had expected her brooding husband to say.
The word husband still tasted strange on her tongue, but she was beginning to like it more every day. And tonight, at the party, she had a true taste of what it was to have a man like Renzo DiCarlo be her husband in the real sense.
A partner, a protector, a caregiver, and a fierce ally if someone else came for her, even if that was his family.
Cracks had splintered in the hard shell she’d built around her heart. Suddenly she felt helpless against all the longings he set loose inside her. With each sly comment and innuendo-riddled glance, Mimi had only found herself growing stronger.
With Renzo by her side, no one could touch her. But she also realized that they were curious about not just her or Luca, but the hold she had on her powerful husband.
True to the vow he’d made to her at their wedding ceremony, despite her own reluctance to be a part of it, Renzo had kept every word.
With each brush of his body against her, with each little touch—his hand on her lower back, his arm around her waist, his fingers dancing over her nape—she’d found herself falling deeper and deeper into her own desire.
“Do you want to go into the bedroom?” she asked, sounding like a frightened virgin. Which she was not. But from the first moment she had laid eyes on him years ago, Renzo made her feel defensive. Even now, he provoked the wildness inside her, pushing her to prove something to him. And to herself.
Or was it that he made her feel so safe that she could let out all the desires and wants she’d buried deep beneath rationale? Was it her trust in him that she’d never known with any other man that made her not want to back down?
Renzo’s smirk was full of devilish teasing. “No, bella. Unless you’re shy about these things and want the cover of darkness?”
This was what he meant when he said his control was thin tonight. He meant to demand her surrender in a way she’d never given any man. “I’m not…a virgin,” Mimi said, full-on blushing now. She needed to get this out, though. “But I don’t have a lot of experience. I mean…”
“I guess we could do this under the covers then.” Something dark danced in Renzo’s eyes, and every inch of her trembled in response. “It’s not what I want for tonight, but I guess I shall make do.”
She bristled and straightened her shoulders. “You’re pushing me, knowing how much I hate to look incompetent.”
He laughed then, and it was full of a…strange emotion she seemed to provoke in him. A shiver zinged down her spine as she wondered if it could be fondness or even affection. “Competence has nothing to do with this, Mimi.”
His hands danced on the band of her silk shorts, pulling at the soft elastic and then letting it go, so that it snapped over and over. And then, in that little gap between, he brushed his fingers over her skin. Going a sliver lower each time.
Such fleeting contact, and yet she felt it as if he were branding her with a hot poker. The tips of his fingers could be leaving scorch marks on her flesh for how seared she felt.
Slowly, fisting her fingers tight in his shirt, Mimi pushed herself back. The muscles in her belly strained, but she kept going.
Dark, hungry eyes watched every movement, and she wondered if this was their own version of a trust fall. She had no doubt that he was testing her and expecting, almost wanting, her to fail. The latter she didn’t understand.
So that he could refuse her invitation without offending her? Or because, for once in her life, Renzo needed someone else, and he couldn’t bear it? Did he need her as much as she needed him?
Finally, her elbows bumped into the glass table behind her. Holding his gaze, she let her head fall back all the way too.
Her front felt like it was on fire while the cool glass kissed her back. Renzo’s hand moved to her upper thighs, and she spread them like he told her to. “I never back down from a challenge.”
Everything in her protested at how she was spread out before him. And yet for Renzo, she wanted to do this.
The light from the chandelier was bright against her eyes, hiding his shadowed expression from her. Instead, she looked down over her own body. Her nipples stood out hard and throbbing, while her silk top pulled up, baring a silky swath of her midriff.
“Plant your feet on the armrests of the chair.”
Mimi bit back the automatic protest that rose to her lips.
She would be completely open to his gaze like that.
Something about his stance told her he was waiting for her to back down, to walk away from him in his dark mood.
To play it safe and by the rules. Stay between the lines that Pia and her mother had drawn for her, like she’d always done all her life.
He wanted her to prove to him, and herself, that she could be what he wanted, or needed, at a time like this.
That little wildness she’d always caged inside her, afraid of failing measured against her mother and her stepsister, fluttered its wings against the bars. She planted her feet firmly and made sure to dig her toes into his hard thighs.
Renzo’s hands lingered on the seam of her shorts. Then in one swoop, he pulled them off.