Chapter Eight #4
Her hesitation pricked him. How did he explain to her that his protectiveness didn’t mean he thought less of her when he didn’t understand it himself? When he wanted to wrap her in a cocoon and never let her out of his sight? She’d surely hate him then.
“Yes, I’ll let you know if I feel unwell. Would you like to know the signs to watch out for?” she said after what felt like an eternity.
“Sì.”
“Migraine. Pallor. Light-headedness.”
Relief shuddered through him. “Thank you for telling me.”
Her hands moved over his back, stroking, kneading. Then she giggled. “FYI, breathlessness after an arrogant Italian expertly eats me out is not a danger sign. Please keep the orgasms coming.”
His laughter echoed in the dark, and he ran his right palm up and down her leg. She nuzzled her face into his back in a gesture of affection that made him dizzy.
The corridor felt like a different reality, one which he didn’t want to emerge from. He was smiling in the dark like a fool, and his chest felt lighter, his limbs looser than he’d felt in…forever.
She sighed. And he wondered if she felt the same sense of lightness he did. “Is this flying, Alessandro?”
“No, tesoro.”
“Then, maybe I’m dead? Because so much pleasure should have killed me.”
He pushed the silky hem of her dress aside and smacked her bare ass lightly. “That’s not funny,” he bit out. Filthy, greedy man that he was, though, he let his fingers linger over the curve of her ass.
Her outraged gasp shivered down his spine. “Okay, that’s not a kink I’m into.”
“And what if I was?”
With a growl, the minx grabbed his back and pushed herself up. Her teeth dug into his upper shoulder. Hard. As a direct reaction, his cock was so hard now it was uncomfortable to walk. “Something like that work?”
“Maybe,” he said, grinning.
Every time he’d imagined them together like this, he’d known it would be new. Different because of everything she inevitably forced him to feel. Passionate. Hot. But this…
He grunted when she bit him again, switched his palm to the other cheek, delivered another tap on her ass, and then while she was biting and cursing him, he walked into his bedroom. Which she’d completely made hers.
He threw her on his bed and climbed over her. Her complaints, her kisses, her demands, she made everything new. Made him want. Made him greedy.
Because the one thing he hadn’t expected was laughter.
This joy in his chest every time he watched her. The overwhelming urge to make this moment last forever.
Sam thought she might be floating on clouds. Or was it that her body had never felt more like an instrument of pleasure?
Alessandro’s weight on top of her as they sank into the bed…was heaven. The kiss he took while his chest crushed her breasts and his thick shaft perfectly notched up against her bare core left her reeling.
This kiss was a taking. A claiming, even. He didn’t explore or tease or play, he simply ravished her mouth with a hunger that told her how long he’d wanted to do that.
Even better than the possessiveness of his kiss was the abandon with which she could touch him.
The corded muscles of his neck, the hard slopes of his shoulder, the sparse hair on his defined chest, the ridges of his abdomen…
In that moment, this powerful man was fully hers, and it went straight to her head.
Eager for more, she thrust up her hips to dislodge him.
Instantly, he lifted his weight off her, his eyes frantically searching hers.
Fighting a smile, she snuck her hands lower, until she could cup his hard length. He was like warm steel through his trousers.
A soft gasp escaped her as she imagined him inside her, pounding away at her and, best of all, losing control as he chased his own climax.
“Please, I want to touch you.”
Something danced in his eyes before he nodded.
Somehow, she managed to undo his trousers and snuck her hand inside. He was hard and hot and…big enough to startle her a little.
“Cristo, bella,” he whispered, his mouth buried in her temple.
Staring up at his stark features, she squeezed him and stroked him from root to tip. The bead of pre-cum made her mouth water.
Head thrown back, Alessandro let out a grunt and a filthy curse that pinged against her skin. She did it a few more times, fascinated by the naked yearning in his face, before he arrested her wrist. “It’s been a long while, Sameera. I would rather be inside you.”
Sam bit her lip. “Has it been a long while out of choice?”
Slowly, he took her hand in his and laced their fingers. Then he moved off her, leaning on his side. They were both half-naked, and it was how he hesitated that made it so heart-wrenchingly intimate. She scooted closer, knowing the pull between their bodies was the anchor right then.
“I discovered, at a crisis point in my life, that I have an addictive nature.” His gaze drifted away from the present. “It was either meaningless sex with strangers or…nothing. After I drowned myself in the first for a little while, I got disgusted with myself and stopped completely.”
She traced the small scar through his brow. “I’m sorry it had to come to that.”
He shrugged and kissed the back of her hand.
“Should I feel extra special, then?” she said, wriggling her brows in an exaggerated manner. Anything to chase away the dark shadows in his eyes.
Matteo had mentioned in an offhand comment once that his brother had lost the woman he had loved a long time ago. Now, all the pieces she knew about him began to form a picture that made her both like him and want to run away as far as possible.
His fingers sifted through her hair while a small smile played at his lips. The pad of his thumb traced her cheek with a reverence that filled her heart. “You’re beautiful and witty and spirited. And probably a witch.”
Pushing up, she kissed the corner of his mouth. Which he took full advantage of by devouring her mouth, again.
She was panting when she fell back against the bed, her fingers drawing doodles on his chest. The urgency to feel him inside her thrummed but this…this felt even more precious, more real. “I have to make this all very clinical by mentioning boring stuff. So much for a sophisticated summer fling.”
He stilled, then nodded.
“I have an IUD.” She cleared her throat. “Getting pregnant is dangerous for my heart condition. But when it’s peak fertility time, I like to double up, just—”
“We’ll use a condom.”
Sam buried her face in his chest. “It’s silly but—”
“Nothing about your health or your choices or your sense of safety is silly, bella. You insult me by suggesting otherwise.”
Snuggling closer, she licked the line of his throat. “Thank you.”
His fingers wrapped around her nape, before sliding into her hair, tugging her head up.
Smiling, he pressed a kiss to her temple. A hesitation danced in his eyes.
“Ask me whatever you want, Alessandro.” She swallowed against that surge of affection she felt for him.
His fingers sifted through her hair slowly as he said, “You aren’t resentful of the options that have been taken away from you?”
“Like babies? Or a long-term relationship with someone who might want the guarantee of a happy future?” she said, without missing a beat. “No.”
She took a long breath, loving the intimacy of the dark night cloaking them like this.
Loving that he was curious enough to want to know things about her.
If this was just a fling, what would a real relationship with this man be like?
“For a long time, all I wanted was to leave the hospital. Then it was being alone for an hour or two without my mom flipping out. Then came a solo shopping trip, an outing with friends, building to this confidence to go on a trip by myself. To tangle with an Italian stud. Now it’s college and a career as an artist and traveling the world at some point.
” Looking at his stark, gorgeous features filled her with that joy of simply being there, in the moment with him.
“I have so much to live for,” she said, kissing the bristly underside of his jaw, “and I refuse to spend even a minute mourning the few things I can’t have. ”
Nodding, he dipped his head, and this was a different kiss. It was soft and reverent and so full of promise that Sam couldn’t sift through all the feelings it evoked.
The jarring tone of his cell phone broke the spell.
She straightened her dress as Alessandro answered his phone. A volley of Italian followed, bringing an instant pall over his features. Then he pressed a hand to his neck, a gesture that betrayed his discomfiture. “I have to go.”
Sam looked out the large windows, out into the dark night beyond. “Now?”
“Sì.”
Frowning, Sam got off the bed and followed him into his cavernous closet. Even the sight of her clothes neatly hanging by his didn’t throw her anymore.
“I have to go to Florence,” he said softly, throwing a change of clothes into a small bag.
“Are you running away from me?” she whispered, giving voice to the crows pecking at her. In the flash of a second, it was as if the intimate world between them had fractured, thrusting him back into a reality she couldn’t join.
He stilled. “I’m not a coward, bella.”
“No, but you do like to control yourself, Alessandro.” A long breath shuddered out of her as she claimed her power herself. “And I have challenged it from day one, no?”
Dropping the bag, he covered the distance between them to clasp her cheeks.
“I have to visit a friend, an old woman in distress. And I can’t abandon that responsibility because I’m desperate to fuck you.
” He pressed a quick kiss to her temple, then grabbed the bag.
“If I get inside you, I won’t want to leave. ”
Hurt found a tender spot in her. But she had power too in this relationship, whatever else he called it. She couldn’t forget that.
“Are you saying that for my benefit or yours, Alessandro?”
Shock danced in his eyes before he left the bedroom, leaving her alone again.