Chapter 10
Chapter
Ten
CALEB
Jesse’s “plan” turned out to be a street barely wide enough for one car to pass through at a time.
None did, though. The second we entered, it was like we’d stepped into a different century.
The buildings rose four and five stories on either side, their bases made of thick stones with deep joints.
Iron wall sconces threw pools of amber light onto the black cobblestones, which were shiny and slick from the rain.
Church towers were visible at the end of the street, where traffic and a few pedestrians braved the cold.
I hunched deeper into my gray hoodie, which I’d paired with jeans and boots with enough traction to stop me from falling on my ass.
Jesse wore a sweater and dark beanie that hugged his head and made me want to push him against the nearest wall and suck him off.
“What is this place?” I asked, breath puffing. Every dozen or so steps, tall wooden gates broke up the monotony of the stone. Small plaques mounted beside each one were too blackened to make out the letters. Not that I could have read the Italian.
Jesse offered a cryptic smile. “You’ll see.”
I stepped over a flattened piece of cardboard so soaked that the cobblestones beneath seeped through the pulp. “Hopefully before we get murdered.”
He laughed softly. “Trust me, baby, you and I are the most dangerous creatures on this street.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
He stopped before one of the gates. Moisture gleamed on the black wood, which looked so old it might as well have been stone. Jesse flipped the cover on a tiny keypad I hadn’t noticed, the shiny steel aggressively modern on the hushed street.
He punched in a code, and the gate swung wide on silent hinges. More cobblestones opened onto a cool, still courtyard lined with potted lemon trees. Somewhere, a fountain splashed. Smooth columns supported ornate arches that led to glittering windows.
But I barely saw any of it, my attention riveted on the car in the center. Glossy black, it crouched low to the ground like a predator about to pounce. Exhaust pipes flared at the rear. The body looked sculpted by hand, every angle screaming speed.
It took me a second to realize my jaw was hanging open.
“Is that a…?”
“Lamborghini,” Jesse said, warm and smug beside me.
“Whose is it?”
“Ours for right now.”
I looked at him. “You rented it?”
“I did.”
“To go for a run in the woods.”
“We need to leave the city first.” He raised a dark eyebrow. “Unless you’d rather take the bus?”
Protests leapt onto my tongue. I swung back to the car before he could change his mind, and I walked a slow circle around it, excitement like jet fuel in my veins. Through the windshield, charcoal-colored leather stretched over seats stitched with bright red.
“Can I drive it?” I asked, aware I sounded like I’d just ripped a golden ticket out of a chocolate bar.
Jesse went to the driver’s side and opened the door. “When we’re outside the city. Roman traffic will eat you alive.”
“Deal.”
I popped my door and slid into the passenger seat.
Leather gave me a welcome hug, and the smell of new car and serious money hit my nose.
The dashboard gleamed with a spread of screens and switches that probably cost more than three generations of Lawson family wealth.
A charging bull pawed the center of the steering wheel.
“Jesse,” I said as he settled behind the wheel.
“Yeah?”
“I love this car.”
He winked—and I immediately cataloged a new favorite Jesse Expression. “Hold onto something.”
“Why?”
“Just do it.”
I gripped the edges of my seat.
He started the engine. Power charged up my spine and settled between my thighs, a bajillion cylinders of Italian horsepower humming around my dick.
“Jesus Christ,” I breathed, squeezing the leather.
Jesse chuckled as he eased us through the gate and onto the narrow street. Light from the sconces slid over the hood in little bursts of amber.
We plunged into the heart of Rome, and Jesse navigated the tangled, twisting streets like he’d done it every day for a century. Vespas wove around us trailing their high-pitched whines. A cab driver cut us off, and Jesse didn’t flinch, just dropped a gear and let the engine roar its displeasure.
Monuments and statues flashed past. Tourists in coats and hats crowded the sidewalks. A damp, slate-gray sky hung over everything, but it didn’t diminish the city’s beauty. Or maybe I just viewed it through an upgraded lens. Everything looked better from inside a Lamborghini.
About twenty minutes later, the ruins and apartment buildings receded and Rome loosened its grip.
The highway began to curve through rolling green hills flanked by forests and stone towns perched on ridges. Medieval towers dotted the centers like something out of a fairy tale.
“The towns in this area are called the Castelli Romani,” Jesse said.
I squinted through the rain streaking my window, my gaze fixed on the blurry lights that studded the hills. “People actually live up there?”
“For the last three thousand years. Some of these villages have been inhabited since Rome was a republic.”
Three thousand years. I’d spent twenty-three in a middle class suburb. If Ulfrik hadn’t come along, I might have spent the rest of my life in New York. But my lifespan wasn’t measured in decades anymore.
Jesse turned down a dirt road that wound between rows of bare-branched trees, the car’s suspension absorbing the ruts like they were a joke. A half-mile later, he stopped and let the engine idle.
“Want to drive?”
I was reaching for the door handle before he finished the question.
When I’d settled behind the wheel, he gave me a mild look. “Just so you know, this is the only time I’m down for switching.”
I huffed as I put the car in gear. “I’m a bad influence on you.”
He was still laughing when I punched the accelerator.
The engine purred. People said that about car engines all the time, but most of them had probably never driven a Lamborghini so they had no idea they were fucking wrong.
Because purr didn’t fit some four-cylinder Honda with a spoiler compensating for its driver’s needle dick.
No, that word belonged to the poetry of carbon fiber and leather around me.
The dirt road unspooled in a brown ribbon, and I pushed harder, feeling the rear end shift just slightly before the tires found their grip and launched us forward.
Rain tapped the windshield. The wipers swept it clean in efficient arcs.
When I approached a curve, I could have sworn the car read the road and leaned into it with me, the front end dropping like it knew exactly where I wanted to go before I did.
“Easy,” Jesse said, though his voice held more amusement than warning.
“I am being easy.”
“Sure you are.”
I came out of the curve and floored it down a straight stretch. The engine shifted from a purr to a throbbing wail that vibrated in my molars and made me feel like I straddled a subwoofer at a metal concert.
Quietly, Jesse reached up and grasped the grab handle above his door.
I stole glances at him, his joke about switching rattling around in my head. He was as toppy as they came, which was fine by me. Some people were born to lead and others were born to chew their way through the mattress, and I’d made my peace with which one I was.
On the other hand, he’d said he was open to me eating his ass. We’d never done it. Maybe it was time to change that.
We drove for another thirty minutes, the towns sliding into rain-soaked forests. Jesse caught my eye and grinned.
“You look like you’re having fun.”
“I’m having an orgasm,” I said.
“Caleb.”
“I’m serious. I think I’m an autosexual.”
He bit his lip. “Wrong terminology. Autosexual means you love yourself.”
I lifted a hand off the steering wheel and shuttled my fist in the air. “I do plenty of that, too, Professor van der Meer.”
Laughing, he directed me down a series of roads that grew progressively bumpier. When he pointed to a spot under a stand of gnarled oaks, I slowed and parked, killing the engine.
Rain misted the windshield. A forest rose around us, the trees wet and dripping. It was just a few hours past noon but the sky was dark with the promise of more rain.
Jesse smiled at me. “Ready to run?”
A sigh built in my chest. “I don’t mind the running part. It’s the shifting part that sucks.”
His warm brown eyes chased away the gloom. “I packed tiramisu for after.”
I flung off my seatbelt. “You should have led with that.”
The shift came easier than it had in France. Still not what I’d call a good time—and my jaw elongating was its own special kind of hell—but my bones rearranged themselves with more speed than before.
Jesse was already on four legs by the time I finished, and he sniffed me over with the zeal of a TSA officer, poking his nose through my fur and nipping my jaw. When he was seemingly satisfied all my limbs were in the right place, he pressed his flank against mine.
Then he took off in a flash of brown fur.
With a yip, I crashed after him.
We sped over the hills, paws kicking up the dark Roman soil.
The sky split open, and rain slanted in icy sheets, but the weather didn’t bother us.
Not with the world transformed into a thousand shades of green.
Scents rolled around me like dishes at a buffet, the emeralds and citrons rich enough to eat.
Squirrels and foxes scrambled out of our path as Jesse pulled ahead, tossing a taunting bark over his shoulder.
Oh, it was on.
I surged forward and chased him up a ridge, pulling close enough to snap my jaws at his tail. At the last second, he veered left. My momentum carried me forward, and I skidded on wet leaves, forelegs paddling in place like a cartoon character.
Jesse’s bark of canine laughter floated back.
Growling, I tore after him. This time, I caught him—and then quickly realized my mistake when he spun and seized my scruff in his jaws. He tackled me to the wet pine needles, butted my head with his, then sprinted away.