12. Isabella
CHAPTER 12
Isabella
L orenzo hadn’t worn a condom. I couldn’t believe I would do anything so irresponsible as to let him fuck me bare. I spent the rest of the afternoon curled up on my fresh sheets—changed while I was in the shower, just like Lorenzo had promised—angry at myself and at Lorenzo.
I tried reminding myself that Lorenzo and I were planning on making a baby anyway, but surrogacy happened in a doctor’s office. It was clinical and impersonal. It didn’t involve Lorenzo calling me beautiful or bringing me the kind of pleasure I had only ever read about in shitty romance novels.
Having nothing to do didn’t help my spiraling thoughts. There were only so many laps I could make inside the house, and I wasn’t allowed outside, necessarily. I could probably have a guard shadow me if I wanted to be in the back garden, but I wasn’t feeling particularly in need of company at the moment.
At seven, Amalia called me down to dinner, and I wasn’t surprised to find that it would be just her and me for the evening. “Elio told me that they were working some things out with one of the minor families.”
I had no idea what that meant, but the image of Lorenzo beating that man with a pair of brass knuckles came to mind. He touched me with those hands . I shuddered. “I’m sorry you’re stuck with me,” I said.
Amalia chuckled. “I promise you, it’s no hardship. It’s nice to get a little girl time.”
“It must be hard being the only woman in the house,” I said.
“I was the only girl in a house with four brothers, both younger and older.” She looked at me and rolled her eyes. “Trust me, I’m used to it.”
I whistled. “That’s a big family.”
She snorted and took a dainty sip of her red wine. “You’re Italian, right?”
I nodded and shrugged at the same time. “My family isn’t really all that close. It was my dad and me for most of my life. My little sister is going to NYU, though, so I’m hoping to get to spend some time with her.” Not that it seemed likely to happen now.
Amalia’s smile was tight. She reached over and patted my hand. “I’m sure you’ll get to see her soon.”
Calling out her obvious lie wasn’t going to do anything besides make her mad, so I just smiled at her and murmured, “I hope so.”
We finished our dinner with little fanfare, and I shooed her out of the kitchen so I could clean up. Lorenzo’s kitchen was equipped with a state-of-the-art dishwasher, but instead of loading it, I filled the farmhouse sink with scalding water and soap.
While the dishes soaked, I packed up all of the leftovers, labeled them the way I had seen Amalia do, and put them into the refrigerator. I was elbows deep in the sink when I saw headlights out the window.
My heart kicked in my chest, but I kept scrubbing at the dishes, rinsing them, and putting them onto the drying rack. It only took a few moments for Damian and Elio to come through the back door. Elio paused when he saw me. “Where’s Amalia?”
“I sent her upstairs. I think she said something about getting in the tub.”
His smile became devious. “I think I’ll go check on her,” he said and winked at me, practically skipping from the kitchen.
I shook my head, chuckling. “He’s just a big kid, isn’t he?”
Damian, who had been reaching for the door to the refrigerator, paused and looked at me. “You’re talking to me?”
“Am I not allowed?”
“It would be best if you didn’t,” he said with a shrug and went back to finding dinner for himself. Once he found what he wanted, he took it with him out of the kitchen without looking my way.
My chest hurt. It wasn’t like I was invested in making any sort of lasting friendships here, but the next year of my life would be a hell of a lot easier if I could talk to people. “You could just put the dishes in the dishwasher. I paid an arm and a leg for it for a reason.”
I looked over to the door. Lorenzo was standing there, dressed in the same clothes he wore this afternoon. He hadn’t even gotten undressed when he fucked me. All of my anger came rushing back to the surface, and I couldn’t turn away fast enough to hide my scowl.
“What’s your problem?”
I shook my head. “Nothing.” I felt Lorenzo come up behind me. He didn’t touch me, but I could feel his body heat pressing against my back. I expected him to say something, but he just stood there, happy to annoy the shit out of me, until I cracked. “You didn’t wear a condom earlier.”
There was a pause, and then: “Is that all?”
I whirled around, nearly careening into him with how close he was standing. “You don’t just forget to use a condom, Lorenzo. That’s a thing for horny, irresponsible teenagers to do.”
“You agreed to be my surrogate. Why would we bother with condoms?”
I could feel my brow wrinkling inward. I was going to get worry lines by the age of twenty-three if I stayed here. “We’re supposed to see Dr. Coleman about all of that. There’s supposed to be cups and petri dishes and the whole thing, right?”
“Or, we could just fuck and save on the doctor’s bills.”
Do you need me to show you how beautiful you are , my ass. “Why bother bringing in a doctor at all if you were planning to get me into bed? Why bother with making me feel—” I cut myself off, sinking my teeth into my bottom lip.
Lorenzo’s eyes darkened, and he stepped closer, crowding me back against the sink. “What did I make you feel, dolcezza ?”
My throat felt like it was being squeezed shut from the inside. “Like you actually wanted me,” I said.
Lorenzo stared at me for a heartbeat. Two. Then his hands were hooking beneath my thighs and lifting me upward. I let out a squeak and wrapped my legs around his waist, my arms around his neck, to stabilize myself.
Leaving the dishes half done, Lorenzo carried me out of the kitchen, up the stairs, and down a hallway in the opposite direction of my room. A moment later, he toed open a door, and we were stepping into what could only be his bedroom.
I saw that the furniture was dark wood, and that he had dark curtains hanging over the windows, but then he tossed me onto the mattress, and my focus narrowed to the man who was currently shedding his clothes.
I had seen Lorenzo shirtless at the urgi-care, but I hadn’t gotten time to truly appreciate his body. Broad shoulders and thickly muscled, there was not an ounce of softness to this man. A shiver ran through me.
Get up and go to your own room , I told myself. He couldn’t just drag me around however he liked and get away with it. But no matter how much I commanded my body to move, it refused to obey. Instead, I met Lorenzo’s gaze. “We’ve done this already today.”
“And, yet, the lesson didn’t sink in,” he countered and shoved his jeans down. Once he was naked, he grabbed my ankle and pulled me across the mattress toward him. I tried to struggle, but he only tightened his grip on me. “I don’t do anything that I don’t want to do, understand? If I touch you, if I fuck you, it’s because I want to. If I didn’t want to, I wouldn’t. There doesn’t have to be any big reason behind it.”
“But—”
“I’ve thought about your pussy all day,” he said bluntly. Like he didn’t want there to be any misunderstanding between us. “From the moment I had to leave this house until I stepped into the kitchen, I was thinking about the next time I would get to bury my cock inside of you.” His fingers tightened around my ankle before sliding up my calf, massaging through my jeans. “Tell me that you want me, dolcezza . Tell me that I can have you. That’s all you have to do.”
I hated myself…but a part of me wanted Lorenzo Vitali more. “You can have me.”