Chapter 90
Harlow
Caterina and Serenity came home with a gorgeous bouquet of pink flowers. Serenity leaped in my arms as Caterina walked towards me with the flowers and a smile. I could fall in love with this woman more and more each day. She was perfect and gave me my fairytale.
“Mama said these were perfect, because they were pretty like you.”
I looked at Caterina with a cheesy grin. “Well, Mama does have excellent taste. Why don’t we put these in water and we can watch a movie?”
I held Caterina’s hand as we watched Barbie Swan Lake together.
Serenity danced with the animation, and something told me we would have a ballerina on our hands.
By the time the movie was done, Serenity was fast asleep.
Caterina picked her up and took her to her bedroom, kissing her head before tucking her in for the night.
“I need to talk to you,” she said as she closed her door.
“Good, because I need to talk to you, too.”
I took her hand and pushed her to our bedroom, kicking the door open and shut as I pushed her onto the bed. “I want to do a CNC scene with you.”
Her face dropped, and I didn’t know if I should be insulted or not. “Harlow, I would love to do anything with you, but I need you to know something first, and then you can decide if you ever want to touch me again.”
I folded my arms across my chest, panic kissing my skin. “What is it?”
“Before Mario would come to me and ask for advice. I thought he had a girlfriend who was in a bad relationship. He wanted to know how to make a woman comfortable during sex when she was nervous.”
I froze, my mind taking me back to my nights with him. Ale—Mario was one of the sweeter men. “He would talk to me before, trying to learn about my life, but I was trapped, so small talk wasn’t an option. He was the only one who did foreplay. H-he learned from you?”
I saw her chin tremble. “I told him to set the mood, kiss and touch his partner, to give her pleasure and not to always expect in return. I told him how to ra—”
“You didn’t tell him anything, Caterina,” I snapped.
I didn’t want her to blame herself for what Mario did to me.
“You weren’t in the room making him do anything.
You didn’t put his mouth on me or force him inside me.
He chose to do it, even with me telling him to stop.
And I know for sure you would never teach him that sex without consent was ever okay, that was his decision.
I’m not angry with you. Did you think I would be? ”
She sighed. “I should’ve known. After the first few times he would tell me, I should have known he was hurting you and not dating someone.”
“He was your friend. I’m not angry. Mario was one of the nicer ones.
It doesn’t excuse what he did, but what you told him helped.
I hate to say it, but he wasn’t buying me to hurt me.
” I pulled her into me, wiping the tears from her face.
“Look at me.” She blinked and met me with her gorgeous green eyes.
“You showed me that you love me when you killed him. Whatever happened in the past, advice, etc. doesn’t matter because when it mattered most, you chose me. ”
“I will always choose you, mia vita.”
“And just so you know, I still want you to touch me. He’s not going to taint anything. I love you, and I love the way you make my body feel.” I kicked my legs over her lap, and she grabbed my ass. “Now, back to what I was saying. I want to do a scene with you.”
“Are you sure?”
I nodded, running my fingers through her dark curls. “Yeah. I think I need to get my control back. Even with him dead, Vincenzo is still winning. I’m also having dreams.”
“The nightmare this morning?”
“Yeah. I want you to plan it. I trust you with every fiber of my being. And we have T-Rex to use if I need to stop, and you can read my body language.”
“What if I hurt you? Or trigger you?”
“Then we stop and talk. I need to do this. I need to get a part of myself back that he still has. I can’t keep letting a ghost have power over me.”
I finally admitted it out loud. The fear of certain things was because of Vincenzo, and now I wanted Caterina to replace all the bad memories again.
I wanted to try certain things with this scene, although I knew penetration would scare me, but I wanted the painful memories replaced with easier ones.
Vincenzo took a part of me once more. I healed before.
I learned what I liked and opened up in my sexuality.
Hell, I had sex in an office at a nightclub, but now I couldn’t see myself doing anything more than being in our bed.
I would try to do more sometimes, but I wanted this scene to show me I had control of my body, my orgasms, and my pleasure—no matter where it was.
“What do you need from me in this scene?”
I smiled, kissing her nose. “You have to talk to Serena about it.”
Her brows furrowed. “Is this a way to force me to go to therapy even though I said I was going already?”
“Nope. I want you to plan it, and I don’t want to know when it is. I want to be scared when it happens.”
I felt her tense under me. “Harlow, I—”
“Caterina, I trust you. I need it this way to make it believable. Serena knows the scene. I think it was inspired by something that happened before, but it was different. We can talk about it together if needed, but I want the shock value. I’ll know it’s a scene, but I want to be scared.”
“Okay, I’ll talk to her tomorrow. Are you ready for Mallory’s gala?”
Mallory’s gala was in a week, and it was the last big event we had planned before we could focus on everything else.
Caterina wanted to make sure Roman was good before she took us to Italy.
I also wanted to find Harmony before we left, but I knew Roman was working on uncovering what Akim was doing while Natalya was looking for his sister.
“Ready. I’m ready to see my savage queen of a wife come out when other people bid on me.”
“Do you want someone to get shot?”
“There she is.” I laughed. “I love you. Now, let’s shower and then we can cuddle.”