5. Gemma
Gemma
His muscle pins me to the bare mattress.
Dante’s scent of oil and rain is a grounding force.
The panic attack that just ripped through him—the one that put a terrifying, blank stare into his dark eyes and dragged him back to the night he lost everything—is over.
I anchored him. My hand flat against his chest brought him back.
Now, the vulnerability in his expression is hardening.
His clinical distance has shattered. What replaces it is so raw and territorial, it makes my body hum against the sheets.
He came back. I dragged him back.
His frame shifts between my thighs. We are stranded on the fourteenth floor of the Grand Continental.
The air in this abandoned tomb is freezing, smelling of rotting velvet, old money, and decades of neglect.
The gilded mirrors on the far wall are clouded with dust, reflecting the shadows of this ruined penthouse.
I do not care about the cold. I do not care about the dust. Heat radiates off Dante in waves, searing right through the velvet drape still wrapped around my shoulders.
He draped it over me hours ago—a small, deliberate act of possession that cost him nothing and meant everything.
I push my palms against his chest, right over the small, jagged scar near his collarbone. "Are you going to stare at me all night, big guy, or are you going to finish what you started against that wall?"
A rough, territorial sound vibrates deep in his throat.
The noise is pure animal. My sass usually keeps men on their toes, keeps them at a distance so I can run my business and my life exactly how I want.
My food truck, La Diosa, was my entire world until the Bellanti family turned it into a bullet-riddled pile of scrap metal hours ago.
I should be crying in a corner. I should be terrified of the mafia hitmen hunting us.
Instead, all I want is for this terrifying, tattooed man to wreck me.
"You don't know what you're asking for, Gemma," Dante rasps. His voice is gravel and dark promises. The oversized gold watch on his wrist catches the dim moonlight filtering through the filthy windows.
"I know exactly what I'm asking for." I arch my back, deliberately rubbing my hips against the rigid, agonizingly bulge trapped in his denim jeans. "I'm not a delicate flower, Dante. I survived the South Side. I survived my livelihood getting blown up. I can survive you."
"Nobody survives me." Dante grips the hem of his shirt that I am wearing.
His knuckles brush the bare skin of my thighs.
The contrast is jarring. He is all calluses, scars, and violence.
I am soft curves and defiance. He drags the cotton up my body in one smooth, ruthless motion, pulling it over my head and tossing it into the shadows.
The cold air bites my bare skin for exactly one second before his scorching body covers mine.
His dark eyes drag over my breasts, my waist, my thighs. The hunger in his stare is absolute. There is no hesitation. There is no polite restraint. Dante looks at me like I am the only meal he has been offered in a decade. He worships my curves with his gaze before his hands even touch me.
"Mine," he mutters, the word vibrating against the shell of my ear. "You smell like orange and spice. You smell like life. Everything else in my world is dead, Gemma. Everything except you."
His mouth crashes down on mine. The kiss is a desperate collision.
He claims my mouth, his kiss desperate and absolute.
I meet his aggression with my own, wrapping my arms around my neck and tangling my fingers into his short, dark hair.
The dark ink covering his strong arms flexes and presses into my bare skin as he shifts his weight, pressing me flat beneath him.
My lips part with a loud moan as his teeth graze my lower lip.
He tastes like adrenaline and dark coffee.
His calloused hand reaches under the hem of his oversized henley and slides up my ribcage, his thumb tracing the underwire of my black lace bra.
He does not bother with the clasp. Dante simply grips the delicate fabric and rips it down, freeing my breasts.
The lace tears with a sharp sound that echoes in the dead hotel room.
"Beautiful," he growls against my throat. His rough beard scratches the sensitive skin of my neck, sending electric shocks straight down to my core. "So damn soft. So fucking perfect."
His hot mouth closes over my right nipple.
A gasp rips out of my throat. Dante sucks hard, his tongue lashing against the tight peak.
The sensation is blinding. I arch my spine, pressing my chest deeper into his mouth, silently begging for more.
My hands grip his broad shoulders, feeling the tension bunched in his muscles.
He pulls away just long enough to capture my other breast, giving it the same ruthless, worshipping attention.
The pull of his mouth sends an aching throb directly between my legs.
The dry humping against the rotting wallpaper earlier pushed me to a climax, but the ache has returned with ten times the ferocity.
My pussy clenches, already weeping slick wetness onto the bare mattress.
"Dante," I whimper, my sassy bravado melting into a puddle of desperate need. "Please."
"Please what, my sweet girl?" He drags his open mouth down my sternum, tracing the line of my stomach. "Tell me what you want. Tell me you want me to ruin you."
"I want you." My fingers dig into his biceps. "All of you. Now."
This man is going to ruin me. And I am going to let him.
Dante shifts lower. His large hands grip my knees, pushing my legs wide open.
I am exposed to him in the dim light of the ruined penthouse.
My black lace panties are soaked through, clinging to my swollen wetness.
Dante stares at the junction of my thighs, his chest heaving with deep, ragged breaths.
The intensity in his expression makes my chest tight.
He does not just want to fuck me. He wants to consume me, to brand me as his own so deeply that the rest of the world ceases to exist.
He hooks his fingers into the sides of my panties and tears them down my legs, tossing the ruined silk onto the floor. I am naked, vulnerable, and splayed open for him. The cold air of the dead-zone hotel sweeps over my slick folds, but the chill is banished the second Dante leans in.
His rough cheek brushes against my inner thigh. I jolt at the contact. Dante grips my hips, anchoring my thighs exactly where he wants them. Then, his hot, wet tongue drags right up my center.
I scream his name. The sound bounces off the gilded mirrors and rotting velvet drapes.
Dante does not care about the noise. He wants me loud.
His tongue is relentless, sliding through my slick wetness and finding my swollen clit.
He circles the sensitive nub, pressing firmly, sending wave after wave of blinding pleasure crashing through my nervous system.
I thrash on the mattress, but his grip on my hips is like a vice.
He holds me still, forcing me to take every ounce of pleasure he is giving me.
"Dante, oh god, wait—" I am spiraling too fast. The sheer intensity of his mouth is too much. I have always been in control. Taking orders, submitting to someone else's rhythm, it goes against every independent instinct I have. But this man dismantles my defenses without even trying.
He ignores my plea. He sucks my clit directly into his mouth, applying a firm, agonizing pressure.
At the same time, two fingers slide deep into my pussy.
The stretch is incredible. I moan as he curls his fingers inside me, finding a sensitive bundle of nerves and stroking it mercilessly.
My walls clench around his digits, dripping slick down his knuckles.
"You're so wet for me," Dante rumbles against my thighs, his hot breath fanning over my swollen folds. "So perfectly tight."
He adds a third finger, stretching my entrance even wider.
The fullness is maddening. He pumps his fingers in and out of my slick core, his thumb returning to work my clit with ruthless efficiency.
The pleasure builds into a towering, terrifying wave.
I cannot hold it back. My hips snap upward, chasing his hand. My nails bite into the dusty mattress.
"Give it to me, Gemma," he demands. "Fall apart for me."
The orgasm tears through me like a live wire.
My body bows off the bed, my muscles locking tight as intense spasms rock my core.
I cry out, my voice cracking under the sheer weight of the pleasure.
Dante takes my climax, swallowing my sweet juices, his fingers maintaining a steady, grounding rhythm inside me until the last tremor fades.
I collapse back onto the mattress, my chest heaving. My chest heaves as I struggle to pull air into my lungs, my mind completely wiped blank by the intensity. I lie there, boneless and panting, staring at the cracked ceiling of the Grand Continental.
Dante moves up my body. He is still fully dressed, his dark jeans straining against an erection that looks painful. The silver buckle of his belt presses into my bare thigh. His eyes are pitch black, dilated with raw hunger. He looks down at me, his chest rising and falling hard.
"My turn," he whispers.
He stands up beside the bed. The sound of his zipper lowering is sharp in the quiet room.
Dante pushes his denim and boxers down his muscular legs, kicking them aside.
My jaw practically drops. He is solid. His cock is solid, incredibly long, and standing at rigid attention, weeping a drop of precum from the broad tip.
The weight of his balls rests perfectly beneath the shaft.
He is a weapon built for ruin. And he is about to step right into my center.