Chapter 47
47
Layne
M y lips tingle like they’re covered in coffee-flavored popping candy after the flurry of kisses Valentine steals as he walks backward out of my room.
He growls against my lips, licking over the tingles. Maybe he can feel them too, but either way, we both reach for each other at the same time, to sample one another.
“Get out of here.” My words are nearly lost under giddy giggles and sweet sighs, but also because Valentine’s lips stay plastered over mine.
Owning the last kiss becomes a game neither of us is losing or trying too hard to end.
Only out of necessity, and Dante’s sentimental insistence we stick to a couple of traditions, do I revert to dirty tactics. I shove my tongue nearly down Valentine’s throat at the same time as shoving him in the chest, making him stumble out of my bedroom. I kick the door shut before I can change my mind about him and Dante’s traditions.
Valentine chuckles. And like always, it is deep, sexy as fuck, and the sound vibrates over my skin, making me smile, but also making me squeeze my thighs together. In the very next second, he twists our fun into something else as he speaks through the door. “I left you a dress to wear, Mrs. De Luca. I thought it would look stunning on you, but if you don’t like it, I won’t be offended.” I can clearly hear the suggestion in his voice, but I can feel he’s holding back on being persuasive in the words and tone he uses.
He really is so fucking sweet.
“Thank you,” I whisper, my hand hovering over the handle, about to give him my gratitude with another kiss, or two.
“I meant what I said about not wearing it if you don’t like it, though.” Valentine chooses to infuse his designation now, the push of assertion not because he doesn’t trust me to be honest about a dress but a push to remembering I have the freedom and space to be honest.
My Omega side goes soft, like a melted marshmallow, for all the little gifts they keep leaving. Most certainly, I get caught up in the sentimentality of receiving, irrespective of whether I like their gifts or not. But they push me to be truthful about if I like things or if I don’t. I’m starting to understand Pack De Luca wants to know the real me, which is the greatest gift of all. “Okay.”
“Good,” I hear him say softly, before his mood shifts again and we get down to business. “Dante will come and help you with your weapons when you’re ready.”
“I’m going to be armed?” It seems a stupid question, given what he said.
“Absolutely. I’m having trouble with control today, but knowing you’re armed helps. You’re my secret weapon. I don't foresee needing to rely on you, but I feel better knowing you’re behind me.”
I get giddy with my growing excitement, and my nerves, for today. My tummy does a loud gurgle, which I’m sure the whole world hears.
“I’ll get Matty to bring you some toast and a glass of lemonade.”
“Dante and I were going to make breakfast.”
“Plans change. Matty will deliver to you what you need.”
A handful of words from him, and as well as being giddy, I’m blinking back tears, but I think that’s how my day is going to be. And I seriously give zero fucks about how all over the place I am. As long as I am with them, I really don’t care. “Thanks, I need to go shower, or I’ll look like the Grinch, and that will definitely keep people away from you.”
My earlier breakdown in the shower didn’t count, since I came out of that looking worse than when I’d gone in.
“Or I can come back in and leave you so blitzed out in an orgasm haze, you’ll float through the day,” he suggests, and the overly loud noise he makes at the end lets me know exactly where his hands are.
“Valentine,” I squeal, before a blush so hot and vibrant blazes across my skin, I have to fan my face with my hand. “Go take a cold shower! Actually, I’m going to have one.”
Valentine chuckles, intentionally adding more of his designation like a final tease before he reverts to his other persona. “We need to leave in an hour.”
I feel him leave, as opposed to hearing him go.
The cold shower helps allay nerves and tempers my lust. As I’m about to rinse the conditioner from my hair, Matteo appears in the bathroom, his brown eyes dancing all over my body.
“Are you coming to join me?”
“I shouldn’t. I was just dropping off some toast and lemonade.” He shrugs before he starts undressing. “I wouldn’t miss any opportunity to be with you.”
I make room for him. As soon as he is in front of me, Matteo dips down to kiss the hollow of my throat before trailing his mouth up until he’s at mine. I get a smile against my lips, as opposed to a kiss, before he turns me around and gives me a head massage. Then, before I can offer to return the favor, he’s using the body wash he brought for me to lather me up.
He pampers me, head to toe, dropping in a few teasing bites here and there before he stands up and moves completely out of the way and raises his arm, pointing out of the shower.
“Get your ass out of here, minx.”
I feel so torn, but at the same time, I can feel the hour Valentine said we have fast disappearing.
Matteo finishes his shower, then shaves at the sink next to me while I do my makeup. I absolutely adore having him around me, even though we don’t talk. Just sharing the same space with him is therapeutic for my heart and soul.
“Let me brush your hair?” he says once he’s done, the towel tucked around his waist.
“Matteo”—I cup his face—“don’t take this the wrong way, but get the hell out of here.”
“It’s knowing my perfect dick is under here, isn’t it?” he asks seriously while undoing the towel, showing me what most certainly is the reason I’m kicking him out.
Much like I did with Valentine, I shove him through the doorway, then turn on the hair dryer to drown out his suggestive teasing. Which is harder than it sounds. Now that I’ve found my pack, I’m wanting to spend an awful lot of time with them, and not just for their intelligence. Pack De Luca has me constantly craving sex in any way, shape, or form.
Somehow, I manage to focus and replicate the half-up, half-down style I saw on a reel. Spraying the curls in hair spray, so they hold longer, I open the door, half expecting to find Matteo still naked, but it’s infinitely worse. He’s in a tuxedo.
As I clutch my chest and stagger back into the bathroom, he catches my retreat with a husky laugh. “Stop fucking around. The sooner we go, the sooner I can find somewhere at the event to fuck you stupid.”
With a gentle hold, he steers me into the walk-in closet, where everything is laid out, as Valentine promised.
“No talking. Just keep your lusty fuck-me eyes to yourself, okay? My control is about to snap,” he teases as he holds up my panties for me.
I get one leg up before his control snaps. His hand wraps like a vise around my ankle, trapping me with one of my legs in the air. In the very next moment, his mouth is on me, his tongue so far up my pussy, I arch up on tippy toes.
Lust ignites, and I stink up a caramel-scented storm, thick with need and heavy with arousal. Matteo watches me closely as he continues to eat me, but before I even have a chance to get my fingers in his hair, so I can grind myself over his mouth, he stops and goes back to pulling up my panties.
“Not fair, Matteo,” I growl, doing a passable interpretation of a rabid Alpha.
“Untrue,” he says quietly. “Now your taste is on my tongue, and your pussy is buzzing. It would be cruel for the both of us to attend today any other way.”
I glare at him and keep glaring while he feigns innocence. Matteo keeps his focus as he finishes dressing me in my underwear.
“ Il mio tutto ?” Dante’s voice yells out, cutting through the sexual tension.
“In here.”
“Hopefully fucking naked with your legs spread. I’ve decided Nonna would want you full of my come.” He stops talking when he finds me and Matteo. “Jesus fucking Christ, baby, I can’t mess you up when you look like that.”
His eyes burn over every inch of my body, and Matteo makes it easy for him. He spins me slowly for Dante.
Dante runs a hand over his face. “Let’s go kill people, because then we’re locking the world out and fucking you until your heat is here. Then we’re just going to keep on fucking you until your heat ends. This is a totally win-win situation.”
He’s wearing a matching tuxedo to Matteo’s, and he looks just as dangerous as my Beta does. Both of them stop looking at me like they’re about to devour me and get back to the task at hand, helping me get ready.
Dante drops to his knees in front of me, and for half a second, I think he’s going to press his face into the junction of my thighs, until he lifts his hand to show my knife sheath, with a new knife sitting inside it.
“Sorry, this took a while to arrive, but look how stunning it is.” Dante pulls out the blade and passes it over. While he gets busy adjusting the straps around my thigh, I get a feel for the knife.
My new knife is similarly shaped as the one now embedded into the wall above Valentine’s bed, but this one is overly feminine. Along the edge of the blade are small markings, and when I look closer, I realize it’s been etched with images of the lilies that Valentine likes so much. Down the center, and on both sides of the blade, are a set of gems.
“Ceylon sapphires to match mine and Val’s blue eyes.” He flutters his eyes, as if to prove his point, before going on. “Matteo chose cognac diamonds. The blade is CPM ultra lightweight and will cut through almost anything. Do you like it?”
I’m completely overwhelmed.
When I don’t answer or even look at him, he uses a push of his designation for me to respond.
“Yes, I love it,” I say, lifting my eyes from his present to him.
“Good. It’s important to me that you do. What about how it feels? Too heavy, or is the handle too big?” he asks, and he steers my wrist so he can see the way the handle fits in my hand.
“It feels as good as it looks. I promise.”
“Good.” He takes it from me and returns the deadly gift to its sheath.
Both he and Matteo take a step away, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out they’re appreciating how I look dressed only in my panties and knife. Their vanilla and Amaretto scents cloud the room, settling over my skin like a fine mist.
“I think you’re going to look incredible in the dress my brother chose.” Dante runs his hands through his near perfect hair, looking suddenly nervous. “If you don’t like it, just say, okay? But it’s got pockets, and he’s already filled it with an EpiPen.”
Matteo lifts the dress in question, and it looks like Vivienne Westwood wedding couture, but in a soft sky blue. When he unzips the gown and holds it open for me to step into, I have to sit down on the bench in the dressing room because it is Vivienne Westwood. I dip my head down between my knees, my happiness spinning out of control.
“Will you all please stop spoiling me? It’s too much,” I whisper, trying not to burst into tears. My chest feels so very full.
Matteo sits next to me on the small dressing bench. “No can do. Sorry. You’ll have to get used to how we show our love for you. And we’re not caught up in some material bullshit. We’re choosing things based on what we know will look amazing on you, but also what we hope will make you feel amazing. Val said he selected this dress because the cut will showcase your shoulders, and the sky-blue color is an old Sicilian tradition. He was so caught up in visualizing you wearing it, the price wasn’t a factor. Same with Dante’s knife. What is important to us is if you actually like it.”
Dante is less subtle as he tips my head back with a hand under my chin. “Baby, you need spoiling as much as we need to spoil you. The money we spend is not even a fraction of how we feel about you. And that’s what should be overwhelming, because it constantly scares me. Now, let me get your gun on, so we can go kick some serious fucking ass, probably ruin your dress in the process, before we really do ruin your dress when we tear it off you. Okay?”
Everything they said makes sense, and the ways they both rushed in to calm my last-minute jitters are as different and as beautiful as they are. I turn so Matteo can help me get the gown on while Dante straps a gun holster on my thigh.
Of course, the dress fits like a glove, and the way it makes me feel is something money can’t buy. But it’s the look Dante and Matteo share when I confess to them how much I adore the dress that brings the most joy.
Valentine is waiting in the kitchen for us, the dogs by his side, and he nearly drops the phone in his hand when he sees me. His blue eyes flash before he takes a step toward me. He points to the small bouquet of white lilies on the island, and though I see them in my periphery, he has my focus. Each step he takes brings him closer, and his presence hits first, like a battering ram through my defenses. “Are you armed?”
His mood is off, though, he’s angry. And I respond immediately, my chest aching.
I stop him from walking off. “Valentine, thank you for my dress. I love it.”
“Good,” he snaps, pulling his arm away. “I can’t even describe how I feel seeing you in it.”
“Try for me?”
A storm gathers in his eyes, then he jabs his finger aggressively toward me. “I want to lock you in the most secure building in the world and never let you out. It makes me so fucking angry the way I want to covet you so much.”
The welling apprehension I was feeling floats off after he explains himself. But Valentine's irritation is still apparent. I invade his personal space. His anger is aimed at only himself and is something his powerful mind has conjured up. Much like my own doubts and deep scars haunt me, Valentine clearly has his own issues. Whether these reactions and emotions are warranted or not doesn’t detract from the way they sometimes kick our asses.
I scour my nails over the back of his head to hold his attention, even though it’s clear he just wants to go. “Talk to me.”
His jaw is slammed shut, and he talks through his teeth, hissing almost. “We should never have asked you to do this.”
My hand settles around the back of his neck, my thumb resting under his jaw. “I’m not sure any of us asked. Things between us happened as they were meant to.”
He leans closer, and I can see frustration simmering in his eyes. “And now I’m putting you front and center in today’s bullshit.”
“What happened? You left my room telling me I was your secret weapon, and now you’re doubting me? Or us?”
“Fuck, no. That’s not it.” Valentine cracks his neck but also breaks away from me.
Dante steps forward, and he speaks, but I keep watching Valentine. “Val’s worried about how you’re going to feel about him after you’ve seen him working.”
I drop my eyes for an instant as I answer both of them. “Pretty sure I’ll be weak at the knees and desperate for the attention of my Alpha.”
When I look back at him, Valentine has his gaze affixed to mine, and he purposely lets his control fall away to show me a more vicious side to him. One that he’s kept well veiled to now. “And you’re fine watching your pack get a little fucking deranged in their revenge?”
I gasp in fake shock and throw my hand up. “Wait, you’ve been holding out on me?”
And then I laugh harder when he snatches my hand and pulls me to him. His arms wrap around me like steel cords, his frustration nipping against my skin, but I feel so safe in his arms.