Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Sophia
Why did he have to keep doing that? Bringing up the past. Like I wasn’t haunted by it enough.
I closed my eyes, half expecting him to leave because that’s what he did, and I desperately needed to be alone. Only he didn’t leave. His hands closed around my hips and pulled me back against the hardness of his body. I fought the urge to rub against him and kept still. My eyes closed.
Maybe if I stayed quiet, he would think I’d fallen asleep and leave me alone to my misery because that’s what I lived in now.
Pure agonizing purgatory.
“I don’t want to talk either,” he whispered. His lips brushed against my throat. His hand slid upward from my hip and slid under my shirt to cup my breast.
The thick pad of his thumb brushed against my nipple and teased it upward.
I stifled back a cry of longing.
Why did he have to be like this? How was it fair that my body reacted to him with so much need?
“This is what I want.” One hand was on my breast, and he bit down on my neck. Hard enough to hurt but not hard enough to break the skin. “This is what I dream of.”
His arm around me tightened, his hand delving down between my legs to rub my clit through my clothes.
I couldn’t help it, I moaned, my body instantly coming alive.
God, I was weak.
“Let me touch you.” The hand snaked into my panties, brushing over my wet folds over and over until he narrowed back in on my clit. He started rubbing it in tight little circles.
My back arched, pushing my ass against the hard cock I could feel forming behind his zipper.
“Fuck, I want you.”
I wanted him as well, and that’s where the trouble was. Because I couldn’t see a time in my future when I didn’t want him.
“Matteo,” I moaned his name. Reaching behind me, I cupped him over his clothes, teasing him just like he was teasing me.
“Fuck.” He swore again. Loosening his grip on my body to yank my pants down and bare my ass for him. “Fuck, just like that, Franny.”
I froze. Had he just called me Franny?
“I’ve dreamed of being inside your tight little…”
I could feel him pressing against my nakedness, his hand fumbling between us so he could free himself.
“God, Franny, I need-“
I shot upward, spinning and staring down at his face. “What did you just call me?” Yanking up my pants, I glared at him. “What the fuck did you just call me?”
He didn’t move. His hand moved up and down his shaft lazily. “Get back into bed.”
“You called her name.” I couldn’t help it. My voice shook with anger. “You called me by another woman's name, Matteo.”
His lips twitched. “So?”
“So?”
What the hell did he mean, “so”? “You touched my body. You wanted to use my body and -“
“She’s my fiancée, Sophia. She’s the woman I’m going to marry and the future mother of my children.
” His eyes narrowed. “I’m sorry. Did you think I was here with you every time we fucked?
” A sarcastic chuckle left his lips, but it might as well have been a knife twisting in my heart.
“Come on, Sophia, you were just a warm, wet pussy I could sink into because my future bride is a good, sweet girl. I can’t touch her until the wedding.
So I used you to relieve some stress. But it was always her I was thinking about. Always her that I was imagining.”
I moved without thinking. Swinging my arm back, I slapped him hard across the cheek. “You don’t mean that,” I whispered. My hand was stinging from the force of the slap, but not as much as my eyes were from trying not to cry.
“Don’t I?” This time, his lips did curve upward.
His smile wasn’t happy. It was cruel. “Now who is living in the past, Sophia?” He shook his head.
“I moved on.” He used my own words against me.
“It’s about time you did the same. I’m going to be married, Sophia.
I’m going to put a baby in her belly as soon as I can.
You know, the one thing you could never give me. ”
I ran, my feet moving as fast as they could. I needed to get away from him. Because after everything he had done and said in the past, this was the night he completely broke me.
Heading toward the guest bedroom at the end of the hall, I locked the door quickly and fell into bed. Crying felt weak, but I couldn’t help myself.
He was in love with this other woman. This girl who was so perfect for him that he had called me by her name.
He would marry her and have a family with her and he was excited about it.
There was no hope for me and him. There probably never had been, but now any hope I had foolishly had was dead and gone.
He had killed it the moment he moaned her name in my ear.
“Sophia.” Matteo’s voice came from the other side of the door. His fist rapped against the wood. “Unlock the door.”
Ignoring him, I pulled the thick quilt over my head to muffle my sobs.
He called out again, more frantic, and I ignored that as well. I didn’t want to see him. Or hear his voice.
In my entire life, I had never wanted to be away from Matteo, but I did now.
I never wanted to see him or talk to him ever again.
He was right. It was time I moved on, but how could I do that when I was here? And even if I could find my way back home to my daughter, how could I move on when every time I looked at her I saw him?
Hiding my face in the pillows, I let the sadness take over, tears wetting my face and then soaking my pillow. I cried and cried until I couldn’t cry anymore because I was totally and utterly spent.
It was only then that the exhaustion of the last few hours took over, and I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
I came awake suddenly, and instantly, I was on edge. When I had crawled into this bed to cry alone, I had made sure the door was locked.
But now it was open. I could see the faint light from a lamp through it and feel Matteo’s warm, hard chest against my back.
His arm was flung haphazardly around my waist, and his hot breath tickled the back of my neck.
Sometime between me falling asleep, sobbing my heart out, and now, he had unlocked the door and crept into my bed.
He had purposely sought me out. Not to fight or to talk or even to have sex.
He had crept into this room just so he could sleep next to me.
That wasn’t the actions of a man who hated me. It wasn’t what a man who wanted to be with another woman did.
The fact that he was here next to me was confusing as hell. It didn’t answer any questions I had. It multiplied them.
From the bedside table a loud buzzing sound filled my ears. His phone was going off as a message came through.
Who was contacting him at this time of night?
I knew it was probably work-related. Some business venture that needed his attention. Just like I knew I should wake him up. Or even leave the room and sleep somewhere else.
But my gut was telling me something else.
It was telling me to look.
Moving as softly as I could, I slipped from the bed and padded silently to the phone. He didn’t stir. He didn’t even stir when I picked it up.
My brother’s name flashed by, and my eyebrows shot down. What was Gio doing messaging him at this time? What could they possibly have to talk about that couldn’t wait until the morning?
I didn’t even think about it. I opened the message, and my heart plummeted.
I’m in London, taking care of a problem I should have taken care of a long time ago. We can discuss more when I get back stateside.
A problem he should have taken care of a long time ago?
Lily!
Heart racing, I tried not to cry out. Gio had gone to London to hurt my daughter just like he had threatened to do. I was out of time.
Gathering the keys that lay next to the phone, I hurried from the room.
I didn’t have time to kill Matteo. Even if I could, it would be too late for that. I had to get home before Gio took away the only good thing in my life.
Pausing just long enough to throw on jeans and a sweater, I looked around. My passport. If I was going to get home, I needed that, but I hadn’t seen it since I arrived, and I had no cash, either.
How was I going to get anywhere without those two things?
“Focus,” I told myself in a hissing whisper. “Focus and think, Sophia. Where would he have put them?”
Turning in a circle, I clutched the keys in my hand, and then my eyes found the locked door of his office.
He always locked it, but that didn’t really matter now, because I had the keys.
Tiptoeing to it, I opened it just enough to slide inside and close it softly behind me.
I knew I didn’t have long. At any moment, Matteo might wake up and come looking for me. If he found out I had read his message and was in here, he would demand to know what I was doing, and it would leave me no choice but to tell him the truth.
Of course, I could do that now. Wake him up and tell him everything. But there wasn’t time for that now. It would take too long to make him understand, if he ever believed me at all, and I didn’t have time to waste.
My brother was already in the United Kingdom.
I found the safe under his desk, and fell to my knees as another hurdle stared me in the face.
I didn’t know the code. And I didn’t have time to try and find some scrap of paper with it written down. Not that Matteo would be stupid enough to do that.
Reaching out, I typed in the first set of numbers I could think of.
My birthday.
The safe clicked open as I stared at it, open-mouthed.
What did it mean? He had used my birthday as his code.
What the hell did it mean?
It didn’t matter what it meant, because I didn’t have time to think about it. Lily was in trouble, or she would be very soon, and I needed to get to her. I couldn’t let the here and now and thoughts of the past distract me.
Shoving my passport into the back pocket of my jeans, I stared down at the wads of cash just sitting there.
I needed money, and Matteo had loads of it. It felt wrong to take from him, but I didn’t have a choice, and I didn’t owe him anything at all.
Plus, this was to save his daughter's life. He might not ever be able to know about her, but he owed us that much.
Grabbing handfuls without counting, I stuffed money into my pockets and stood up.
I would go home, and Lily, Nat, and I would disappear somewhere Gio could never find us.
Somewhere Matteo wouldn’t either. If he ever came looking, which I didn’t think he would.
Taking a deep breath, I moved silently through the living room. I had my passport and cash, so the first part of my plan was sorted out. Now, all I needed to do was get past the guards that were no doubt waiting downstairs.
I moved toward the elevator, pressing the button and cursing it for the loud whooshing noise it made as it opened. Guiltily, I looked behind me, half expecting to see a sleep-tousled Matteo barreling toward me.
Only there was no one there.
My breath was shaky as I stepped inside, and the doors closed behind me.
I had done it, I had escaped. Now all I had to do was sneak passed the guards and I would be on my way home.
To my daughter.