21. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Alina
The silence in the mansion was absolute.
Not the unsettling quiet of an empty house, but something thick and sealed—a silence built from sound-proofed walls and layers of heavy security.
It felt heavy, pressing in on her. Alina sat on the edge of the massive bed, staring at the door.
She half-expected it to shimmer and open back into her cramped apartment, her real life. It didn’t.
A knock came at the door and a pause before, “Alina…may I come in?” floated through the door.
As she stood she whispered “Come in.”
Dante slowly entered Alina's room and looked at her. The look was like she was the only person who could keep him tethered to this world.
As he stepped closer, her breath trembled. He reached up slowly, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers grazed her cheek, warm and gentle. She froze—not in fear, but in pure anticipation.
“Dante…” she whispered.
He leaned in—slow, deliberate—giving her every chance to pull away. She didn’t. Their foreheads touched, her breath hitching.
His voice was barely a whisper. “Tell me to leave.”
She couldn’t. She didn’t want to. Her silence was his answer.
His hands had started shaking, and he pressed them flat against his thighs to make them stop. Then he kissed her.
It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t tentative. The moment their lips met, weeks of restraint snapped like a wire pulled too tight.
Dante’s hand slid into her hair, cradling the back of her head as he angled her mouth to his, deepening the kiss with a low groan that vibrated through her chest. Alina melted into him, fingers fisting in his shirt, pulling him closer, closer, until she could feel his heartbeat against her sternum, frantic and matching her own.
He tasted like whiskey and sin. She moaned into his mouth, and the sound seemed to completely undo him.
In one smooth motion, Dante lifted her, hands gripping the backs of her thighs.
Her legs wrapped around his waist instinctively as he carried her, lowering her onto the massive bed.
The mattress dipped under their combined weight.
He followed her down, never breaking the kiss, his body settling between her parted thighs with perfect, devastating pressure.
“Tell me to stop,” he rasped against her lips, even as his hips rolled slowly, letting her feel exactly how hard he was.
Alina shook her head, breathless. “Don’t you dare.”
Clothes disappeared in a haze of impatient hands and muffled curses.
Her shirt—his shirt—ended up discarded on the floor.
He peeled her pants down her legs like he was unwrapping something sacred, kissing every inch of skin he revealed: her knee, the inside of her thigh, the sensitive crease where leg met hip.
When he reached her panties, he looked up at her, eyes dark with hunger.
“Last chance, Alina.”
She answered by lifting her hips and helping him slide the lace down. Dante cursed reverently, and then his mouth was on her.
Alina’s back arched off the bed with a sharp cry as his tongue found her, slow and deliberate at first, then hungry, devouring.
He slid two thick fingers inside her without warning, curling them just right, stroking the exact spot that made stars explode behind her eyelids.
She grabbed his hair, hips rocking against his face, shameless and desperate.
“Dante—fuck—please—”
He didn’t stop until she shattered, her thighs trembling around his head, his name breaking from her lips like a prayer and a curse.
She was still pulsing when he rose over her, shedding the last of his clothes.
His body was a masterpiece of hard lines and old scars—broad shoulders, ridged abdomen, and a length so thick and heavy it made her mouth go dry.
He stroked himself once, twice, watching her with hooded eyes as she spread her legs wider in silent invitation.
He settled between them, bracing his weight on his forearms. The blunt head of his length nudged her entrance, slick with her arousal.
“Look at me,” he whispered.
Their eyes locked, and then he thrust in.
Alina gasped, her breath catching in short, broken pulls as her body struggled to make room for him—a deep, aching pressure that sat right at the edge of too much, her fingers curling tightly into the sheets as he pressed deeper, slow and relentless, until there was nowhere left to go.
Dante dropped his forehead to hers, breathing hard, jaw clenched like he was fighting a losing battle for control.
“God, you feel…” He groaned, hips twitching. “Perfect. So fucking perfect.”
He started moving—slow, deep rolls of his hips that dragged against every sensitive nerve inside her. Each thrust pushed a broken moan from her throat. She wrapped her legs tightly around his waist, heels digging into his back, urging him deeper.
The pace quickened. The heavy bed creaked beneath them. Skin against skin. Dante’s hand found hers, lacing their fingers together and pinning them above her head as he drove into her harder, faster, losing the last threads of his legendary restraint.
Alina came again with a silent scream, clenching around him so tightly he snarled her name like a warning. He followed seconds later, burying himself deep and spilling inside her with long, powerful pulses, his entire body shuddering violently against hers.
For a long moment, the only sounds in the massive room were their ragged breathing.
Dante collapsed beside her, immediately pulling her back into his arms, tucking her securely against his chest. His hand stroked down her spine, gentle now, almost reverent.
He pressed a warm kiss to her damp forehead.
“I’m staying right here,” he murmured, voice rough with exhaustion and something much deeper. “In this bed. In this house. With you.”
Alina smiled against his bare skin, too blissed out and sated to argue. For tonight, she didn’t want to be anywhere else.