31. Dante
31
DANTE
Friday, September 20
“Hey.”
I freeze in the doorway of my apartment. I’m still not used to the sound of Victoria’s voice in my space. The woman is always running back and forth to school, or else she’s tucked up on the corner of the couch with her head in a book.
I don’t bother her.
All I do is give her space, reading my own book and looking up at her over my phone while she scribbles furious notes, seemingly forgetting I’m in the same room as her. My place is small, nothing lavish, but it’s clean and in a safe-enough neighborhood. It’s the first place I found that matched my needs when it became obvious I needed to leave the guesthouse. I didn’t bother to keep looking for something nicer. But Victoria never complains about the step down in her living arrangements.
I glance up from my messaging app to see Victoria in the kitchen, her dark curly hair twisted up in a high bun. Stray hairs fall around her face in wispy strands and she blows one out of her way, rubbing her palms over a towel hanging from the waistband of her denim shorts.
“I made dinner.”
Unsure what to say, I close the door and lock it, smelling rosemary and garlic in the air. “What did you make?”
“Gnocchi in a fresh red sauce.” She follows my steps as I get closer. “I added pancetta and mushrooms to the sauce for depth. The gnocchi are like little pieces of?—”
“Potato pasta,” I cut in, lifting a brow at her. “I’m Italian, princess. I know gnocchi.”
Victoria shifts her weight, embarrassed. “Right. Um…There’s also garlic bread.”
“Homemade?”
She immediately frowns. “No.”
A light chuckle rumbles from my chest and Victoria scowls as I round the small kitchen island. “Damn, and that would’ve made it delicious.”
She smacks my chest. “Listen here, Dante ? — ”
“I can’t wait to try it.” I catch her wrist before she can drop her arm. “Thank you.”
“You hate that I did this.”
I shake my head. “I don’t.”
“You do. You don’t like receiving anything and?—”
“Oh, I like receiving just fine, princess,” I mutter, running my thumb over the inside of her wrist. “Gagging turns me on.” Victoria blushes wildly as I place a soft kiss on the top of her hand. “Thank you for making dinner. It’s great.”
“You’re welcome.” She glances at the pot simmering on the stove, averting her eyes and getting her bearings back. “I hope it’s not bad. We could order pizza?—”
“I haven’t even tried it yet.”
Victoria presses her lips together and her eyes jump back up to mine with a lift of her chin. “Don’t get too excited.”
“The garlic bread thing was a joke.”
“You’ve made me paranoid. You’re Italian .”
“That isn’t news. I was Italian when you married me.”
Her blush spreads down her neck, and I can see the flush staining her collarbones. She snorts lightly, and damn it, I shouldn’t find a snort sexy. “I don’t know why I decided to cook. Cooking isn’t my focus. I’m a baker at heart.”
“Hence the Paris bakery plan.” She bobs her head. “Is it ready?”
“Should be in a minute.”
“You ready to talk to me about what Liam said?”
It’s impressive how quickly Victoria shuts down, a steel curtain clanging shut behind her eyes. She must have learned that skill from her pain in the ass mom.
“No.”
“I need to know,” I urge gently, raising her hand back to my lips. “So I can protect you.”
“It’s all a blur,” she huffs. “And I was just…scared.”
“I know. I don’t want to downplay it. That’s why I’m going to get that little son of a bitch?—”
“Don’t,” Victoria pleads. “He’s your nephew. And he has a lot of pride. Don’t you Italians live off your egos?”
“We do,” I agree. “However, we protect our own. Our families.”
“I’m not your family.”
“You’re my wife.” I press another chaste kiss above her fingers. “And you made me dinner.”
“I was hungry.”
“So you made us dinner.”
I rub my thumb back and forth over her knuckles, holding her gaze as Victoria scuffs her feet on the floor. “It was no big deal.”
“Says the girl that’s paranoid I’ll hate it.”
“I’m about to order a pizza and eat the whole thing in front of you.”
I smirk at her because she wouldn’t be that cruel. “I’d love to see that.”
“Would you, now?” she challenges, pulling her hand free and popping her fists on her hips. “Because I’m craving some, actually.” She begins to step away, reaching for her phone on the counter.
“You don’t want to do that.”
Victoria’s eyes narrow, daring me to stop her, and my arm wraps around her waist, pulling her flush against me before she can finish dialing.
I said I wouldn’t do this anymore, and now I’m breaking my own rule. But not even Gabriella did shit like this for me, this domestic shit. And on top of that, I haven’t been this attracted to a woman in years.
Haven’t wanted to be.
And now I’m crossing lines right and left, playing at being a husband while ignoring the facts.
What Victoria and I have is a business partnership. Not a marriage.
Yet, I can’t seem to pry the word wife from my brain, not in relation to her. Victoria being my wife means she’s mine, claimed in front of everyone.
And I can do whatever the hell I want with her. To her.
“I’m sorry, princess,” I murmur, breathing the words against her lips as I blindly reach to switch off the burner. “But your dinner is going to get cold.”
Lifting her by her ass, I plop her down on the edge of the countertop and step between her parted thighs. Our mouths collide on instinct, drawn to each other like magnets.
I can’t get enough of the way she melts for me, can’t get the memories and images I’ve collected of her out of my head. It wasn’t too long ago that this girl was playing the violin in my classroom and hoping for my approval, that she was complimenting me like a true fan, that she was irritating me like it was her job.
Now she’s my legal wife. My responsibility. Mine.
I want nothing more than to make it very clear to her what that means.
What it would be like if this was real.
Hooking my fingers along the edge of her shorts, I flick open the fly and yank them down her ass, dragging her panties over her legs along with the denim. Victoria doesn’t break my kiss, too far gone, and dinner becomes an afterthought as I imagine what we’ll do instead.
I’ll make it up to her.
I’ll buy her a damn pizza or eat her gnocchi cold. I really don’t care. But I need to be inside her, swallowing her moans as I take her rough and deep.
Victoria tears at my jeans as I sink two fingers inside her. She’s already soaked as shit for me. It only adds to my need. To my burning desire to own her tonight. I can’t wait to use her body any way I want.
My cock springs free and Victoria doesn’t hesitate to guide me to her center. My fingers are still deep inside her. Her increasingly haggard breaths drive me wild. I’m going to pound into her so hard that we’ll both need a break before the next round.
And there will be a next round.
“Dante,” she pleads, stroking my cock as I continue to finger-fuck her. I want her to come first, I want her sensitive and quaking, overwhelmed by pleasure when I slide deep.
“Give me just one orgasm, princess, and I’m all yours.”
“Please…”
Fuck. Me.
Denying Victoria when she’s like this is impossible. The urge to pleasure her, satisfy her, is nearly as essential to my being as my need to breathe.
“I’m not going to be gentle,” I tell her. “And I’m not going to slow down. You should come before?—”
“I want to come on your cock.”
Done.
Drawing my fingers out of her wet heat, I grasp my cock at the base and slide home in one quick motion.
She squeezes me and my eyes slam closed on impact. Victoria mewls in pleasure as I crash into her over and over. Her nails bite into my skin, and I’m not sure whether it’s out of pleasure or pain as I feel her ass drag back and forth across the countertop.
“Open your eyes,” Victoria commands, and I’m helpless to refuse, obeying immediately. “I want you to remember who you’re fucking.”
How could I forget?
“And who am I fucking? The sweet little violinist who begged me to teach her or the sassy brat who thinks she can challenge me?”
“Your wife.”
The words do something to me, and I don’t want to examine the why too hard. Maybe it’s because, in a way, she’s admitting I own her. That no one can take her from me. Gabriella was never mine to claim. She belonged to someone else and I wish I had recognized it sooner.
But Victoria is independent as shit and never fell for the entitled pricks at her school. She didn’t want to attach herself to someone appropriate and turn into some sort of Stepford clone of her mother.
No, she wants to belong to herself, to live life on her own terms.
“You just love to remind me, don’t you, princess?” I gloat as I fuck her nice and hard. “Always making sure?—”
“That you know I’m yours,” she inserts, sinking her teeth into that pouty lower lip of hers. “You’re the only one who can fuck me.”
“Anyone can fuck you,” I retort, hating the thought. Victoria turns heads everywhere she goes and could easily use that to her advantage, twisting men to her needs with hardly a wink. “But they’d die.”
“Why?” she gasps, apparently turned on by the thought of what I’d do to anyone who dares to touch her.
“You know why,” I bite back. “No one touches what belongs to me.”
A smile crosses her face, and I both want to see it and resent it. I can’t give this woman what she needs, what she deserves, long term. I’m not husband material. Not the forever kind. It’s a temporary title, one that allows me to protect her from anyone who might try to take advantage of her status and money.
Like you?
Guilt begins to bubble in my chest and Victoria must sense it because she grips the front of my shirt and tugs me closer.
“You’re mine, too, Dante. Don’t be so scared. Don’t think about what happens when this is done. I’m not.”
Why?
I want to ask the question, but I keep my lips shut. She’s my responsibility now, but she won’t be for long. I’m going to kill Angelo for murdering my brother, setting me up, and thinking about using Victoria as his personal plaything. His lack of decency and class is unimpressive, even if he is a mob boss, and I truly don’t think it’ll be a challenge to kill the motherfucker and have done with it.
“Fuck me,” she hisses gently. “Mark me, use me. I don’t care how hard or fast?—”
“Shut up, Victoria,” I seethe, angry that she seems to think she’s just an object to me, a living sex doll. That she thinks I’m some alpha, possessive asshole who collects things and throws them away when I’m finished.
“Make me,” she challenges and I grind my teeth. This constant last-word shit is beyond belief.
I thrust inside her, bottoming out and causing her to cry out. I rip her shirt over her head, taking a moment to appreciate the pink lace holding up her generous tits before I reach behind her to unfasten her bra and free them.
Her nipples are tight pebbles and I can’t help but tease them with my thumbs as I cup each breast in one hand. Her flesh spills over my fingers and I squeeze, causing her to moan in pleasure. Victoria arches toward me and I nearly bite my tongue trying not to come. My balls clench at the softness of her skin and the feel of her pussy strangling my cock.
Victoria is perfect in every way, and I’m going to ruin her for anyone who comes after me.
We move together in a chaotic wave, driving each other to the brink of pleasure and destruction. I don’t know if I can hold on any longer when Victoria finally screams my name with her release, her cunt tightening around me over and over again.
I let go, spilling inside her, and I’ve barely taken the edge off my need.
I want more.
Victoria’s forehead falls to mine, a panting and beautiful wreck after what we’ve just done.
She deserves the world.
A bright future and a man without a shadowy past and questionable morals.
I’m not that man.
I’ll never be that man.
But I can’t stop myself from ruining Victoria a little bit more.