Chapter 17
FRANKIE
I sense Dante as soon as I walk into the house.
It’s been a long day. My thighs ache from horseback riding and I want nothing more than to slip into a hot bath, but I need to talk to my husband and make my confession.
I’ve already made up my mind that I’m going to tell him what I overheard, but I still don’t know what I want in return.
I’m not even sure how to hold information like this hostage.
I’m hoping seeing his face will inspire something in me, good or bad.
Either my inner gangster will come out, or I’ll flake and crumble.
Slipping off my shoes, I pad down the darkened hallway, toward the low light spilling from a doorway.
I’m fairly certain it’s one of the living rooms (not the one with the movie screen in it), but it could also be the library.
Or the spare office. Or the games room with the pool table.
Hell, who am I kidding? I can barely keep track of my own rooms in this place.
Plus, I may have polished off Charlie’s wine once she’d left—and the rest of the bottle—to help me work up the nerve to come home and face Dante.
So I’m a little discombobulated, truth be told.
Regardless, it turns out my instincts are dead-on.
When I enter the living room, Dante is standing near the brick fireplace, looking out a window into the dark. His profile is to me. He’s holding a glass of wine, his tie loose, the neckline of his shirt open. He’s striking in the soft amber light. Then again, when isn’t he?
If I could get away with it, I’d be content to simply stand here and watch him brood, but he intuits I’m here. Slowly, he turns to look at me, taking a small drink before settling his eyes on mine and hanging on there.
It strikes me how different we are. We’re two very separate people.
But I’m about to step fully into his world, and when I’m done offloading what I know, I pray I’ll be able to leap right back out.
“Bella Notte with your sister.” He turns back to the window. “How was your meal?”
It’s not a real question—more like words to fill the space. I’m hardly surprised that he knew where I was and with whom. He could have microchipped me in my sleep for all I know.
“Very good. As was the wine. I had almost a whole bottle to myself.”
He looks at me again, nodding to himself. “My wife is a drunk.”
“Maybe. I wasn’t, up until a few days ago…when my life took a drastic and unexpected turn. Can you blame me?”
I make my way over to him. He doesn’t acknowledge my sarcasm, or my approach.
“Dante, look. We need to come to some kind of truce. Unfortunately, we’re stuck with each other, and spending the rest of our lives fighting is just going to give us both ulcers.”
He flicks me a look, filled with disdain. “A truce implies we reach a mutually beneficial agreement. What could I possibly want from you that would benefit me?”
I lean my hip against the side of the sofa. He’s close enough that I could smack the haughty sneer off his lips if I were a braver, or more violent, person.
“My help,” I suggest. “My expertise. My knowledge.”
He scoffs, as if what I’ve just said is ludicrous, and I feel my face go hot.
“Do you even know why I spent the last three years in Italy?” I ask, losing patience.
It’s a rhetorical question. Of course he doesn’t. He never cared to ask.
He smiles at me over the rim of his glass. “Fucking your way through Sicily?”
I don’t smile back. “If I were more like you, then yes, that is exactly what I would have been doing. Instead of fucking, however, I was earning my master’s degree in soil sciences with a focus on enhancing vine production.
My undergrad program at UC Berkeley was a double major in business marketing and agriscience.
I’ve had a sommelier certification since I was twenty-two—”
“Bravo,” Dante says dryly, but I don’t let him goad me.
“I’ve been training to run a winery my entire life. My father, supremely lazy ass that he was, made sure I could do all his work for him someday. So, dear husband, you tell me. Does that sound beneficial to you?”
He tries to dismiss me with an off-putting laugh, but I don’t accept it. Moving to him, I grab his glass out of his hand just as he moves to take a drink. I smell the alcohol, take a small sip, then a larger one.
“French brandy with a base of…” I close my eyes, mining the encyclopedic knowledge in my brain. “Let’s see, the river Garonne, right bank…that makes it Saint-émilion wine, Grand Cru of course, aged two years.”
I open my eyes and find Dante paying attention now, though he’s trying not to show it.
“The appellation specializes in red wines with a crisp, full finish,” I go on, “and I’m getting very strong notes of plum and cherry—suggesting production from grapes grown in a temperate year. Hmm, I’m surprised. I’d think it a bit fruity for a man like you.”
I finish off the rest of the glass and hand it back to him empty.
“Fill it with something else and let’s make a game of it, shall we? I can do this all night.”
One corner of his mouth turns up, but he quickly schools it. I’ve got him. I see the curiosity, the surprise in his eyes. So much for his poker face.
“I can be useful to you, Dante. I know things.” Oh, hell, the alcohol is going straight to my mouth. “About your wines, about your grapes…about the unfortunate mealybug infestation in the southeast corner that’s threatening your newest vines.”
He’s fully facing me, his body taut. I should stop talking. Instead I lean closer, nearly touching him.
“About the death of your father.”
He grabs my shoulders, all pretense gone. “What do you know?”
This is it—and I’m not prepared. Despite Charlie’s advice, I haven’t figured out what to ask for in trade for this information. Letting out a breath, I realize it doesn’t matter. I can’t honestly use this as a bartering tool. It feels too wrong.
“It wasn’t an accident. Somebody did something to his car. I overheard my dad talking on the phone about it. He offered to sell that person’s name to whomever he was speaking with.”
Dante is so still he might well be a statue. I don’t know how I was expecting him to react when he found out, but it wasn’t like this. Maybe he already suspected? Or is his granite face just hiding overwhelming anger, or disbelief? His nostrils flare, the only sign that I’ve triggered him.
“I need names,” he says coolly. “Your father is a lot of things, but he’s not a murderer. He didn’t act alone. Find out who else was involved.”
“Already working on it.” I take a breath, then turn away to give myself some space.
“My father is a terrible man. He’s selfish and rude and belligerent, but until today, I never thought he was evil.
I can’t have him around my little sister, but she loves her horses too much to leave.
Isn’t that the dumbest, sweetest thing?” My voice cracks, but I force myself to keep my chin up.
“Anyway, Charlie’s gonna stay at the house with Livvie until we can figure out what to do about the horses.
In the meantime, whatever you do to my dad, just… leave my sisters out of it. Please.”
I turn around and Dante is right there, in my space. He cups my chin with his hand and forces me to look up at him. His jaw works to one side, but he says nothing.
Releasing me, he shoves his hands into his pockets. I’m about to leave when he says, “If you’re a sommelier, you should make yourself useful in the tasting room. They could use a hand in there.”
“I’ll be there at eight a.m. sharp.”
“Eleven,” he corrects, exasperated. “Christ, even the tourists don’t drink before noon.”
I shoot him a frown. “I’m up at sunrise every day. What the hell am I supposed to do with my mornings?”
“I can think of a few things.” He lets loose one of his rare smiles and runs a hand down my arm, his fingers drifting over the sensitive skin on my wrist, drawing out a shiver from me.
“Oh, come on. That’s a joke. I’m not sleeping with you.”
He takes my hand and presses my palm against his lower abdomen. All at once, I’m completely sober.
“Maybe not. But you will give me a blow job.”
“Ha! Now that’s a joke.”
He lowers my hand, over his belt, down the front of his pants. His cock is thick and stiff, and I grip him through the fabric on instinct, drawing a groan from him.
“That’s right. You’re going to suck it, Francesca.”
Dante reaches out and runs his fingers through my hair, taking firm hold of the strands, tugging just enough to make my scalp tingle. Our eyes lock as he gently, ever so slowly forces me to my knees, holding my gaze the entire time.
The carpet is blessedly thick, and God, so is his cock. My hand is still fondling it.
“Suck it,” he repeats. “Right now. Right here. Show me what that hot little mouth is capable of.”
I attempt to scoff at him, but nothing comes out. All I can do is lick my lips.
I know I should say no, leave him standing here wanting and alone, but I just can’t seem to do it. My mouth is watering, the ache between my legs almost unbearable.
“Suck,” he commands for the last time.
The tone of his voice makes something inside me snap, and I claw at his zipper hungrily, whimpering when his cock pops free into my eager hand.
I lick my lips again to prepare them to receive the fat tip and then I open wide and take him into my mouth, sucking and swirling my tongue around the sensitive skin.
I brace myself at first, afraid I’ll discover what Jessica may have—the taste of another woman—but I realize quickly that the taste is of him alone.
The salty flavor of his precum flames me on, more evidence of his arousal.
I try to take in more and more of him, but there’s only so much I can do from this angle, and he’s so thick.
I look up at his face. My heart blips at the slightest hint of vulnerability I can see there.
His eyes are closed, the usual stress lines around his mouth and eyes gone. It makes me want to pounce.
Sliding my lips off of him, hand wrapped firmly around his cock, I get to my feet and force him backwards, one step at a time, stroking him all the while. When the back of his legs hit the couch, I push him into a seated position and drop to my knees in front of him again.
He looks surprised by my aggression, but I’m back on him in an instant, the angle much better as I slide his pants to the floor and suck him all the way to the back of my throat.
Dante spreads his legs wider, giving me more room to work.
When I reach down to cup his balls, he throws his head back in ecstasy.
Soft sounds come from his throat as I suck, driving me on. I suck harder. I love making him moan. Having this power over him.
I work his balls, tracing them with one finger, trailing my touch beneath his sack to the ultrasensitive skin just below.
He sucks in a breath, almost squirming, but doesn’t try to stop me.
I gently caress that spot, sucking his head hard as I bob back and forth, until he swells in my mouth, stiffening with an agonized grunt. I’ve got him right on the edge.
He grabs my head and starts thrusting in my mouth, rough, fast, hard. In seconds he’s coming, loudly, sounding like he’s in pain as he spills his hot seed down my throat. It takes two gulps for me to swallow it all down.
I sit back on my heels, a little dazed. Both of us are breathing hard. My lips are swollen, my jaw aching from all the sucking.
He hasn’t moved, as if I’ve drained the energy straight out of him, but he’s staring down at me fiercely. Then he stands, watching me as he fixes his pants. A stone once more. He doesn’t offer to help me up, which is fine, because my legs are weak and shaky. I’m not ready yet.
But then he reaches down and puts a hand on my cheek, his thumb tracing my tender lips. “Eleven a.m.,” he says.
And then he’s gone.