Matteo
Istand in the doorway of my room as if crossing the threshold is the equivalent of stepping off a steep cliff. One shoulder leans against the frame, and my forehead rests on the wood as I summon the courage to enter World War III without first arming up.
Azra is somewhere inside my room, ignoring me.
She hasn’t spoken to me in hours.
I deserve her silent treatment. Earlier, I was too angry to think rationally. My fury had me doing and saying things before I could stop myself, and now the weight of my stupidity sits on my chest like a ton of bricks.
As I scratch my cropped beard, I stop acting like a pussy and enter my room. The first thing I spot is Azra. The next is a large, shiny black limousine rolling through the main gates of the estate.
I groan when I realize it’s our ride to the gala.
Who the fuck hires a stretch limousine to attend a charity event?
It’s long enough to qualify for its own zip code, glossy enough to reflect every streetlight in the city, and dramatic enough that every pedestrian we pass will stop to stare.
Talk about not reading the room.
It screams “I’m rich as fuck” as loudly as it does “And you’re poor as dirt.”
My family thrives on theatrics. Making sure everyone in this town and the hundreds nearby know who we are has skyrocketed our reputation. Pompousness, like a stretch limousine, signals exactly who’s arriving and how grateful you should be to be graced with our presence.
Normally, I feed off the hype, but tonight, it grates on my last nerve.
That probably has more to do with the silence of the person who’s been hogging my room all afternoon, but it doesn’t change the facts.
Azra sits behind a vanity mirror, torso angled toward it, pretending she’s as fascinated by the impromptu makeup tutorial Lucia is giving her as Valentina and Camille are.
Even while interacting with my family as if she’s a major part of it, she hasn’t uttered a word to me once in the past seven hours. Not a groan or a huff.
It’s driving me insane.
She looks surreal in one of the dresses I selected. It hugs her curves perfectly, but she didn’t stop there. She added a chiffon headpiece with gems woven through the hem like constellations. The gems create a rainbow halo around her hair, resembling diamonds.
She’s an angel summoned to earth to put in place the fool who dared to offend.
God, I fucking hope so.
I like her fiery. I feed off her sass. But she folds too easily.
I hate that more than I hate the possessive jerk who acted like a dick this afternoon. I want the version of her who bites back and challenges me. The one who won’t let me get away with murder, even if I committed it in her honor.
She didn’t display an ounce of that woman in that abandoned field twenty clicks out of town. She caved like releasing a torrent of my cum would douse the jealousy burning me alive.
For half a second, she was right.
Everything came undone when she climbed onto my bike, like sucking my dick was a chore.
The only thing that’s kept the tension high for the past seven hours is her silent treatment.
What I said about being a sick fuck who gets off on controversy was the truth.
Azra’s glares every time our eyes accidentally collided have kept my dick hard all afternoon.
Its throbs would only be more enjoyable if her lips were hovering above my crown while she bit back at my scorn with an edginess I’ve never experienced from a woman before.
Too worked up wondering how her plan will play out tonight, I cross the room and catch her reflection in the mirror.
“Your lipstick is a little too perfect.” I roll my tongue between my teeth before covering my niece’s ears with the pink headphones she’s rarely been without this past week. “Maybe we should mess it up?” The vein in Azra’s neck throbs, but it calms down after my next three words. “With my dick.”
Lucia’s disgust is silent, displayed with a screwed-up nose. Valentina’s been in the picture longer than Lucia, so she vocalizes her disdain with words. “Matteo—”
“It’s fine,” Azra cuts in. “I’m used to handling beasts.
” Her head snaps toward me, eyes sharp. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m good.
” She turns up the volume on Camille’s iPad, fully engrossing her in the footage of her dance recital last week, before murmuring, “The cook gave me a toothpick to remove the shredded coconut from my teeth, so your services aren’t required. ”
Valentina chokes on her spit, and Lucia slaps her hand over her mouth.
I grin, loving that I forced her to respond.
Desperate for more, I say, “Didn’t hear any complaints when you were gagging on my cock.”
“Have you ever had a pubic hair stuck in your throat? It doesn’t matter how thin and short it is, your throat will spasm.”
After a narrowed glare too quick to give me any satisfaction, she turns back to face Lucia, ending the game before it truly started.
Fine. She wants distance? I can give her that. Especially if it’ll prevent me from whipping out my dick to prove her lies as fraudulent. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve flashed one of my brothers’ bed companions, though it would likely be the first time they killed me for it.
After snatching a pair of slacks and a buttoned-up shirt from the walk-in closet, I leave the room faster than I entered it.
I don’t even get two steps out of my room before I realize how close to death I came.
“Did you really take her to the dumping grounds?”
After schooling my expression, I twist to face Nico, my interrogator. He wouldn’t have killed me for flashing Valentina and Lucia, but he would have tattled. The teachers’ pets always do.
I shouldn’t have bothered trying to play it cool. Nico’s top lip furls as he calls me a dickhead under his breath.
“Guess it’s lucky she sucks dick good, hey?”
I don’t give him time to catch his breath or remember I have no claim to the woman I’m defending. Grabbing him by the front of his shirt, I shove him against the wall. The impact isn’t hard enough to hurt him permanently, but enough to make his breath hitch.
My forearm flattens across his collarbone, pinning him in place, and his eyes widen.
“Whoa… hey… what is this?”
“You tell me.” My voice sounds nothing like it usually does. It’s too raw and unhinged—and that’s saying something since I’m a known psychopath. “Have you been watching the surveillance feeds again?”
Nico blinks, confused. Or pretending to be. I can’t tell. My blood pressure is too high for anything to make it through the chaos.
“Answer the fucking question.” I push him harder into the wall. “Did you spy on Azra and me today?”
His mouth opens, then closes.
That hesitation is gasoline on the fire already burning in my chest.
“You did,” I snarl. “You actually fucking watched us.”
“Not during whatever the fuck you think I saw. I’m not you.” His scorn doesn’t scald as effectively as hoped. Usually, a playful tease like that would soothe my anger, not spike it. “I was doing my job.”
“Your job?” I bark out a laugh when he dips his chin. “When has it been your job to watch your brother get his dick sucked?”
Nico balks, his brows lost in his hairline. “Hold on, what? I was joking earlier…” He reads the entire fucking plot on my face. “You escorted her to the dumping grounds, then made her suck your cock? Christ, Teo. You truly are a psychopath.”
He worms his way out of my hold, then paces the hallway rug.
This is how he thinks.
“I was referring to the footage from the boutique. Vanni told me to keep an eye on you in case an Adami showed up, and you lost your shit like you almost did with Antonio. The fact that he left both the basement and the boutique breathing is still a surprise to me.”
I work my jaw side to side, striving to keep my unusual emotions at bay, but my confusion blurts them out without warning.
“He knows what her moans sound like.” Nico’s lips twitch, but I keep talking, silencing him.
“Azra didn’t step foot out of the dressing room, so how the fuck did Antonio know those moans belonged to her? ”
Nico laughs.
He fucking laughs.
“Nico…” I growl.
“I’m sorry.” He’s not. Not in the slightest. “I just can’t believe I’m having this conversation with you, Matteo I-don’t-do-commitment Caruso.”
“I don’t do commitment.”
“Yeah, buddy. Keep telling yourself that, and you might eventually convince yourself.”
I shoot him a menacing look in silent warning, and he gets this situation under control.
“One… the salesclerk recognized Antonio and Azra from a newspaper article about their upcoming nuptials. She told Antonio that his wife-to-be was in the dressing room. Two… if Azra didn’t step foot out of the dressing room, what was the point of kissing her?
If the clerk didn’t think it would be cute for Antonio to surprise his future wifey, he wouldn’t have witnessed your exchange. ”
I’m too stunned by his first point to let him interrogate me about his second. “The salesclerk told Antonio Azra was in the dressing room?”
He pats my chest and makes a lovey-dovey face that I’ll rearrange with his fists if he doesn’t move it this instant. “Yeah. I got footage if you don’t believe me.”
“Jesus fucking Christ.”
It takes Nico a beat, but he eventually finds the punchline. “You took her to the dumping grounds because you thought she lied to you.”
He’s not asking a question, but like a chump who can’t swim without a life vest, I nod. It’s easier to lie without words. I didn’t take Azra to the dumping grounds to hurt her. The only reason I went there is because it’s the only part of Carlisle not under constant surveillance.
I didn’t want my brothers witnessing my first, and what I fucking hope will be my last, bout of jealousy.
“You’re an idiot.”
I nod in agreement but still try to defend myself. “I wasn’t going to kill her. I just wanted to scare her a little.”
“So how did it go from scaring her to her sucking your wang?”
It’s fucked, but pride puffs out my chest. “Have you seen her?”
“Yeah, I have.”
I block the path of Nico’s admiring gaze before it can get anywhere near Azra.