Chapter 20
TWENTY
Capri
My cheek grazed the cool hotel wall by the suite door as Sebastian tugged on the zipper of my dress. My heart raced as my stomach tensed, riding out the pulse between my legs.
“Why didn’t you tell me you knew what my father had planned?” I asked.
“Because as you said, it didn’t matter.” He grasped the beaded satin from my shoulders and shimmied it down my body. “I was never going to let you enter into that arrangement.”
“You really are my hero.”
“I’m plenty of things.” He kissed his way down my spine as he dropped to his knees. “But I don’t think I’ve ever been anyone’s hero.”
“Then I can be a first for you.”
“You’re more of my firsts than you know.” He hooked his fingers in the sides of my panties and glided them down my legs, helping me out of them. I scratched at the wall when his fingers skimmed my inner thighs.
“Oh…” I breathed out when he brushed his lips along my backside.
“I’m obsessed with your body.” He pushed his fingers inside me from behind, wasting no time going deep. “Fucking you has become the most prominent thought in my mind. Do you know how distracting that is?”
“I have a pretty good idea.” I had gone from never having sex to wanting it both while I was awake and in my sleep. “I dream about it.”
“You don’t have to dream.” He kept a pleasurable pace inside me while he licked and kissed his way back into a standing position. “As much as I want to take you from behind, pressed up against this wall, I’ll have to save that for another time.”
“Why?” My nipples scraped against the wall as he rustled with his belt. “You can take me any way you want.”
“I will.” He spun me to face him. “Right now, I want to see that gorgeous face of yours and stare into your mesmerizing eyes when I enter you.”
When he lifted me off my feet, I clasped my legs around his waist, bracing myself for the desirable impact of him slamming inside me. He didn’t disappoint.
“Fuck!” He pinned me to the wall with his powerful form, stilling inside me and staring into my eyes.
In that moment, we halted any movements, even breathing, as time stopped. Any outside distractions, all the things we couldn’t control, vanished. There was nothing left but the two of us. My heart, my soul, my love…
“Can you feel it?” he whispered. “Do you know?”
“I…” Closing my eyes, I took a breath when he began to thrust inside me. “Hades…”
In between hot, unrestrained kisses, he murmured passionate words that I didn’t understand. When he flipped from English to Greek, I focused on the sound of his voice. The tenderness in his tone drove me wild with need.
I clenched around him, quickly losing myself in the sensation he created. Not just the physical connection, but in the strength of the emotional bond we had formed over these past few weeks.
“Capri.” He mumbled more words I couldn’t comprehend as he penetrated me and then pulled all the way out. Repeating his unhinged motion and holding me hostage with his entire body.
“I don’t understand, but I feel it.” The fire inside my stomach exploded into every fiber of my being until it burst free. Clinging onto Sebastian like he was a lifeline, I relished in the feel of him. “I need you.”
“You have me,” he replied.
He slammed into me, banging me into the wall until he roared out his own release. Pressing his lips to mine, he moved inside me, but with slower, more deliberate thrusts. He loosened his grip on me as we continued to kiss, exploring each other with our tongues.
“I can’t get enough of you.” His labored breaths slowed. “When we’re together, I don’t ever want to stop.”
“What did you say to me?” I spoke against his lips. “You spoke to me in Greek again.”
“Hmm.” He lowered me to my feet as he swiped his lips across my neck. “I don’t know.”
“It sounded so beautiful. How could you not know what you said?”
“I know what I think when we’re together, but I don’t know what I say out loud and what I keep to myself.” He smirked as he adjusted his pants and raised the zipper, leaving them undone. “Not everything is for your ears. There has to be some mystery.”
How does he make everything sound so sexy?
“I’ll have to look up the word kardia.” I bent down and scooped his dress shirt off the floor. “Since you won’t tell me.”
“Heart.” He helped me into his shirt. “It means heart.”
“What about your heart?” I hadn’t thought to ask him about health issues. “Are you okay?”
“You have got to be the most inquiring woman I’ve ever met.” He sat on the plush couch overlooking the stormy, city sky. “Come and sit with me.”
“I’ll sit with you if you tell me what you said.” I smiled, turning the tables on him. “You know, like for a price?”
“You’re learning.” He patted the seat next to him. “I must be an excellent teacher.”
“You’re an excellent everything.” I cuddled into his side and tucked my legs underneath me. “I’ve never met anyone like you.”
“I feel the same way about you.” He stroked my hair. “I definitely wasn’t expecting you.”
“Aren’t you glad you got that tattoo?” I rubbed the skyline on his forearm. “It’s what led me to you.”
He gazed out at the buildings in the distance. Is he thinking about his old life? The one before he was banished? Or was he happier that he had reinvented himself?
“What does the tattoo mean?” I asked, recalling how my father didn’t want to discuss it.
“I thought we were talking about what I said a few minutes ago?” He cupped the side of my face. “I can tell you what I said in Greek, or I can dredge up the past and give you a history lesson.” He frowned. “You can’t have both.”
“Why does it seem like you don’t want to share either with me?”
We hadn’t had much of an opportunity to really get to know one another. It had only been a few weeks since we met and nothing had gone smoothly since he arrived in New York.
“When I spoke in Greek, I said I needed you.” He touched his forehead to mine. “My heart needs you.”
“Oh.” I gently kissed his lips, thankful that he chose to tell me what he said in a foreign language instead of the meaning behind an old tattoo that probably meant nothing to him.
“It sounded better in Greek, right?”
“It sounds wonderful any way you say it.” I could live with the intrigue that surrounded him if he kept telling me stuff like that. “This has been the best birthday I’ve ever had.”
“I can do much better than this.” When he laughed, I melted. “You didn’t even have cake.”
“Who needs the calories?” I giggled, but I was known to love a decadent dessert. “Sex with you was much better than any piece of cake.”
“I appreciate that, but I know a fantastic baker back home.” He reached for a small, black box sitting on the coffee table in front of us. “He’ll make you whatever you want.”
I did feel bad that I didn’t get to taste the cake my mother had ordered for me.
I always had a banana cake with chocolate icing.
But that wasn’t my fault. I wanted to co-exist, but if my parents couldn’t accept Sebastian, I couldn’t compromise, especially now that I knew they were trying to marry me off to Christopher.
I might have expected that from my dad, but what the hell was my mother thinking?
“Happy birthday.” Sebastian handed me the box. “Open it.”
“You didn’t have to get me anything.”
“It’s your birthday.”
“You bought me that gorgeous dress and those shoes for the reception. That would have been enough.”
“Nothing will ever be enough when it comes to you. I already made that clear.”
I lifted the lid off the rectangular box and spread open the shimmery, silver tissue paper to reveal a Cartier diamond bracelet with two intertwined hearts dangling from it.
“Sebastian.” My gaze flew to his. “This is gorgeous, but I…” I knew jewelry almost as well as I did fashion, and this stunner had to be half the cost of a semester at NYU.
“If you tell me you can’t accept it, I’m not going to be amused.”
“I love it.” I handed it to him and held out my wrist. “I was just going to say that it wasn’t necessary because I already have everything I want this year.”
“Now you have a pretty bracelet to remember your twenty-first birthday.” He clasped it on my wrist. “I plan on sharing many more memories with you.”
“Thank you.” I crawled into his lap. “I have another question.”
“Of course you do.” He sighed as he glanced at his tattoo.
“It’s not about the tattoo.” As much as I wanted to know the meaning behind it, I wouldn’t force him. He would tell me about his past when he was ready. I could be patient for him.
“What is your question?”
“I don’t know when your birthday is.”
“November twenty-seventh.” He tucked my hair behind my ear. “I was born in Athens.”
“How old were you when you came to the states?”
“Seventeen.”
“Why did you leave Greece?” I asked.
“There was nothing for me there.” He pressed his fingers to my lips. “I answered your question.”
“You did.” I snuggled into his chest, suppressing the urge to interrogate him a little more. Patience. “We didn’t eat dinner.”
“Would you like me to take you to dinner?”
“I’d rather stay in.” The ominous sky illuminated with lightning strikes. “Can we order in?”
“It’s your birthday. We can have whatever you want.”
“Prosecco and cake.”
“For dinner?”
“It’s my birthday.” I traced his jaw with my fingertip. “But maybe some cavatelli in a blush sauce.”
“I’m sure I can make that happen.” He took his phone from his pocket. “Is there a specific restaurant you had in mind? I haven’t eaten in this town in years, so you’ll have to make the recommendation.”
“If it’s easier, we can order from the room service menu.” I rested my head on his shoulder. “It might be too difficult to get a restaurant to deliver on a Saturday night on such short notice.”
“I’m quite persuasive when I want to be,” he said. “Tell me what you want, and I’ll get it.”
As we began scrolling on his phone, looking for nearby Italian restaurants, someone knocked on the suite door. My stomach dropped. Had my father come to retrieve me again? Was my mother here to berate Sebastian?
“I want to stay here with you,” I told Sebastian. I couldn’t take much more of this insanity.
“No one is taking you from me.” He scooted me off his lap and kissed the top of my head. “I’ll handle it.”
As he answered the door, I stood and peered over his shoulder.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Atticus said.
“It’s okay.” Sebastian widened the door and granted him access.
I didn’t know if I was more embarrassed over my dress and panties being on the floor or that Sebastian’s shirt barely covered me. I quickly buttoned myself up as Sebastian came to stand in front of me.
“Happy birthday, Capri.” Atticus smiled. “I hope you’re having a lovely day.”
“Thank you.” If he was aware that we had just had explosive sex against the wall, he didn’t let on.
“I need to speak with Atticus.” Sebastian placed his hand on my back and nudged me toward the bedroom. “Decide what you’d like for dinner, and we’ll order it as soon as I’m done here.”
“Okay.” I swiped the hair from my face and looked at Atticus. “We’re ordering dinner if you and Zeus would like to join us.”
“That’s very generous of you.” Atticus nodded. “I’m going to borrow Hades for a few minutes.”
I wandered to the bedroom, noting their intentional silence until I was out of sight.
Leaving the bedroom door cracked, I kept my hand on the handle and waited for them to speak.
I didn’t know why. It wasn’t as if I needed to involve myself in Sebastian’s business, but my inquisitive side took over.
“Our newest associate would like to take another meeting with you,” Atticus said. “He’s run into a small problem that might require your expertise.”
“That was quick,” Sebastian said. “Set it up.”
Set what up?
Was this what I could expect if I built a life with Sebastian? Late-night secret meetings, assassination plots, never knowing who he truly was and what he was capable of?
Maria’s words invaded my thoughts. You’ve fallen for a serial killer.
Falling for him was the easy part. But could I live with the rest?