50. Dante
Chapter 50
Dante
I’ve never felt anything like this—this overwhelming sense that all of me recognizes all of her so viscerally.
I keep waiting for the familiar disconnection, that sense of watching myself from the outside, but it doesn’t come. It never does with her.
Now, I’m terrifyingly present.
I’m just here, with Reese, feeling everything, and it’s simultaneously the most frightening and most honest thing I’ve ever done.
Her thighs tremble against my back as I work in and out of her, and I kiss her neck exactly where I know she likes it. Her sheets are smooth against my skin, and they smell like her—magnolia and cedar mixed together in a way that gets me high every time.
I’ve never done this. Ever.
Unprotected. Raw. It’s always been a fucking risk.
But with Reese. Fuck.
This is trust.
Trust that makes her feel like she was made for me.I savor each push and pull of my cock in her warm pussy. She runs her fingers through my hair, and I let myself look at her properly. Flushed cheeks, toned muscles, and that gorgeous pixie cut.
I could be with her forever, and it still wouldn’t be enough time.
I want to be with her forever.
She isn’t just part of my future; she is my future—complete, irreplaceable, essential.
“I love you.” I mutter words I never thought would feel so right before. “I—” Thrust. “Love—” Thrust. “You—” Thrust. “So fucking much,” I groan, picking up the pace despite myself. The sound of our bodies meeting fills the room as I take what’s mine. She tightens her walls around me, and I have to grit my teeth to keep control.
“I love you too,” she breathes, tugging my hair. I let her take control of the kiss, needing her to know how much I want this too.
I run my hands over her ribs, her hip. Fuck, I hope she notices how much she affects me, how each tremor betrays more than desire. It’s fear, it’s awe, it’s knowing I’ve never felt this exposed before.
“I’m never going to get tired of hearing you say that.” I chuckle. My hardness stretches into the deepest parts of her with each thrust. I keep driving into her, feeling her body yield to mine completely. Fuck .
“I love you,” she whispers. “I love you, Dante Hastings. I love you.”
It feels like I’m about to explode, and from the way she’s gasping, she’s right there with me. The last threads of my control are unraveling, and I don’t care anymore.
“Fuck—Reese—” I can barely get the words out. My carefully maintained walls are crumbling, and I’m letting them fall.
My sweat drips onto her skin. I can’t think straight anymore—just need, want, mine. The sounds she’s making are driving me crazy, and when I see that same desperate hunger reflecting back in her eyes, I know I’m crossing a line I can never return from.
“I can’t wait to feel you come, Dante,” she moans. “I love you so much.”
That does it. I’m finished.
Reese rides the wave of pleasure with me, her cries mixing with the sounds I’m making as I empty myself deep inside her, her body gripping me tight.
Everything else falls away, and there’s just this. The perfect clarity of knowing exactly where I belong.
I collapse on top of her, pressing my lips to her cheek where it’s damp with sweat.
We lie there. Neither of us speaks. How strange it is that two people can be this close, can share something so intimate, and still be separate beings with our own unknowable inner worlds. Maybe that’s what makes moments like these so precious—their fundamental impossibility.
After a while, she shifts, turning her head to look at me.
I kiss her forehead, and she lets me.
I’m in love.
Steam billows as I emerge from the shower, water rolling down my neck. And there she is, looking at me like I’m the answer to a question she didn’t know she was asking.
“What’s got you looking so pleased?” I say, walking over like I’m not counting every step, memorizing how her floors feel beneath my feet.
She props herself up, the sheet sliding down to reveal the curve of her shoulder. “It’s silly, but you’re leaving wet footprints all over my cypress floors,” she says. “And I love it. Love that you’re here.”
I understand completely. It’s not about the damn footprints. It’s about belonging. About finally letting ourselves have this, properly this time.
I lean down to kiss her shoulder. “Promise me I’m not going to wake up and find out this never happened.”
“Not a dream,” she whispers, fingers tracing my jaw like she’s memorizing every angle.
“Good. Though God knows I’ve dreamt about this enough. About getting it right. We’re doing this again?” The question lingers in my throat, loaded with all our past mistakes.
She sits up fully, letting the sheet pool around her waist. Her eyes meet mine. “We are.”
“But better this time. No more hiding when things get scary,” I agree, settling beside her. My heart pounds hard. Can she hear it? “No more trying to be what everyone else thinks we should be, either.”
She laughs softly. “This is definitely a great way to start a new year.”
“It is,” I admit quietly. “We’ve come pretty far, haven’t we?” She looks up at me with those brown eyes—full of everything we’ve built and everything we haven’t said yet.
“I think so,” she says. “I’ve actually been thinking that I’m going to start my own production company this year,” she says. The words tumble out before she can second-guess herself, but I catch the flicker of doubt, the faintest shadow behind her confidence. “It’ll be harder than anything I’ve done, and if Robyn Hood succeeds, I’ll be terrified. But in a good way. Like how I feel about us.”
“I fucking cannot wait to see what you accomplish.” I kiss her. “We’ll figure it out, together. Our own way.”
“Our way,” she whispers, her lips curling into a smile against my jaw.
I chuckle softly, gently stroking her short hair. “You know, you’re never going to get rid of me, fighter.”
“That’s what I was sorta hoping for, Mr. Hastings.”