Chapter 13 #2
He hums, strokes my hair back, and brushes his lips back and forth over mine before coaxing my mouth open. A single errant tear slips from the corner of my eye and joins the wetness in my hair. Matteo wipes it away with his finger before lifting his head.
His heavy-lidded eyes and kiss-swollen lips send tendrils of pleasure down my spine. He groans. His cock jerks inside me.
“Stop,” I say before I launch into theatrics again. My voice emerges harsher than I mean for it to sound. “Get off me.”
He lifts his torso and grabs my hips as he stands. I writhe as a volley of mini-shocks roll through me from the shifting of his shaft inside me.
“Did I hurt you?”
The horror in his voice pulls my attention to his face. I follow his gaze to our joined bodies where a faint smear of blood rings our sexes.
“No. It was my first time,” I admit.
“Your first… goddamnit, Brook, I thought…” Panic and concern shine from his eyes as he studies the mess between my legs. “I didn’t realize you were a virgin. I thought you just hadn’t had an orgasm with someone before, not that you haven’t had sex.”
He lifts his gaze to my face. I can’t read his expression through the terror in my veins.
My heart skips a beat when he cups the side of my face.
“I wouldn’t have been so rough if I had known,” he murmurs.
I shake my head.
“It was perfect,” I shudder.
He groans and invades my mouth with hungry strokes of his tongue. My nipples pebble and goosebumps rise on my flesh. His cock hardens inside me. I nip his tongue, turn my head to the side, and push his chest.
“Stop, Matteo. We already—”
“I’m nowhere near done with you yet, little rabbit,” he growls against my jugular.
I gasp as he sucks my earlobe into his mouth. The marble counter digs into my back as he tilts his hips back and forth in the tiniest of thrusts.
He wraps his arms around me and lifts me off the kitchen counter. With his cock still lodged inside me, he carries me through his apartment to his bedroom, all the while kissing and licking my ear and throat. I fight for breath as he lowers me onto his plush comforter.
“I’ll be gentle this time,” he vows.
I tighten my legs around his hips, pulling him deeper inside me.
“Not too gentle,” I murmur.
He growls and explores every inch of me. I marvel at his strength and sink into a world of sensations as he wakes parts of me I never knew existed.
After countless orgasms, I lie sweaty and depleted in his arms as his cock softens inside me. His seed creates a sticky mess between my thighs, but he holds me close and murmurs praise in my ear. Peace flows through my soul as I tighten my arms around him.
“Marry me, Brook.”
Reality crashes down on me.
I roll out of his arms and hide my wince as his cock slides free. I lament losing his hard, thick warmth, but I stumble to my feet and shake my head. He reaches for me. I shuffle backward.
“No,” I say.
He rises and stands on the far side of the bed. My heart gives a heavy thud as he stands naked before me for the first time.
“This was fun, but it won’t happen again,” I force the words from my throat as I turn toward the door.
Matteo stalks around the foot of the bed and grabs my arm before I reach the hall. I hiss as my still healing bruise throbs. He releases me but shifts his body to block my retreat.
His cum trails down my inner thigh.
“Don’t try to run away from me, little rabbit,” he growls.
“You left me first!”
We both freeze. For a moment, I don’t understand my own words, but then memories flash through my mind and I relive the worst moments of my life. The world fades away, and I’m right back in the halls of our high school.
“I kissed you and then you shoved me away, called me a shallow, selfish bitch, and accused me of missing one test question on purpose so you’d have a better score.
” I can’t stop the tsunami of words any more than I can stop the hurt barreling through me.
“Then you turned your back and walked away, just like my father did only six days before.” My breaths saw in and out of my lungs as acid eats through my veins.
“I needed you, but you ignored me. You literally looked the other way every time I walked into the room.” I step forward and shove him with all my might.
He doesn’t budge. My fury increases tenfold.
“It hurt worse than when my father threw us out because Mama had cancer. He didn’t want us anymore, but you?
” I shove him again. He grabs my shoulder but doesn’t push me away.
“You hated me because I didn’t live up to your expectations.
” I slam the side of my fist against his sternum.
“You treated me like I was worth less than the dirt under your shoes. Just. Like. My. Father.” I punctuate each word with an angry thump against his chest.
He pulls me to him and wraps his arms around me. Held against his naked body, all the fight drains from me, and I cover my face with my hands and cry.
When I finally stop sobbing, he rests his cheek on the top of my head and tightens his arms around me.
“I didn’t know anything about your father, Brook. I thought you were choosing my brother over me,” he says.
Incredulity flows through me. I wipe the tears from my face and lift my head.
“Your brother? I hardly spoke two words to Angelo throughout all of high school.”
A muscle ticks in his jaw, but he runs his hand down my spine as though to soothe a wild animal.
“I saw you together in the hall.”
I scoff.
“What, on the rare occasion I walked past him? I—”
“You were clinging to him.” Bottomless fury swirls in his eyes, but his hold remains comforting, not stifling. “He threw his arm around your shoulders, tugged you close, and walked away. You went willingly,” he says through gritted teeth.
“What? Nothing like that ever happ—” A vague memory tugs at the edge of my mind. The bell rang. Noisy halls. My phone buzzing in my pocket.
My mom’s voice. My world came crashing down. Someone took me to the counselor’s office.
“I didn’t choose him. I didn’t even realize it was him who helped me that day.”
At his skeptical eyebrow lift, I push against his chest. He doesn’t let me go. I use my anger to hide my relief.
“My mother called and told me she had stage-three breast cancer. I stopped processing. My brain just shut off. The next two days were a blur. Then my father kicked us out and you—”
I squeak as Matteo bends, hooks an arm behind my knees, and lifts me off my feet. Cradled to his naked chest with my body aching in new places from his sensual mastery and my heart raw and exposed, I tuck my face against his shoulder and dig my nails into his flesh.
He wraps me in the comforter and settles me in his lap as he sits on the edge of the bed.
“I’m sorry, Brook. I failed you. Let me make it up to you.”
“You can’t. What’s done is done. It was over ten years ago,” I say.
“Then let me spend the next ten years fixing it. Not just ten, but twenty years. Thirty. The rest of our lives. Marry me.”
My heart aches. I want what he offers with every fiber of my being, but I can’t let go of my anger. I need justice for my mother and revenge against my father.
“No,” I manage through the emotions lodged in my throat.
The pain and longing shining from his eyes pull a confession from me I never thought I’d speak aloud.
“Not until I ruin my father for stealing my mother’s inheritance and kicking us to the curb like garbage. Not until he feels the same humiliation he put us through. Not until everything he’s ever wanted is either destroyed or mine.”
Thick fingers weave into my hair and tilt my face up to his glimmering hazel eyes. A thrill runs down my spine at the enchanted wonder lurking in his gaze.
“I can’t wait to watch you rip him to shreds.” The unwavering certainty in his gaze steals the breath from my lungs. “Take whatever you need from me, little rabbit. Use me. I’m yours. All yours. Understand?”
My stomach bottoms out. He means it.
I grab his nape and pull his mouth down to mine.
Fresh motivation flows through me. Revenge on my father means more than just avenging my mother and assuaging the fury in my soul.
It means freedom.
Freedom to love the man who stole my heart in high school. Despite the reservations in my mind, my heart is all in.
Matteo Ricco is mine.
All mine.