Chapter 26 - Ana
Iwake with a crick in my neck, collapsed in a doorway, and it takes me a moment to figure out where I am. The music room. Him.
A folded paper waited beside me, placed carefully where I'd find it.
He is across from me, slumped on the ground, and at my movements, he rouses.
I give him a questioning look, and he answers with one of his own that says everything.
I'm still here. Always here. Take whatever time you need.
After everything, after I tried to kill him, called him monster, made him suffer for crimes he didn't commit, he's still here. Patient as death and twice as certain.
Papa wouldn't want this hollow ghost I've become. He'd want me to choose life, even if that life looks nothing like what we planned.
My fingers tighten on the blanket he laid over me. Dante sits up and leans his back against the other side of the doorway. The silence stretches, waiting. Not demanding, never demanding. Just waiting.
Dio mio, he looks exhausted. Dark circles shadow his eyes, his usually perfect appearance disheveled.
"I'm sorry." My hands shake as I sign the words, the movements clumsy with desperation.
He shakes his head slowly, deliberately. No.
"I'm sorry," I sign again, more frantically. The words aren't enough, could never be enough, but they're all I have. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."
Each repetition comes faster, my hands moving in violent apology. For the knife at his throat on our wedding day. For every cruel word, every moment of hatred I poured on an innocent man. For taking ten years to see the truth that was always there if I'd looked past my rage.
"I tried to kill you." The signs slash through the air. "Multiple times. I planned your murder while you sat in that chair protecting me. I called you monster when you were…"
His hands catch mine mid-sign, his grip firm but gentle. The contact stops my spiral, grounds me in the present instead of drowning in the past. His thumbs stroke across my palms, soothing the frantic energy, and I realize I'm crying again. Still. Always.
When my breathing steadies, he releases one hand to sign: "Nothing to forgive."
"Don't." The word tears from my throat. "Don't make this easy for me. I need to earn this. Need to deserve you after what I've done."
His eyes darken, and his signs turn sharp: "You think I want your penance? Your guilt? I want YOU. Fierce, unbreaking, choosing me not from debt but desire."
"Ten years I've been a blade aimed at your heart. Without that purpose, I'm just what? Another broken girl in your bed?"
His hands release mine to sign with violent precision: "The only girl in my bed. Ever. The only one who gets to break me and rebuild me with her hands."
"Who am I without revenge?" The question escapes before I can stop it.
"Who do you want to be?"
The answer comes without thought, without hesitation: "Yours."
His whole body goes still, that perfect stillness that means I've surprised him. Good. He deserves to be surprised by something other than violence for once.
"Not from obligation," I continue, my signs growing more confident. "Not from the contract or guilt or because I owe you everything." I step closer, close enough to smell cigarette smoke clinging to his shirt. "I choose you. I choose to love you. If you'll have me after everything."
His hands don't move. He just stares at me with those dark eyes that have watched me sleep for weeks, that saw me at my worst and protected me anyway. The silence stretches until I can't bear it.
So I close the distance between us.
My lips find his throat first, pressing against the raised scars with the reverence they deserve. Each mark is an apology, a promise, a confession. His breath catches as I trace the path of old violence with my tongue, tasting the salt of his skin, the proof of his sacrifice.
"These are my fault," I whisper against his neck.
His hands come up to frame my face, tilting my head back to meet his eyes. He signs carefully, making sure I see every movement: "My choice. Would choose again. Every time."
The kiss that follows is nothing like our previous ones.
Not violent, not desperate, not about possession or claiming.
This is soft, tentative, like we're learning each other for the first time.
He tastes like espresso and sleepless nights, like all the words his scarred throat can't speak.
His lips move against mine with a tenderness that makes my chest ache, and I taste something new in this kiss.
Hope, maybe. Or forgiveness. Or just the simple recognition that we're both broken in ways that fit together perfectly.
When we finally break apart, both breathing unsteadily, I rest my forehead against his. "I love you," I whisper, the words I never thought I'd say to anyone, especially not him. "I think maybe I have for a while. I just couldn't see it past the hate."
His hands slide to my waist, pulling me closer with a gentle possessiveness that makes heat pool between my legs. I've been so focused on my pain, my revenge, that I've denied what's been building between us. Now, with truth laid bare, the desire crashes through me like a tidal wave.
I roll to my knees before him, my hands trembling as they reach for his belt. His breath catches, and when I look up, his eyes are blazing with heat and question.
"Let me," I whisper. "Please."
He nods once, a sharp jerk of his head that betrays his control slipping. I fumble with his belt, then his zipper, my inexperience obvious in my clumsy movements. But he doesn't rush me, just watches with those dark, patient eyes that see everything.
When I finally free his cock, I can't help the small gasp that escapes me. He's enormous, thick and long and intimidating. I wrap my hand around him, amazed at how hard yet silky the skin feels, how my fingers can't fully close around his girth.
"I've never…" I admit, looking up at him.
He signs with one hand, the other gently stroking my hair: "No rush. Only what you want."
What I want is to please him like he's pleased me. To show him with my body what words can never fully express. I lean forward, tentatively running my tongue along the underside of his cock. The taste is unfamiliar but not unpleasant—salt and musk and something uniquely him.
His hand tightens in my hair, not pushing, just holding on as if I'm his anchor in a storm.
Emboldened, I take the head into my mouth, my lips stretching around his thickness.
I can only manage a few inches before I feel the threat of gagging, but the strangled sound he makes—one of the few noises his damaged throat allows—fills me with fierce pride.
I establish a rhythm, taking what I can of his length while my hand works what won't fit. His breathing grows ragged above me, his stomach muscles clenching beneath my free hand. I look up to find him watching me with an intensity that should frighten me but only makes me bolder.
When I hollow my cheeks and suck harder, his hips jerk involuntarily. He immediately signs an apology, but I shake my head, releasing him just long enough to whisper, "It's okay. I want all of you."
I take him deeper this time, fighting my gag reflex, tears springing to my eyes as I push past my comfort. His hand cups my face with infinite tenderness, thumb brushing away a tear. The gesture, so gentle amid such raw desire, makes something crack open inside me.
His cock pulses against my tongue, and I can tell he's close by the tension in his thighs, the way his breathing turns to silent gasps.
His arms come around me suddenly, lifting me from the floor. I wrap myself around him instinctively, trusting him to carry me wherever he wants. Not to the study with its desk full of complicated memories. Not to the guest room where distance lived between us.
To our bedroom. Our bed. The one where I've slept alone while he kept watch from that torturous leather chair.
He sets me down beside the bed with infinite care, like I might shatter from rough handling. His hands move to my clothing, but slowly, waiting for permission. I nod, helping him when his fingers shake slightly.
This is nothing like before. When he took my virginity on his desk, it was all hunger and desperate need, violence and pleasure twisted together. This is worship. Every touch reverent, every kiss an apology for the pain we've caused each other.
My clothes pool at my feet. His clothes follow, and we stand naked before each other in the afternoon light.
I trace his scars with trembling fingers, so many, too many, and he lets me explore each one.
Learning the geography of his sacrifice, the price of protecting people who thought him monster.
His fingers trace the fading bruise on my hip, his mark from when passion turned violent.
"I'm sorry," he signs.
"Don't be," I tell him. "I wanted your marks then. I want new ones now. Gentle ones. Love bites instead of war wounds."
When he lays me on our bed, his touch is so gentle I want to cry. Actually, I am crying, slow tears that he kisses away as his scarred hands map my body like he's writing music on my skin, each touch a note in a symphony only we can hear.
"Please," I whisper, pulling him closer. "I need you. Need to feel you. Need to know this is real."
He enters me slowly, our eyes locked, and the feeling overwhelms me completely.
The stretch of his cock filling me, the weight of him above me, the heat of skin against skin.
His hand wraps loosely around my throat, not threatening, but claiming.
His thumb presses against my pulse where it races for him.
"Mine," he mouths against my lips, the word I can read without signs.
"Yours," I breathe back, and his control cracks. His next thrust goes deeper, harder, like he's trying to brand himself inside me. My pussy clenches around him, drawing him deeper, and we both groan at the sensation.
This is it. This is home. Finally home. Not a place with walls and doors, but this: him inside me, around me, choosing me despite everything. After all the wandering, all the hatred, all the searching for who I'm supposed to be, I'm finally exactly where I belong.
Finalmente a casa, finally home. The feeling settles in my bones.
We move together in perfect synchronization, the same way we fought in that restaurant, but this is creation instead of destruction.
Building something new from the ashes of who we used to be.
His hands frame my face as he moves inside me, and I see my own wonder reflected in his eyes.
His cock hits that spot inside me that makes stars explode behind my eyelids, and my nails dig into his shoulders.
"Dante," I gasp, his name a prayer on my lips.
His thumb finds my clit, circling with just enough pressure to push me toward the edge. The dual sensation of his cock filling me and his thumb on my clit sends lightning through my veins.
When the pleasure crests, I sign "I love you" against his chest, over his heart, over the worst scars.
He signs it back against my skin, fingers trembling as his own release follows mine.
I feel him pulse inside me, filling me with heat, marking me from the inside.
We shatter together, but this time we're breaking into something whole instead of broken pieces.
We lie tangled together in our bed, truly ours now, as afternoon fades toward evening. His fingers trace lazy patterns on my bare shoulder while I press kisses to whatever skin I can reach. The leather chair sits empty across the room, a monument to the distance we've finally crossed.
"No more chair," I say against his throat, feeling him shiver at the words.
"No more chair," he agrees, his hand finding mine to lace our fingers together.
"We're married now," I continue, the wonder of it making me smile. "Actually married. Not just the contract or the ceremony. This. Us. Real."
He pulls back to look at me, and I see that almost-smile playing at his lips. His hands move carefully: "Four weeks to figure out what everyone else knows at the altar."
"Everyone else doesn't have our baggage," I point out, and he actually huffs a silent laugh, shoulders shaking with it.
The light outside is golden, painting our skin warm colors where we're still pressed together. His cock is still inside me, softening but neither of us willing to separate yet.
"I choose you," I sign against his chest as I whisper the words, needing him to understand this isn't about owing him or guilt or having nowhere else to go. "Every day, I choose you."
His arms tighten around me, and I feel him press a kiss to the top of my head. We don't need words or signs for this. The way our bodies fit together, the way our breathing syncs, the way we hold each other like we might disappear says everything.
We're exactly who we're supposed to be.
Each other's. Completely. And God help anyone who tries to separate us now.