Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
CHASTITY
H eaven help me, I couldn’t stop myself. Not where Matteo was concerned. The closer he was, the less clearly I could think. All I could do was act on the dark impulses he awakened in me.
Even though the logical part of me knew this deal of his might very well lead to disaster, my emotional side didn’t care. All it wanted was the pleasure that was promised in the moment.
And not just this moment, but two weeks’ worth of moments.
Two weeks of raking my fingers through his thick hair and pressing my lips to his. Just touching him set my soul on fire.
That fire only grew as he walked backward, pulling me along with him toward his bed.
I won’t lie—there was a brief moment of alarm when he lifted me up off the floor. My heart fluttered right along with my stomach as I felt myself go weightless in his arms. He carried me like my full weight was nothing to him.
And with as strong as he was, no doubt it wasn’t.
He could have tossed me clear across the room one-handed if he wanted to. He could have done anything. He was in complete control—of the situation, of me, of everything .
“Your father said I was your obsession.” His voice rumbled against my ear. “Is that true?”
Oh God .
Of all the things he could bring up, why did he have to choose that ?
“Matteo…” I started—but quickly trailed off.
What was there to say? My fantasies about him had been my deepest shame for years now. Openly admitting to them felt like confessing to a crime. A mortal sin.
One there could be no forgiveness for.
But still, I had to say something .
“I had a crush on you back in school.” It was the best I could come up with. And, technically, it was the truth. “But that was years ago. We were just kids.”
His inscrutable dark eyes stayed on mine as he slowly lowered me down the length of his body until my knees rested on the edge of the bed. “We’re not kids anymore.”
No, we weren’t.
The proof of that was standing right in front of me.
A decade ago, Matteo had been long and lanky. He might not have grown any taller in the last ten years—not that I could tell, at least, but he’d certainly filled out.
This close, the broad expanse of his chest filled my view. His muscles had grown and defined.
He’d become the true definition of a man.
Powerfully masculine and brutally protective.
Not to mention possessive.
Drawing in a deep breath, his chest expanded even further. I shuddered in anticipation as he caressed his hands down my arms. Even through the thick wool of my habit, I swore I could still feel the heat of his touch.
“So what happened to this obsession?” he asked.
“ Crush ,” I corrected him. “I got over it.”
“Did you?” A flash of a smile teased his lips, making it clear he didn’t believe the blatant lie. “What a shame. I like the idea of you keeping yourself warm with thoughts of me all these years. Of amusing yourself during boring days with forbidden fantasies of everything we could have done to each other.”
“It wasn’t like that,” I said, but my voice shook under the weight of the falsehood.
“Then what was it like?” His touch grew harder, more insistent. Light caresses changed to deep pressure. “Tell me, Chastity. Did you wait until night? Until it was dark, and you were alone in your room?”
“Matteo, please.”
“Please, what ?” he asked with a smirk. “Stop? Or keep going? Ten years is a long time to live on nothing but fantasies. But if you tell me what pictures played in your head, I could help you bring those dreams to life.”
Did he know what he was offering? I wasn’t sure I could handle that level of pleasure.
Or intimacy.
Opening my private inner thoughts to him was too frightening. Far more terrifying than simply submitting myself to whatever hedonistic plans he’d dreamed up.
“Just kiss me again,” I practically begged, leaning into him again.
But he gently pushed me back. “Oh, I will… after you tell me how you stoked the fires of this obsession for years.”
“ Crush ,” I tried again.
“ Obsession .” He shook his head, no longer humoring my lies. “A woman who is willing to trade her meticulously planned life for two weeks of sin with a man she hasn’t seen in a decade isn’t nursing a crush. Admit it, Chastity. Your father was right. You’re obsessed.”
Was I?
How was I supposed to know what normal desire was when everything in my life was so abnormal ? I’d grown up surrounded by sin but was expected to keep myself pure. My family’s blood ran thick with vice, but I was punished for even allowing a single wicked thought.
No wonder I’d ended up so screwed up.
“I don’t want to be obsessed with you,” I admitted. “I never wanted to be.”
My face drifted down in shame, but Matteo crooked his finger under my chin and lifted it up again. It seemed no matter how scandalous my confession, he was going to force me to look him in the eye while I said it.
“Why not?” he demanded.
I considered another lie for a second but quickly dismissed the idea.
It wouldn’t do any good. It was as if Matteo already knew the answer and was just waiting to hear me say it. Anything less than the truth would only prolong this embarrassing conversation.
“Because I didn’t just think about you during the night, Matteo.” I had to force the words out. There was no way that kind of humiliating revelation was coming out on its own. “I acted on those thoughts.”
His chest expanded even wider with another breath. His eyes narrowed just a touch, and the heated expression inside them grew more intense.
“What did you do?”
“I…I…”
“Tell me, Chastity,” he commanded, his patience finally running short. “Tell me the truth, and I promise I’ll kiss you so damn hard you’ll forget your own name.”
Maybe it was obsession because a promise like that was irresistible.
“I’d touch myself.”
His gaze practically caught fire. His nostrils flared as he drew in a sharp breath.
“Between your legs?”
I nodded, too ashamed to admit it out loud again.
“And you’d think of me while you touched yourself?” Even his voice was tight.
I nodded, too ashamed to speak.
But he wasn’t.
“Show me,” he said, stepping back from the edge of the bed.
My eyes went wide. “What?”
“Take off your clothes, and show me how you touched yourself.” He moved across the room and settled into a chair against the wall.
“I can’t do that.”
“You can.” His shoulders stretched wide as he leaned back against the leather upholstery. “And you will .”
What was it about his voice that held me rapt? That commanding tone was impossible to defy.
Still, I had to try.
“But it’s not right,” I argued. “No one is supposed to see that.”
“No one but me,” he said before tilting his head back and resting it against the chair’s high back. “Trust me, in two weeks, this will seem tame.”
Really? That was hard to believe.
Alone in my bed, touching myself had seemed like the worst sin imaginable. Something that I’d never be forgiven for, no matter how hard I prayed.
But that was before I’d fallen into Matteo’s arms.
Now, I had a feeling a whole new sensual world was about to open up—and swallow me whole.
Suddenly, his bed felt like a stage, and he had a front-row seat in the audience. I couldn’t help squirming under the weight of his gaze.
“I’ve never undressed in front of anyone before,” I confessed. “I’m afraid I’ll embarrass myself.”
“That’s not going to happen,” he assured me. “I want to see you. So take off your clothes.”
He made it sound so simple.
And I guess, in the end, it was.
Both my black pinafore and white tunic slipped over my head easily. I’d started to fold them neatly out of habit when Matteo stopped me with a dark laugh.
“Don’t worry about those,” he said. “Just toss them in the corner.”
“But they’ll wrinkle, and this is my only outfit.” The two other identical sets were currently hanging in my father’s house.
“We’ll find you other clothes.” His tone was firm. So, even though it went against years of tidiness that had been beaten into my head, I did as he said and let them drop on the floor.
“Good,” he said with a lopsided smile that sent a wave of awareness tingling over my exposed skin. “Now, take off the rest.”
The rest ? But only my undergarments remained.
“I’d be naked,” I told him.
“That’s the point.”
He folded his hands in his lap, looking like a man who had been in this position plenty of times before—waiting for a woman to strip down and bare everything.
“But I was never completely naked in my room,” I explained. “I was always wearing something—my nightgown and underpants.”
Not to mention the blanket that I’d kept wrapped tight around me. Even all alone, I’d needed all those layers to hide my shame.
“Like you said—that was in your room,” he said far too casually. “This is my bedroom. And here you’ll show me everything .”
Oh God , I really was in over my head, drowning in waters I was a fool to ever think I could tread.
I closed my eyes as I pulled my simple cotton bralette off with trembling hands. But shutting out the light didn’t keep me from feeling the cool air against my breasts. It was the change in temperature that made my nipples instantly harden, I tried to tell myself—not the excitement of the situation.
By the time I rolled the plain white panties down my thighs, my fingers were fully shaking.
So was the rest of me.
“Oh, fuck , Chastity,” Matteo’s growl rolled across the room. The sound was so raw, so intense, that my eyes couldn’t help but pop open again.
When I saw him, I made a primal sound of my own. A breathy moan that somehow managed to encapsulate ten years’ worth of pent-up desire.
And if you’d have seen him—no longer lounging back in the chair, but leaning forward, muscles coiled like a wild animal ready to pounce—you probably would have done the same.
“Don’t make me wait any longer,” he said through gritted teeth. “Show me what you did.”
And God help me, that’s exactly what I did.
As if possessed by the spirit of Jezebel herself, I pressed my hand between my slightly parted legs. My fingertips were instantly drenched in warm heat as they slid over my folds. Pressing between the outer lips, I found that achingly sweet spot that always called to me when thoughts of Matteo invaded my mind.
Usually, I had to close my eyes to envision him. But not this time.
Now, he was sitting right in front of me, his eyes locked with mine. I didn’t have to content myself with old dreams and pale fantasies. This was real.
The way his eyes focused on my every movement— real .
The way his teeth hungrily grazed against his lower lip— real .
The way his whole body tensed as I gave myself entirely over to the delicious sensation spreading inside me— far too real .
“Lie down,” he commanded.
This time, I didn’t argue. I simply obeyed, falling backward against the mattress as I continued making slow circles with my fingertips. My thighs naturally widened, and my knees tented up.
I knew the position allowed him to see more—see everything . But strangely, I didn’t care.
In fact, I even liked it.
The sense of power I got from hearing his breath quicken was intoxicating. Knowing that it was me—innocent little Chastity Costa—causing him to burn the way I’d burned for years was more powerful than any wine or spirit in the world.
“What are you thinking about?” he demanded.
“You,” I answered honestly. “At night, I’d close my eyes and imagine you were the one touching me like this. That it was you making me feel this way.”
Another rumbling growl filled the room.
“Is that what you want?” he asked. “Do you want me to use my fingers to bring you over the edge?”
My breath hitched in my throat. Having him watch me was one thing, but actually feeling his touch somewhere so private…
I wasn’t sure I was ready for that yet.
I needed a little more time.
Maybe we could work up to it.
“I want you to kiss me like you promised,” I told him instead.
“A kiss?” The wicked laughter in his voice gave me pause. “Yeah, I can do that.”
I gasped as he bolted out of the chair, sliding his body up the mattress toward me.
But he didn’t move all the way to my lips. Instead, he slung my knees over his broad shoulders and lowered his head at my waist.
A half-second later, I cried out as I felt his version of a kiss—the heat of his mouth surrounding the folds between my legs and his tongue delving between them.