I dropped my head forward and pressed my forehead against the mattress, aching for release. “I want that,” I whispered, focusing on tightening every time he drew back. “I want…”
“Me,” he growled in my ear. “Tell me you want me.”
Oh God, I did. Even with everything still a mess between us, I wanted him. I always wanted him.
Tears sprang to my eyes again. Tears I still didn’t understand. “Yes,” I whispered. “I want you, Luc.”
An animalistic sound rumbled at my back. On the next stroke, he pulled free of my body. I gasped as cool air whooshed over my spine, then he flipped me to my back in one quick move, and my eyes flew open wide as I stared up at him.
His face was flushed with arousal and excitement, and his forehead glistened with sweat. But it was the haunted look I saw in his stormy asymmetric pupils that nearly did me in. One that said he needed this. He needed me. Even more than I’d thought when I’d followed him into his shower.
My stomach quivered with a mixture of fear and exhilaration and uncertainty. Yes, I wanted him. Yes, I wanted this. But this suddenly wasn’t about me. This was about him and his demons, and for the first time since I’d touched him tonight, I realized he hadn’t said my name. He hadn’t used that nickname—angioletto—he always whispered when we were close. And I couldn’t help but wonder if he was seeing me now, or a woman from his past.
He shoved my knees to my chest before I could find the words to ask, looked down to line up his cock, and drove inside me. We both groaned when he bottomed out, and then his mouth was on mine, claiming my lips the same way he was claiming my body, with fervor and a possessive need I’d never felt from him before.
He fucked into me almost violently, as if he were fucking away the memories. And I let him. Tears sprang to my eyes once again as I wrapped my legs around his waist, as I closed my arms around his shoulders and held him close while he used me. Tears I didn’t understand because my climax was spiraling straight toward me once again and my body ached for everything he wanted to give me. But I still wasn’t sure what it all meant. Where we stood. Or if there even could be an us once this night was over.
“Mine.” He grasped my head in both of his big hands and held me still as he kissed me. “You’re mine.”
Was I? I hadn’t felt like I was his since I’d learned who and what his family really was. Since I’d run from his parents’ villa in Tuscany. Ever since that night, everything had been jumbled in my head, and my heart had been in knots. I didn’t know how to untie it or even if I could after everything that had happened between us.
His cock repeatedly struck that perfect place, driving me harder toward the edge. I gasped against his lips as he thrust deep again and again. Tried to hold back, wanting his orgasm to trigger mine, wanting to go over the edge with him, but he continued to hammer into me, faster and harder with every plunge. And my orgasm, which had seemed so far away, slammed into me before I could stop it, crashing with the ferocity of a tidal wave against the shore. One that cleared my mind of all my doubts and fears and swept me under until the only thing I knew was mind-numbing pleasure and body-shaking bliss.
I was sweaty when I opened my eyes. Sweaty and limp where I lay pinned against the mattress. Above me, Luc twitched, and I felt the aftershocks of his own orgasm deep inside me where his cock was only just now starting to soften.
His face was buried in my hair, his hot breath washing over my neck, his hands against the mattress on both sides of me. I didn’t remember him coming. I didn’t remember anything but my own release. But I suddenly wanted to. I wanted to know how he’d felt, if he’d called my name when he’d spilled himself inside me, or if someone else had been on his mind at the height of his pleasure.
An irrational wave of jealousy swept over me. One I didn’t like. What he’d confessed to me hadn’t been easy. He’d only told me about his past so I would understand the danger I was in now. And logic told me he’d barely even known that girl—the one he’d fucked yet had never even dated. But that didn’t stop my jealousy. Because that girl had shaped him into the man he’d become, not me. That girl was the reason he’d left his family, not me. And I knew now without a doubt that what had happened to that girl was at the root of why he was so obsessed with keeping me safe.
My stomach pitched, and uneasy questions filled my mind. Had he saved me from his brother and the evils of his House that night on Long Island as a way to right the wrongs of his past? Had he taken me with him to Rome only to ensure what happened to her wouldn’t be replayed through me? And did that mean the connection I thought we’d forged was real, or had our relationship been set up on his part to prove to himself he wasn’t completely consumed by the darkness of his House as he so feared himself to be?
Bile pushed up my throat as I lay still beneath him, listening to his heavy breaths slowing in the darkness. I didn’t like where my thoughts were going. I didn’t like the sickness stirring inside me. But so many of his reactions and words made sense to me now. I couldn’t deny that tonight in the shower, after he’d confessed what had happened to that girl, that his eyes had been different. Not just filled with pain but haunted. Glazed. Unfocused. And when he’d looked at me, I’d felt as if he wasn’t seeing me. I’d felt as if he were looking through me at someone else.
I also couldn’t avoid the brutal reality that he hadn’t once said my name since I’d come to him. Not in the shower when he’d kissed me like a man starved. Not in this bed when he’d claimed me with an almost violent need. Not even now, when his naked body was limp and sated and pressed against every inch of mine.
“I’m crushing you,” he mumbled in my hair.
The sound of his ragged voice made me blink, and I swallowed hard around the lump of fear wedged tightly in my throat. “I’m fine.”
He braced his hand on the mattress and pushed his torso off me. Glancing down my naked body, he reached between us. “I need to take care of this.”
Cool air washed over my body as he lifted off me and disappeared into the dark bathroom. He didn’t bother with a light, but I heard the toilet flush, a sound that suddenly triggered another realization.
Looking down at my body, I saw no sign of his release between my legs. My flesh was swollen and still wet, but from friction and my arousal, not from him. Which meant he’d worn a condom. A condom I hadn’t even realized he’d used because I’d been so lost in him when he’d carried me into this room that I hadn’t noticed him grab it or put it on.
By now, the birth control implant he’d placed in my arm had to be working. Why would he go to the trouble of putting that in my body without my consent if he still planned to use condoms when he fucked me?
The answer hit me like a hard punch to the gut, and I sucked in a shocked breath as I stared at my arm in the dark.
He hadn’t placed the implant there to protect me from getting pregnant from him. He’d put it there as a backup safeguard to protect me from any unwanted consequences should what happened to that girl from his past happen to me.
Water ran in the bathroom. My chest constricted, choking the air in my lungs. I needed to get up. Needed to go back to my room. Needed to find a way to protect my stupid heart. Needed to think.
Footsteps sounded from the bathroom before I could do any of those things, and panic squeezed my lungs even tighter. Knowing I’d look like a total idiot if I ran right now, I rolled to my side, away from the bathroom, away from him, and closed my eyes. Hoping he’d think I was asleep. Hoping it would keep me from seeing that haunted look in his eyes again, the one that told me he was thinking about her and not me. The one I was pretty sure might actually break my heart for good this time.
His footsteps went silent as he hit the carpet. I squeezed my eyes, wondering if he’d get dressed and disappear into his office. Wondering if he was finally seeing me now that the sex was over.
No sound met my ears. Long seconds passed where I wasn’t even sure if he was there anymore, but I was too afraid to roll o
ver and look in case he’d already gone. Then the bed dipped. A soft blanket slid over my naked flesh. Followed by his warm, strong, still completely bare body pressing in close at my back.
My stupid heart bumped. I still didn’t move, though. Not when he slid one arm under my neck and wrapped it around my chest. Not when he closed his other arm over my waist and tugged me tighter into the heat of his body. I was still too scared. Still too confused.
We lay like that for a long time in the dark, only a sliver of moonlight through the wide windows shining over us on the bed. He pressed his face into my hair. His hot breath fanned my neck, but I fought the shivers. I breathed deep, slowly, in and out, pretending to sleep, the whole time hurting from an ache deep inside because I missed this.
I missed being close to him just as I was now. I wanted more nights like this where he made me feel as if I was his everything. And I was deathly afraid this had never been real and that I was a complete fool for giving myself to him tonight after everything I now knew.
“I love you, Natalie.”
His voice was low. Soft. Barely a whisper. And everything inside me froze because I wasn’t sure if those words were real or if I’d fantasized them in my head.
He swallowed at my back. “I know you don’t believe that right now, but it’s true. I love you.” His arms tightened around me. “I won’t let them touch you. I promise I’ll keep you safe. You’re mine. You’re mine and I’m yours, and I’ll never let them hurt you. I love you, sweet Natalie.” He pressed his lips against the sensitive skin behind my ear. “I love you so much. Please give me a chance to prove it to you.”
Tears burned my eyes. Tears of joy because he’d said my name. Because those were the words I’d wanted to hear from him since I’d awoken on this island. I opened my mouth to respond, only no sound came out. And as I tried to find my voice, I realized why.
His words might sweep away the sickness and doubt that had plagued me these last two weeks, but they didn’t change our reality. I was still trapped on this island. If I didn’t go along with this marriage, his family would try to have me killed. Probably raped and tortured first to punish him. And the fact he’d implanted a birth control device in my arm told me he wasn’t entirely sure they wouldn’t try to do that even if I acquiesced and acted like the overjoyed bride we both knew I wasn’t.
A heavy weight pressed down on me. One that stole the brief rush of happiness I’d felt at his words and left me more a prisoner than I was before.
What could I do? Did I even have free will anymore? If I couldn’t choose my own path forward, what did that mean for me? What did it mean for Luc?
And most importantly, what did it mean for the future? A future I was now nearly too afraid to even contemplate.
Chapter Ten
Luc
Sunlight slanted through the windows, rousing me after dawn.
A red hue lit up my closed eyelids, and through the cracked panes of glass, I could hear the lapping of water against the shore only yards from my bedroom patio, but I didn’t open my eyes. Not yet. In that peaceful state between slumber and consciousness, I wanted to savor this moment and the way my body ached.
It was a good ache. A sweet ache. The kind that came from worshipping the woman I loved. Memories of the way Natalie had come to me last night filled my mind. Warmed my skin. Sent blood rushing into my cock. Dragged me closer to alertness and right into arousal.
God, I’d needed her. So damn much. So much more than I’d even realized until I’d seen her standing in my shower, her clothes dripping wet from the spray, her eyes calling out to me. I knew I hadn’t been gentle, but she hadn’t seemed to want gentle. When I’d given her a chance to push me away, she’d pulled me in, kissed me hard, and when I’d carried her into the bedroom, she’d clawed at me as if she couldn’t get enough.
My cock hardened at just the memory, and every inch of my body hungered for more—for every bit of her soft, wet, wicked heat drawing me in all over again.
I rolled to my side, desperate to touch her, to feel her against me, to taste her succulent mouth, and reached out for her. My hand landed against cool sheets. Opening my eyes, I blinked in the early morning light, then lifted my head when I realized her side of the bed was empty.
Slowly, I sat up. The thin blanket I’d thrown over both of us fell to my waist. An eerie silence filled the room. Glancing toward the darkened bathroom, I listened, hoping for some sign that told me she was in there, but long minutes passed, and no sound met my ears.
A pressure I didn’t like filled my chest as I threw back the blanket, found a pair of gray sweats in the dresser drawer, and pulled them on. Maybe she’d been hungry and had left me to get food. Or maybe she’d heard Sela in the kitchen this morning and had gotten up to go say hello. My heart pounded hard as I crossed the room and tugged my door open, but again, I heard nothing.
My mind immediately drifted to worst-case scenarios. To the way Natalie had run from me when she’d first awoken from her drugged stupor on this island—a drugged stupor I’d been responsible for—then darted to the way she’d laid into me yesterday on that hike.
My stomach clenched with the realization it was possible she hadn’t come to me last night because she’d wanted me. She was a smart girl. She knew I was the one keeping her trapped here. There was a chance—a big chance—she’d fucked me into exhaustion last night simply so she could find a way to escape without my knowing.
I headed for my office, unease prickling my skin. As I pushed the door open, I scanned the room. Everything was still in its place. Laptop on my desk. Drawers closed. Nothing out of place or rifled through. I crossed the room and flipped my laptop open. While the screen booted up, I reached for the desk drawer where I’d locked my phone, breathing easier only when I discovered it was still secure. A quick check of the other locked drawers in the cabinets behind me confirmed she hadn’t tried to access them, and when my computer came on, and I opened my email, I saw that she hadn’t logged on. Hadn’t tried to send or receive any emails. Hadn’t even touched my damn computer.
Bracing my palms on the desk, I drew a full breath, hating that my first thought was to be suspicious. But I couldn’t keep my brain from spinning. I needed to know why she’d left my bed and where she’d gone. Because a glaring reality was becoming clear in the light of day.
Last night, I hadn’t just confessed my greatest sins, I’d also spilled my heart right at Natalie’s feet when I’d told her I loved her. And she hadn’t said a single word in response.
My skin tingled as I headed for the kitchen. It too was empty and silent, and a quick look at the clock told me it was still too early for Sela to arrive. As I walked through rooms, I glanced out at the beach and the deck. Still saw no sign of her. That tingling grew stronger. I was confident no one could have taken her. My alarms hadn’t gone off, and there’d been no deliveries scheduled last night. She had to be here somewhere. I reached for the partway open door of her room. I’d find her as long as I didn’t freak ou—
My thoughts came to a whirring stop. She was sound asleep, curled up in a plush club chair in the sitting area of her room. She’d pulled on a new black tank and soft blue cotton sleep shorts and lay at what had to be an uncomfortable angle with her head tipped against the back of the chair, gripping a throw pillow at her chest. Curly dark hair fell over her angelic face, shielding half of it from my view.
My pulse slowed, but a hole opened in my gut with the realization she’d left my bed to come here. Telling myself not to jump to conclusions, that maybe she just hadn’t been able to sleep and hadn’t wanted to wake me, I reached for the throw at the end of her bed and carefully laid it over her. My bare foot brushed something hard on the floor. Stepping back, I bent for the object only to discover it was a notepad. Beside it, I found a pen and piece of paper that looked as if it had been ripped off the pad and dropped.
I turned the paper over in my hand, then stilled as the words she’d written came into focus.
H
e lied to me.
He kidnapped me.
He drugged me.
He forced me into a marriage I don’t want.
He implanted a foreign object in my body.
He’s trapped me on this island.
He’s isolated me from family and friends.
His House—his family—is evil.
His family has killed people.
He has killed people—the man in my house, others I don’t know about.
Because of him, people want to hurt me, probably kill me.
I don’t know if I can trust him to tell me the truth.
I don’t know if I can believe what he tells me.
I don’t know if he can keep me safe or if that was just another empty promise.
The air felt as if it leaked out of my lungs. There was no doubt in my mind she’d heard me tell her I loved her last night. No doubt she’d intentionally kept silent.
I eased back as that hole opened wider, leaving behind a cavern of nothingness that seemed to rip through my chest wall. My fingers shook as I set the notepad, pen, and her list on the bed as silently as I could, then turned away, desperate for air, desperate for space, desperate for something to dull the pain slicing through me like a steel blade.
Unable to go back to my room with the memory of her naked and wet and tempting so fresh in that space, I crossed the hall and closed myself in my office. Cool leather cradled my body as I sank into my chair and stared at the sleek surface of my desk.
I was back at square one—no, I was miles behind square one, because at square one, I’d known what I needed to do next. I’d had hope somewhere down the line I could rekindle that heat between us and remind Natalie why she’d been so crazy about me in Italy. Now I knew that flame was never reigniting. And without that heat between us, without that hope, I had no idea how I was going to convince anyone else she was truly my wife so I could keep her safe from the people who wanted to kill her and punish me.