He covered my mouth with his palm, while the other hand remained fisted in my hair. It was rough and restrictive and so addictive.
And I suddenly knew this was what had drawn me to Nicolas Russo. What fascinated me. Maybe the Cosa Nostra had tainted me from the start, like a poison in the water supply, because I needed this: restraint, domination, to feel him everywhere. I’d known it would be like this, so intense, but it felt so much better than I’d ever envisioned.
The orgasm was immediate and so violent it sent a shudder through me that chattered my teeth. Heat pulsed in my lower stomach before branching out in tingles and dazzles of the best feeling ever.
When I came down, it was to him motionless inside of me, watching me with a gaze dark as night. He pulled his hand from my mouth, and by the teeth marks I realized I’d bitten down on it when I came.
“Who fucks you?” he growled.
I shivered. “You do.”
“Who else?”
“Just you,” I breathed.
A rumble of satisfaction came from his chest, and he rested his forehead against mine. “I’m going to come inside you and then I’m going to fuck you again.” His lips hovered above my own. They were so close that with a slow thrust and a tense breath, they brushed
mine so lightly it was like it never happened.
I could almost feel his lips pressed against mine, sliding and licking and biting. Wet and messy and rough. Because that’s how Nico would kiss. I wanted to experience it violently enough it was a war between my head and my mouth.
He’d taste like whiskey and bad decisions.
This time, my head won.
He stayed like that, our lips inches apart, as he thrust inside of me, deep and slow, and with an intimacy that made me feel like someone had rubbed my skin with sandpaper until I was raw and exposed.
But I couldn’t escape it, not with his fist in my hair and his body on mine. Not with his dirty words still resounding in my ears. Not with the warmth that blossomed in my chest at the mere mention of his name.
I’d let him inside of me.
And now I’d never get him out.
“Love is like a virus. It can happen to anybody at any time.”
—Maya Angelou
HEARTBEATS ARE FICKLE THINGS. BEATING one moment and then stopping the next. Raging a storm and then lying as still as a tranquil sea. But what I didn’t know is that they change. They glow and warm and expand in a chest. They ache and yearn for a reason to beep.
My heartbeats had a fondness for the romantic.
They began to skip, to multiply, to fill with a contentment as thick as honey and as warm as the sun. They did it all as my skin grew cold and while I stared at the ceiling and tried to ignore them.
I couldn’t fall in love with this man.
I would rather never fall in love at all than to experience it unrequited. I’d seen it enough times to despise the possibility.
I couldn’t love a man who treated me like a commodity, or even worse—a pretty bird in a cage, and not like a wife. If there was anything I knew with a certainty about Made Men, it was that they couldn’t grasp the concept of fidelity. Those heartbeats tied into a knot, a strangling, uncomfortable ball in the back of my throat.
I smelled like him. He was all over me, and I’d asked him nicely for it. Someone needed to save me from myself before I got on my knees and professed my inevitable love to him. Might as well make it right after he finished screwing another.
Bitterness cut through my chest, and I moved to get up and leave but an iron grip wrapped around my wrist.
Slowly, I glanced at the man who lay like a freshly fucked king next to me. I bet his heartbeats were satisfied that he’d finally laid his easy fiancée. But as soon as I looked at him, the resentment faded into a different kind of ache. When had he become so handsome it hurt? I fought not to rub at the pang in my chest.
He didn’t say a word, just watched me with a lazy stare while inhaling rough breaths. It’d been only moments since we’d had sex again. But in my head, it’d felt like an eternity as the seconds mocked me with the inevitable that he would soon hold another like he had me.
I was ruining a moment I’d wanted badly enough it felt like a need. But now I couldn’t stop myself from analyzing everything—the possibilities and outcomes—and it didn’t look to be in my favor.