Amara swallowed, her heart in her throat. Could she live like that? “So, what now?”
“Now, we deflect,” he told her. “We move on with our lives. I take a mafia princess or two on a date. You take a guy or two on a date. I go about taking over the business. You go about your classes and therapy. Any eyes watching us see that we’re over. But we go home alone.” His eyes blazed on hers. “Nobody touches you, Amara, or I’ll spend a lot of time cleaning up a lot of blood.”
“And same goes for you?” she asked, just wanting to confirm.
“I’m not a hypocrite, baby,” he brushed her hair back from her face. “I’m not asking you to do anything I won’t be doing myself. Nobody touches me either, just you. I have an apartment in Tristan’s building. When we’re in the city, I’ll sneak away to come to see you. No phones or anywhere online, it’s all traceable. If we happen to meet during the day, you’re someone I used to know and I’m someone who broke your heart. My father can never get a whiff of the real thing.”
Amara went up on an elbow, her heart thundering as she processed everything he was saying. He hadn’t given up on them, he had just played them all like the master manipulator he was. Could she trust him to not play her? “And in between? If you get horny?”
He held her jaw in his hand, the gesture one of such dominance it sent fire licking at her bones. “Then, I wrap my fist around my cock and remember how tight your pussy felt, and I come.”
His other hand slid down her body, cupping her between her legs, the heat of his palm stark against her wetness. “It’s that simple, baby. I’m not a slave to my desires, they’re a slave to me.”
Amara processed that, looking at the sincerity and openness on his face, the kind she’d rarely seen him give to anyone for a long time. He had perfected his mask of a charming, easy-going, easily underestimated guy. Laying bare as he was, she could see how much he hid – the manipulation, the shrewdness, the sincerity.
His eyes moved over her face. “What I’m offering is not what you deserve, but for your own safety I can’t give more than this right now. I don’t even know when I could give you what you do deserve. There’s no timeline to this, so it won’t be easy. But you get to choose. If you don’t want this, tell me now. I’ll walk away and I’ll stay away, and you’ll never have to deal with me again.”
She didn’t want that. She wanted him. She wanted a future with him even if she didn’t know what it looked like. It was a risk and if it backfired, Amara didn’t think she’d be able to recover from that loss.
“And if I want this?” she asked him softly, hand fingers wrapped around his wrist, feeling his steady pulse under her palm. “What then? What do we do for now?”
“We hide in the shadows for now.” Dante gave her that little grin, the one that always sent butterflies fluttering in her belly, and whispered against her lips, “So, will you play with me, my queen?”
Amara looked into the eyes of the man she loved, saw that same love reflected back at her, and sealed their fates.
“Yes, I will, my king.”
They made love one more time before sunrise.
Amara woke up to see him getting dressed, her throat tightening even as her heart felt joy. She saw as he gave Lulu a head rub and came to her, leaning on his hands beside her face.
“I have to leave,” he told her, his eyes soft, his mouth swollen from their kisses.
Amara nodded.
He bent to press a kiss to her lips, then presses their foreheads together for a long second.
And then he straightened and walked out, leaving her in her bed, with a smile on her face and a hope in her heart.
Days became weeks.
He came to see her five times those first few weeks. She wrapped them away in her memories.
She saw more of him on the internet, sometimes alone, sometimes with a woman. She ignored it as he asked.
It chipped away little pieces of her.
Weeks became months.
She finished school with accelerated classes, started her master’s degree, began her therapy training. Made friends with books, talked to Lulu, continued with her own therapy. Embraced her demons in the morning, grew into herself in the afternoon, found pleasure in her body at night.
He came many times.
He left every time.
Chip, chip, chip.
Months became years.