Her brow rose, but I could tell she was pleased. “Are you trying to buy me?”
I shifted closer to her, taking her chin in my fingers. “I love you, Lia. But I don’t need to buy you because you’re still my property. I can put a rein on my selfishness, but not when it comes to you. Your body, your soul, and the breath in your lungs is mine.”
Her eyes widened and I bent and kissed her perfect mouth. Then I took the velvet box from the gift bag and laid it in her hands.
“For you. Consider it an early Christmas gift,” I said.
She glanced up at me and back down, her fingers hesitating. Then she swallowed and flipped back the lid. Her little gasp sent a shock of arousal through me. Inside lay a black diamond necklace that had cost me several thousand dollars to have made and engraved. It was a single rope with big, dark stones every few inches and a heavy diamond that hung low. I lifted it from the box and flipped the square clasp over. Inside, in flowing Italian script, it said:
Property of Peregrine Calo.
In the candlelight, she flushed and her midnight eyes glittered. “You are presumptuous.”
“It’s one of my better qualities.”
“How much was this?” she said, her brows drawing together.
I unclasped it and fastened it around her throat, my mouth brushing her ear.
“If you don’t stop opening your mouth to ask how much things cost, I am going to put it to better use, kitten. This is your last warning.”
At that moment, the waiter appeared with a stuffed pheasant and rosemary roasted vegetables. We sat together in silence, basking in a strange sense of normalcy. After the constant turmoil of the first few months of our marriage, it felt good not be at war with ourselves. I kept my hand on her thigh, stroking her soft skin with my thumb until she was shifting in her seat. After we had eaten and the plates were taken away and replaced by some sort of miniature dessert, she sat back with a sigh.
“Satisfied?”
“With the food? Yes,” she said.
I stood, taking her hand, and led her out to empty space on the other side of the room. The lights dimmed and faint music spilled through invisible speakers. She was speechless and her eyes were wide as I slid my hand up her back and pulled her close. Threading my fingers through hers, our rings pressing together.
“We never danced at our wedding,” I said.
She relaxed into me, letting her head sink into my chest. All around us the world glittered with streetlights and snow falling from the endless sky overhead. My wife was warm and compliant in my arms and it struck me how precious her trust was. Her weakness was a gift, her need for my attention and praise was a privilege. She trusted me, she needed me.
The fact that I’d abused that horrified me.
I paused, not caring we might be seen, and sank to my knees before her. Her fingers dug into my shoulders to steady herself and her eyes were endless, dark pools. Pulling me in and making me so painfully weak. Reminding me of how vulnerability like this had always frightened me. How it had always ended with me being hurt.
But despite everything, I wanted the sweet torture of being on my knees at her feet. Of looking up into her devastatingly beautiful face. I craved the pain of her fingers digging into the most intimate parts of my mind and soul.
I’d never been able to do things in moderation. My passions had always consumed me like a wildfire. And now that I’d accepted it, my obsession, my love, for this woman was no exception. I was going to dedicate my body to her cunt and live and die by the sweet, torturous taste of it on my tongue.
Blood surging, I bent and pressed my face against her lower stomach, my arms gripping her hips to me. A gasp escaped her mouth as I gathered her skirt and slid it up her legs, crushing it in my fingers.
Beneath it, she wore a thin, lace thong that was already soaked through. A little moan escaped her mouth as I ran my fingertip up her silky thigh and pulled aside the wet fabric to reveal her sweet, wet cunt.
Her hands sank into my hair and my mouth slid over her sex, tasting her for the first time in weeks. Tangy arousal spread through my senses and I went painfully, recklessly hard.
Jesus Christ, this was more than paradise.
A soft moan escaped her mouth and her back arced. I ran my tongue over her again and again to get every bit of her taste into my mouth. I wanted to bathe in her, to soak the scent of her skin into my pores. I wanted to live the rest of my life inside this woman, tasting her essence and soaking her skin with mine.
Her nails dug into the back of my neck and her sex pulsed. Once. Twice. Then, fuck me, she was coming on my tongue. The little cry from her mouth echoed in the back of my mind as I took her with my mouth and a shudder tore through her hips. Making her buck against my face.
Her hands struggled up and pushed me off her pussy, too sensitive to continue. I pulled my face from her reluctantly and looked up, my fingers tangled in her skirt. She was devastating, looking down at me with her skin stained from the flush of her orgasm. She was an angel carved by a master far greater than I could ever hope to be.
“You don’t do things by halves, do you?” she breathed.
I shook my head. “It’s all or nothing.”