She stops her assault for only a second before she continues. “Bastardo.”
I turn my head to the side and bite her hip.
That keeps her quiet all the way to the bathroom where I let her down in front of the bathtub.
She gazes at the water that’s almost overflowing with hundreds of bubbles. “You got this ready for me?”
“Yes. And now I’ll get us something to drink.” I leave her standing there with a dumbfounded expression and go back to the bedroom to get some sweats and my phone, before making my way into the kitchen.
I missed a message and a phone call.
The message is from an unknown number, saying two words:Front desk.
My muscles tense, and I stare at the words. Then I pull up the front desk contact on my phone and swipe the dial button.
“Signor Santarossa, I was just about to call you again. A courier dropped off an envelope for you.”
“I’ll be right down, Stefano. Thank you.”
“No problem, signore.”
I hang up and walk back to the bedroom to get a T-shirt. Once it’s on, I peek into the bathroom to make sure Gemma is okay. Her whole body is submerged in the bubbles, with only her head above the water. With her eyes closed and her head leaning back against the bathtub edge, the curve of her jaw and throat is exposed in the most sensual way. A true masterpiece.
As if she can sense me, her eyes open, her gaze instantly connecting with mine where I lean against the doorframe.
I get sucked into this moment until my phone vibrates in my pocket.
Damn it. It’s so easy to forget my surroundings when she’s around.
I press off the doorframe and clear my throat. “I’m going to the front desk to pick something up. I’ll be right back.”
She nods, the previous fight in her eyes almost gone. “Okay.”
With that, I leave, not sure what else to say after our altercation, or whatever you want to call it.
She needs to understand her world doesn’t have to be the way it is, that it’s in her power to change it. If I need to push so she can realize that, then so be it.
A few minutes later, I reenter my penthouse with the courier envelope in my hand. Ever since Stefano gave it to me, it’s been like a heavy weight between my fingers. Despite the security being top-notch in this building, no system is ever one-hundred-percent impenetrable. Hackers constantly hone their skills, my sister being a prime example of that. For that reason alone, I would never open something in the elevator that could potentially be incriminating, no matter how badly I want to.
I make it to my office where I rip open the envelope, dumping the contents on my desk. The second my gaze lands on the first picture, my blood boils.
Pictures of Gemma and me, most of them upstate at the cabin. Gemma leaning over the rail of the deck while I ate her out from behind. The next one is Gemma staring up at me with my cock in her hand. The two of us taking a walk together on the property, with Gemma pointing at something in the sky while I continue to stare at her.
The next one has my stomach churning. Gemma on the front porch with the bloody bunny clutched to her chest.
My anger turns to rage, and I grab the nearest item from the desk and fling it against the wall. It explodes into hundreds of small glass pieces on impact, the light shining through the window reflecting in every piece like a rainbow exploded. Shit. This will be a pain to clean up.
But none of that matters right now. What does is that someone had the guts to not only follow me and Gemma around, but to also take photos of us and to send them to me. Who’d be so callous, who’d have the balls to do something like this? It must be someone with a death wish because whoever’s behind this won’t live for much longer.
I stare at the pictures again, picking them up one by one, needing a closer inspection, no matter how blood-tainted my vision is from the rage I’m feeling. The first image is the one of us on the deck, and it’s easy to tell that it was taken mid-orgasm. Gemma’s eyes are closed, her mouth parted, and her hands clutching on to the rail like she’s seconds away from breaking it. She’s absolutely magnificent, and the fact that someone intruded on this very private and intimate moment has me seeing red.
I flip to the next one, where our roles are reversed, and notice something I missed before. I was so focused on Gemma, I didn’t see my eyes are crossed out. Not just crossed out, but someone—the motherfucker behind all of this—seriously X-ed out my eyes with something sharp, leaving the photo paper half cut.
With the push of a button, the computer screen comes to life, and I log in with my fingerprint. While it starts the security program, I’m lost in the other pictures, confirming what I already knew. My eyes are crossed out in every single picture, but never Gemma’s. When I get to the last picture, the one of Gemma and me on the deck, there’s a circle drawn around her whole body with the wordsShe’s minewritten right next to it.
Fucking hell.
I pull up the security camera feed for the building—my sister’s hacking skills can be incredibly useful at times—and rewind it. I spot the delivery truck parking at the curb and pause it, then hit play again and watch the delivery guy in a brown uniform bringing in several boxes and envelopes. I pause and hit play. Both the truck and the guy appear to be a regular courier service. Damn it.