Dante brought me to the den to sit with Joey and Anya after I left his study earlier. He never told them anything but they could tell by the state I was in that something was wrong. So I ended up telling them about my ordeal two years ago. I’ve never told anyone before today. Not even my doctor when I went for tests after. Not even my old boss, who I used to have Margarita Tuesdays with every single week since we left college. Not my cousin, Mia. Not Leo. I kept it all to myself. Convinced that the shame was mine to carry.
Those men ruined my life. I left my job. Stopped seeing all of my friends. I moved out of my beautiful apartment because I couldn’t afford it any longer. Cut myself off from every single person who had ever meant something to me. When I had to take a job to pay the bills, I chose one that would bring me into as little contact with other people as possible. I rarely left the house. I was a ghost. A shell.
Until Dante.
Talking to Anya and Joey felt surprisingly cathartic. They didn’t pity me or make me feel ashamed. They listened and held my hand and now I wish that maybe I’d had the strength to tell them sooner.
I came up to bed a few minutes ago. I haven’t seen Dante, Lorenzo, or even Maximo since this afternoon, and I know it’s because they will be torturing and killing those two men. But I don’t care. I have no compassion for them at all.
I’m still awake when Dante comes to bed a few hours later. He climbs in beside me, smelling of fresh shampoo and soap.
“You still awake, kitten?” he asks softly.
“Yes,” I whisper and then I’m wrapped in his arms as he strokes my hair and whispers things half in Italian, half in English that I don’t fully understand.
I weave my fingers through his hair and pull his face close to mine as I wrap one leg around his waist, rubbing my pussy against his hard cock.
His handsome face furrows in a frown. “I have something to tell you.”
“What is it?”
“The reason those men took you…” His eyes narrow as he tucks a lock of hair behind my ear. “It was your brother.”
Somehow I suspected Leo was involved all along but when such thoughts entered my head I always dismissed them too quickly before they could ever take root. Because the thought that what happened to me had anything to do with my own brother is too unthinkable. “Leo? But why?”
“He owed them some money.”
“And?” I mean he owed a lot of people money.
“When he couldn’t pay, he offered them an alternative.”
Tears sting my eyes. “Me?” I whisper.
“I’m sorry, Kat. I have no reason to believe they were lying to me.”
I shake my head as tears run down my cheeks. “I guess you were right about me being his most valuable asset after all, right? Just something for men like you and my brother to trade like poker chips,” I snap as anger and injustice and betrayal burn through my veins.
I see the pain in his eyes and I know he doesn’t deserve to bear the brunt of my rage right now, but Leo’s betrayal hurts me more than I can bear and I can’t direct these feelings at the man who deserves them.
“You are the most precious thing in the world to me, Kat. I would die before I ever let anyone harm you.”
I look into his dark eyes and despite where we started, I believe him right now.
“I want to forget about it all. I don’t want to go to sleep with these thoughts in my head, Dante.”
Knowing what I need, like he always does, his hand slides beneath my t-shirt where he traces his fingertips over my scar. “Those men will never hurt you again, Kat.”
“I know.”
He presses his lips over my throat as he rocks his hips so lightly against me, causing his cock to rub softly against my pussy.
“Please don’t be gentle with me, Dante. I can’t stand it.”
“Why?”
I choke down a sob that comes at me from nowhere. “I’m hormonal and emotional. Right now, I can’t tell the difference between ownership and affection, or desperation and love.”
“Maybe there is no difference. The world isn’t always black and white, kitten.”
“I know, but I’m afraid,” I whisper.
“Of what?”
“Of falling.”
“If you fall, I promise to catch you.”
My heart blooms in my chest at his words even if he only means that for right now. But then his face changes, and he stares at me with eyes full of concern. “You want to exorcise some demons with me instead, kitten?”
I don’t know what he has in mind, but I am all for doing that. “Yes.”
He pushes himself up onto his knees, taking my hand and pulling me with him. “Get on your knees and face the headboard,” he commands in a soothing voice that makes my insides melt like butter.
I do as he tells me, maneuvering into the position until I’m kneeling on the bed, facing away from him. He moves behind me until his chest is pressed against my back. He slips my t-shirt off over my head before wrapping one hand around my throat and yanking my head back so that it’s resting on his shoulder. Then he slides his other hand over the curve of my hip, pulling me close.
His hot breath dances over my skin as he peppers soft kisses over my neck. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes.” Despite everything he is, he showed me today that I can count on him.
“Good girl,” he soothes, and suddenly the hand on my throat slides to the back of my head until he’s gripping my hair at the roots. He tugs lightly as his free hand dips between my thighs and his fingertips brush over my clit.
“Dante,” I whimper as waves of pleasure roll through my body, even as I know what’s coming next — the demons he wants to exorcise.
“I’ve got you, kitten,” he says against my ear right before he pushes my head down, bending me over until my cheek is resting on the pillow. My heart rate almost doubles.
Dante rubs a soothing hand over my back while he keeps me pinned down with his other one. “It’s okay,” he whispers as he goes on rubbing my back, from my shoulder blades down to my ugly scar and back again, until my muscles relax.
When my breathing evens out, he releases his grip a little, but it’s only to slide his hand from my head to the back of my neck, and I tense again.
“There’s only me and you here, Kat,” he assures me as that hand from my back slides down to my ass and he squeezes my ass cheek before sliding his fingers through my wet folds. I force myself to breathe deeply even as my brain fogs with confusion, trying to drag up those old memories of the last time I was held down like this. And I can’t stop them now. I can’t focus on Dante’s hands just the memories and the terror.
My entire body starts to tremble as I shiver with unforgotten fear, until he’s leaning over me, his warmth settling into my bones and his hot mouth at my ear. “I’m not going to hurt you, kitten,” he growls. “And the next time you have a memory of being bent over and held down, it will be me you think of.” He presses soft kisses over my shoulder blades as he edges his cock inside me and my muscles relax around him.
“All you’ll remember is how good it feels when I fuck you. How much your pussy loves to come on my cock,” he goes on talking to me while he fucks me, and I whimper as the memories dissolve like salt in hot soup, until all I can see, hear and feel is Dante.
His voice affects me in ways I can’t even describe, as though he has a direct line to the essence of my being. He makes me believe everything he says is true. And my body molds to his instinctively, like we are perfectly tuned to the same frequency. “There’s no before me and you. There’s only us. And I will never hurt you. I will never let anyone touch you ever again. You understand me?”
“Yes,” I gasp as he drives into me harder and a stream of wet heat rushes between my thighs.
“That’s my good girl. Now I’m going to hold you down and fuck you, kitten, and the only thing you’ll scream is my name when I make you come.”
He pushes himself up, one hand still on the back of my neck pressing my face into the pillow and the other one holding onto my hip as he rails into me.
“I can get inside you so fucking deep like this, Kat. I’m gonna be bending you over every piece of furniture we own.”
I groan as pleasure rolls through me in a long, undulating wave and my body goes lax, melting into the soft mattress as I give him complete control. Until he ups the ante again.
He runs a finger along the seam of my ass before circling my tight hole, and my entire body tenses once more. “Let’s face all those demons,” he rasps in a husky voice that is filled with emotion and longing and self-control.
“I can’t,” I whimper as I try to pull away, but I’m impaled on his cock and held down by his powerful hand, and there is nowhere for me to go.
“You can, kitten,” he growls as he slides the same finger down to my folds, coating it in my arousal before he starts toying with my asshole again.
My heart is racing. Blood is rushing in my ears as my body teeters between the pleasure that he’s still bringing me and the terror of what he’s about to do.
“I’ll never give you more than you can take,” he assures me as he edges the tip of his finger inside me until I feel the sting of him breaching me. “But you have to relax a little.”
I will my muscles to release and let him inside because I know that’s all it will take for him to make even this feel good. But I can’t let go of that final part of myself. Because then, he will have everything, and I will have given my soul to the devil himself.
He leans over me again, peppering kisses between my shoulder blades, trailing lower until his lips dust over my scar, and I shudder.
“Every single part of you is perfect, vita mia,” he says between kisses. “Every single part of you already belongs to me. So you can let go my little wildcat, because I’ve already got you.”
Holy fuck! Dante Moretti’s dirty talk might be some next level filth, but when he speaks like this, from his heart, it’s like he reaches inside my soul and speaks directly to that part of me that nobody else has ever been able to reach. I press my face into the pillow, letting out a long, slow breath as my body loosens again, and I push my hips back a little, taking the little control he will allow, until his finger slides in a little deeper.
“Good girl,” he soothes as he rocks his hips into me, pressing the tip of his cock against my G-spot, making me moan with pleasure and allowing him to slide his finger a little deeper.
He carries on taking it slowly, edging his finger in and out as my body adjusts to the overwhelming feeling of him taking both my ass and pussy at the same time. There is no pain now, only hot, fierce pleasure that makes me needy for more of him.
“I can take more,” I whimper.
“More?” he growls and then adds a second finger.
“Holy shit,” I gasp as he stretches me wider, but the feelings that are powering through my body are nothing short of euphoric.
Dante goes on fucking me, his hips and his fingers setting an exquisite pace that keeps me dangling on the edge of oblivion. “You going to come for me, kitten? Come on my cock while I’m fucking your tight little ass with my fingers?”
“Yes,” I wheeze.
My orgasm comes slowly at first, ripples of tingling electric pleasure pooling through my core. Dante fucks me through it until the pressure becomes too much, like a river that has been held back by a dam for too long. I scream his name as I experience the most intense climax I’ve ever had in my entire life. It gushes out of me, soaking the two of us and the bedsheets.
“Oh fuck,” he groans, finally letting go of the back of my neck so he can grab hold of both of my hips as he nails me to the mattress. I’m so boneless and spent that the only thing holding me up is him. Pleasure still skitters around my body as I listen to the wet sound of his skin slapping against mine as he takes what he needs. He comes with a roar of my name, holding on to me tightly as he grinds out his release.
When he’s finished, I lower myself to the bed, lying on my side as I gasp for breath. I’m wet and sore and spent and overwhelmed with so many emotions I don’t know how to process them all at once. Closing my eyes, I fight to hold it all together.
“I’ll be right back,” Dante says, but he sounds so far away, like he’s in another room or on another plane of existence. Because there is only me here. Just me in this darkness when my eyes are closed. I’m alone.
Alone? For the first time in two years, I am alone here in that space between sleeping and waking. No monsters. No demons. No flashbacks of memories that I want to bury. It’s just quiet and still. Then a wonderful fluttering in my lower abdomen reminds me that I will never be alone again.
“I’m going to clean you up, Kat.” I open my eyes as he begins to wipe between my thighs with a warm washcloth.
“We made a mess,” I whisper as I snap back to the real world.
“We sure did, kitten.”
“The sheets,” I groan. They are soaked. They’ll need changing but I’m too tired to move.
“We’ll just sleep on the other side of the bed.”
Then he dries me with a fluffy warm towel. “I can do that,” I offer, feeling a little too vulnerable suddenly.
“I know, ” he says as he continues drying me. Then he tosses the towel onto the floor before climbing over me and lying on the other side of the bed. “Come here.” Taking my hand, he pulls me to him, away from the wet patch on the sheets until I’m resting my head on his chest.
He wraps his arms around me, stroking my hair and running his fingertips softly over my side and my growing belly.
Years of anger and rage and frustration and sorrow pour out of me as I soak his chest with my tears. And he just lets me. He doesn’t tell me everything is okay, or try to make me feel better. He doesn’t talk or shush me. He just lets me be.
He might never say those words that I am so desperate to hear from him. But even if he never tells me that he loves me, I feel it. Since the day we met, I have always felt more protected and cared for by him than any man who has ever actually professed to loving me. And that is enough.
So right here, in the arms of the devil himself, I find a peace that even the heavens couldn’t rival.
