A Hunger for the Forbidden (14 page)

He felt weak. Vulnerable in a way he could never recall feeling at any point in his life.

Alessia had walked away from him, and he couldn’t blame her. In a way, it comforted him. Because at least she hadn’t simply blithely walked on in her illusion of who she wanted him to be. She had heard his words. And she’d believed them.

He should be completely grateful for that. Should be happy that she knew. That she wasn’t committed to a man who didn’t truly exist.

But he couldn’t be happy. Selfishly, he wanted her back. Wanted the light and heat and smiles. Wanted one person to look at him and see hope.

“Matteo?”

He looked up and saw Alessia standing in the doorway, her dark hair loose around her shoulders.

“Yes?” He pushed into a sitting position.

“I felt like I owed it to you to really think about what you said.”

“And you owed it to you.”

She nodded. “I suppose I did.”

“And what conclusion have you come to?”

“You aren’t the man I thought you were.”

The words hit him with the force of a moving truck. “No. I’m sure in all of your fantasies about me you never once dreamed that I was a killer.”

She shook her head. “I didn’t. I still don’t think you’re that. I don’t think you’re perfect, either, but I don’t think it was ever terribly fair of me to try to make you perfect. You had your own life apart from me. Your own experiences. My mistake was believing that everything began and ended during the times our eyes met over the garden wall. In my mind, when you held me after the attack, you went somewhere hazy, somewhere I couldn’t picture. I didn’t think about what you did after, not really. I didn’t think of the reality of you returning home, covered in blood. I didn’t think about what your father might have said to you. I knew Benito Corretti was a bad man, but for some reason I never imagined how it might have touched you. I only ever pictured you in the context of my world, my dreams and where you fit into them. It was my mistake, not yours.”

“But I wouldn’t have blamed you if you never imagined that. No one did. Not even my family, I’m certain of that.”

“Still, I wasn’t looking at you like you were a real person. And you were right to make me see.”

“Alessia, if you want—”

“Let me finish. I see now. I see you, Matteo, not just the fantasy I created. And I don’t want to walk away. I want to stay with you. I want to make a family with you.”

“You trust me to help raise your child after you found out what I’m capable of?”

“That night of your life can’t live in isolation. It’s connected to the rest of your life, to all of it. To who your father was, the history of what he’d done to other people, to what he’d done to you.”

“He never did anything to me, he just—”

“He forced you to do things you would never have done. He made you violate your conscience, over and over again until it was scarred. He would have turned you into a monster.”

“He did, Alessia. That’s the point. He did.”

She shook her head. “You put a stop to it.”

“I had to,” he said, his voice rough. “I had to because you don’t just walk away from the Correttis. It’s not possible. My father would not have released his hold.”

“I know. I understand.”

“And you absolve me?”

“You don’t need my absolution.”

“But do I have it?” he asked, desperate for it, craving it more than his next breath. She nodded. “If I have yours.”

“For what?”

“For what I did. For not telling you about Alessandro. For agreeing to marry him in the first place. For trapping you in this marriage.”

“You didn’t trap me.”

“You said—”

“Alessia, I have been manipulated into doing things far worse than marrying you, and I have done it with much greater coercion. A little news piece on what a jerk I am for not making your child legitimate was hardly going to force my hand.”

“Then why did you do it?”

“To cement the deal. To give our child my name. All things I could have walked away from.”

“Then forgive me, at least, for lying to you. For leaving you in the hotel room.”

“I do. I was angry about it, but only because it felt so wrong to watch you walking toward him. To know that he would have you and not me. If I had known that there was a deal on the table that could be secured by marriage to you I would have been the one volunteering for the job.”

A ghost of a smile touched her lips. “When my father first told me about the deal with the Correttis, that it would be sealed by marriage, I said yes immediately. I was so sure it would be you. And when
it was Alessandro who showed up at the door to talk terms the next day I thought … I thought I would die.”

“Waiting for your knight to rescue you?”

“Yes. I was. But I’ve stopped doing that now. I need to learn to rescue myself. To make my own decisions.”

“You’ve certainly been doing that over the past couple of months.”

“I have. And some of them have been bad, ill-timed decisions, but they’ve been mine. And I want you to know that I’ve made another decision.”

“What is that?”

“You’re my husband. And I’ll take you as you are. Knowing your past, knowing the kind of man you can be. I want you to understand that I’m not sugarcoating it, or glossing over the truth. I understand what you did. I understand that … that you don’t feel emotion the same way that I do. The same way most people do.”

“Do you really understand that? I keep it on a leash for a reason, Alessia, a very important reason, and I won’t compromise it.”

She nodded. “I know.”

“And still you want to try? You want to be my wife? To let me have a hand in raising our child?”

“Yes. No matter what, you’re the father of my child,
Matteo, and there is no revelation that can change that. I don’t want to change that.”

“How can you say that with such confidence?”

“Because no matter what you might have done, you aren’t cruel.”

She leaned in and he took a strand of her hair between his thumb and forefinger. Soft like silk. He wanted to feel it brushing over his skin. Wanted to drown out this moment, drown out his pain, with physical pleasure.

“Am I not?” he asked.

“No.”

“You’re wrong there,” he said. “So very wrong. I am selfish, a man who thinks of his own pleasure, his own comfort, above all else. No matter how I pretend otherwise.”

“That isn’t true.”

“Yes, it is. Even now, all I can think about is what your bare skin will feel like beneath my hands. All I want is to lose myself in you.”

“Then do it.”

His every muscle locked up, so tight it was painful. “Alessia, don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t sacrifice yourself for me!” he roared. “Don’t do this because you feel sorry for me.”

“I’m not.” She took a step toward him. “I want
this because I want to be close to you. To know you. To be your wife in every way.” A smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “I’m also not opposed to the orgasms you’re so good at giving me. This is by no means unselfish on my part, trust me.”

His skin felt like it was burning. Or perhaps that was the blood beneath his skin. Either way, he felt like he would be consumed by his need. His desire. Passion he swore he would never allow himself to feel.

Emotion he swore he would never feel.

But in this moment with Alessia, her eyes so bright and intense, so honest, he could hold back nothing. Deny her nothing. Least of all this.

She knew the truth, and still she wanted him. Not as a perfect figure, a knight in shining armor, but as the man he was. It was a gift he didn’t deserve, a gift he should turn away, because he had no right to it.

But he had spoken the truth. He was selfish. Far too selfish to do anything but take what was on offer.

“Show me you want me.” His words were rough, forced through his tightened throat. “Show me you still want me.” Those words echoed through his soul, tearing through him, leaving him raw and bleeding inside.

Alessia wrapped one arm around his neck, her fingers laced in his hair, and put the other on his cheek.
She pressed a kiss to his lips, soft, gentle. Purposeful. “Always.”

There was no hope of him being noble, not now, not tonight. But then, that shouldn’t be a surprise. He didn’t do noble. He didn’t do selfless. And it wouldn’t start now.

He kissed her, deep and hard, his body throbbing, his heart raging. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her in close, reveling in the feel of her. Touching Alessia was a thrill that he didn’t think would ever become commonplace. He had hungered for her touch, for her closeness, for so many years, and he knew his desire for it would never fade.

If anything, it only grew.

He slid his hands down her waist, over her hips, her thighs, and gripped her hard, tugging her up into his arms, those long, lean legs wrapping around his waist as he walked them both to the bed.

Alessia started working on the knot on his tie, her movements shaky and clumsy and all the sexier for it. He sat on the bed, and Alessia remained on top of him, now resting on her knees. She tugged hard on the tie and managed to get it off, then started working at the buttons on his shirt.

He continued to kiss her, deep and desperate, pushing her dress up, past her hips, her waist, her breasts, and over her head. Her lips were swollen from kissing,
her face flushed, her hair disheveled from where he’d run his fingers through it.

She looked wild, free, the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. But then, Alessia had been, from the moment he’d seen her, the most beautiful sight he’d ever beheld. And then, when his vision of her had been one of innocence, protectiveness, it had been all about that glow that was inside of her.

He could see it, along with the outer beauty that drove him to madness. Now that their lives, their feelings, had no more innocence left, he could still see it. Still feel it deep inside of him, an ache that wouldn’t ease.

She pushed his shirt off his shoulders, the buttoned cuffs snagging on his hands. A little growl escaped her lips. He wrapped one hand around her waist to hold her steady and lay back on the bed, leaving her perched over him, then he undid the buttons as quickly as possible and tossed the shirt to the side.

Alessia moved away from him, standing in front of the bed, in front of him. She met his eyes, and put her hands behind her back, her movement quick. Her bra loosened, then fell, baring her breasts to him. His stomach tightened, he could barely breathe.

She smiled, then hooked her fingers into the sides of her panties and tugged them off.

He wanted to say something. To tell her how beautiful
she was, how perfect. But he couldn’t speak. He could only watch, held completely under her spell.

She approached the bed, her fingers deft on his belt buckle, making quick work of his pants and underwear, and leaving him as naked as she was.

“You’re so much more … Just so much more than I ever imagined,” she said. “I made fantasies about you, but they were a girl’s fantasies. I’m not a girl, though, I’m a woman. And I’m glad you’re not only that one-dimensional imagining I had of you. I’m glad you’re you.”

She leaned in, running the tip of her finger along the length of his rock-hard erection. Every thought ran from his head like water, his heart thundering in his ears.

Lush lips curved into a wicked smile and she leaned in, flicking her tongue over the head of his shaft. “I’ve never done this before. So you have to tell me if I do it wrong.”

“You couldn’t possibly do it wrong,” he said, not sure how he managed to speak at all. It shouldn’t be possible when he couldn’t breathe.

And she proved him right. Her mouth on him hot, sweet torture that streaked through his veins like flame. But where other flames destroyed, this fire cleansed. He sifted his fingers through her hair, needing an anchor. Needing to touch her, to be a part of
this. Not simply on the receiving end of the pleasure she was giving him.

He needed more. Needed to taste her, too.

“Get on the bed,” he growled.

She complied, not abandoning her task as she got up onto the bed, onto her knees. He sat up and she raised her head, her expression confused. Then he grasped her hips and maneuvered her around so that she was over him, so that he could taste her like she was tasting him.

She gasped when his tongue touched her.

“Don’t stop,” he said, the command rough, firmer than he’d intended it to be, but she didn’t seem to mind.

He slipped a finger inside of her while he pleasured her with his tongue, and she gasped again, freezing for a moment before taking him fully into her mouth. His head fell back, a harsh groan on his lips.

“I can’t last much longer,” he said.

“Neither can I,” she panted, moving away from him, returning a moment later, her thighs on either side of his. She bent down and pressed a kiss to his lips. “Ready?” she asked.

“More than.”

She positioned her body so that the head of his erection met with her slick entrance, then she lowered herself down onto him, so slowly he thought he
would be consumed utterly by the white heat moving through him.

She moved over him, her eyes locked with his. He grasped her hips, meeting each of her thrusts, watching her face, watching her pleasure.

He moved his hand, pressed his palm flat over her stomach, then slid it upward to cup one of her breasts. He liked the view. Liked being able to see all of her as she brought them both to the brink.

She leaned forward, kissing his lips, her breath getting harsher, faster, her movements more erratic. He lowered his hand back to her hip and strengthened his own movements, pushing them farther, faster.

They both reached the edge at the same time, and when he tipped over into the abyss, all he could do was hold on to her as release rushed through him like a wave, leaving no part of him untouched. No part of him hidden.

When the storm passed, Alessia was with him.

She rested her head on his chest, her breath hot on his skin. He wrapped his arms tight around her, held her to him.

He would keep her with him, no matter what.

Yes, he was a selfish bastard.