by Maisey Yates
She gasped, and he pulled her to her feet, using the hold he had on her hair. She purred as he pulled her against him, her hands pressed to his chest. He knew that she would be able to feel his heart thundering beneath her touch.
That she would be able to sense just how much she affected him.
But that was fine with him. If she wanted him unleashed, then that was what she would have.
He bent his head then, claiming her lips with his own as he maneuvered them both over to the couch. Then, he slipped his hand down, gathering her hair into his fist before sliding it down the length of her dark curls slowly, until he reached the very end. Then he twisted his wrist, wrapping her glossy curls around his fist, tugging back.
She whimpered, the sound one of pleasure, and pain.
“You’re at my mercy,” he said, holding tightly to her hair and reaching around with his other hand, tracing her delicate throat with his fingertips.
“Cristian...”
He leaned in closer, whispering in her ear. “Are you going to let me have control?”
She tried to nod and he held her fast.
“Good,” he said. “You said you wanted this, Allegra. That you wanted me. All of me. I only hope you don’t regret it.”
He said that, even while he hoped she would. Because the kindest thing for her would be if she ran away, far away after this, and never looked back at him.
He turned her away from him, so that she was facing the chaise, then curved his hand around her, pressing it to her stomach before guiding her down onto the velvet-covered surface.
She gasped as he pressed his hardened length against the curve of her ass. But she didn’t protest when he positioned her so that she was on the chaise, leaning over the side, her breasts pressed against the arm. She was on her knees, open to him from where he was kneeling behind her.
“I’m going to have you now,” he said, his voice rough. “I want you so bad I ache with the need to take you.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
He placed his hand on the curve of her hip, his fingertips brushing the tender place at the apex of her thighs. Then he gripped his hardened length, positioning himself at her slick entrance before testing her readiness. He flexed his hips, teasing her, delighting in the kittenish sounds she made as he tortured them both with near penetration.
He could stay like this forever. Poised on the brink, caught between heaven and absolute hell. Needing her like this, feeling so close to the edge was like a stay in the pit of fire, being inside her would be salvation. Though not for her.
He had a feeling that this, this edge, was her last chance to cling to her soul. While joining with her might save him, it would only ruin her.
He cursed himself as he pushed his way into her tight body, gritted his teeth as he gloried in the feel of her. The hot, wet clasp of her taking him in, holding him tight.
He swore as he rocked his hips, deepening his thrusts. Swore again as she gasped at the invasion.
He started slowly at first, gently, until he could no longer control himself. Then he began to up his pace, pushing them both toward the release they so desperately craved.
“You like that,” he growled, “you like me inside you.”
“Yes,” she moaned, lowering her head, arching her spine slightly.
He pressed his hand against the center of her shoulder blades, then let his fingers trace downward over the line of her spine, dipping it between the elegant crease of her buttocks. She gasped, shuddering beneath his touch. He teased her where they were joined, torturing them both with the slick pressure.
“I can’t,” she said, her words a gasp. “I can’t.”
“You will,” he whispered. “Go ahead. Come for me, querida.”
He pressed more firmly into her, moving his hand around to the front to sweep his fingertips across where he knew she was aching for his touch. And then, he felt her shudder around him, felt her give herself up to her release.
She was breathing hard, and he could tell that she was exhausted.
But he wasn’t finished. She had asked for all of it, and he was going to give her all of it.
One hand firmly placed on her hip, he used the other to grab hold of her arms, her body still braced over the arm of the couch. He moved her hands behind her back, wrapping his fingers around her wrists like an iron manacle, holding her as he continued to thrust into her, hard, ruthless.
“I can’t,” she said again, the desperate note in her voice pleading with him to stop. But she didn’t say it. She didn’t tell him no. And so, he continued on.
He wanted to stay inside her forever, to keep himself like this for all time. On the knife’s edge, thrusting into her until neither of them could breathe. Claiming her, taking her, until she was his. Only his.
But his orgasm began to burn inside of him before igniting. Racing through his veins, wrapping its fingers around his throat and strangling him as it stole the very last vestiges of his control. He held more tightly to her, increasing the pace, the only sound in the room his skin slapping against hers, and the harsh, broken sound they both made as he drove them both to the peak of pleasure.
Her release sounded wrenched from her, her groan like broken shards of glass in her throat. And when his own climax overtook him, he shook with it as he spilled himself inside of her, marking her, claiming her.
And then, he collapsed over her, bracing himself on the arm of the chaise, still buried deep inside her. Their breathing was labored, echoing in the room, like a whispered prayer meant only for the two of them.
“I would have you like that always,” he said, his voice sounding rusty. “With nothing between us.”
“Undressed?”
Her question was so innocent it felt like a dagger plunged straight into his chest. “Without a condom,” he said, his tone a bit brisker than he intended.
He withdrew from her body, moving to a standing position. He looked around the room. At the erotic carnage they’d left behind. Clothes littering the floor, announcing their haste, their impatience.
“Does it feel different?” she asked.
“Yes,” he responded.
“Oh. I wouldn’t know.”
Guilt turned even more ferocious, snapping at him now. Of course she wouldn’t know. She had only ever been with him, and he had been careless with her.
He studied her. Her kiss-swollen lips, her wide, sincere eyes, and that weight in his stomach grew graver, heavier.
It was not guilt.
He realized then that he had mistaken satisfaction for guilt. It was an intense feeling, one he was unaccustomed to. Yes, the worst part was the absence of guilt. He felt none. He only felt triumphant. That he was the only man to have ever been in her body. That he had laid claim to her in such a profound and undeniable way.
He looked at her, at the red marks around her wrists, showing where he had held her, at the lipstick stains on his body, where she had marked him.
He was a bastard. And he couldn’t even regret it.
“Why didn’t you want me to come here?”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HE WASN’T SURE he liked where the conversation was headed. Wasn’t sure he wanted this to move on from sex. The sex had been challenging, nothing simple about it, but at least it hadn’t required verbal honesty.
“It’s beautiful,” she said, rolling over onto her back and stretching her arms over her head. With the gold mask still in place, the candlelight shining over her curves, the slight arch in her back thrusting her breasts into greater prominence, he felt like he was looking at a beautiful work of art. Art he certainly had no right to possess.
“Take off the mask if we’re going to talk,” he said. “You can hardly demand I remove mine when you keep yours so firmly in place.”
She reached up and easily flicked the lovely golden piece from her face. Making a mockery of the request. Because the mask she had asked him to remove was one much more firmly affixed, he knew. And here she was, lying in fron
t of him, both naked and fully exposed, and clearly unconcerned about it. Yet more he didn’t deserve.
“Why didn’t you want me to come?” she repeated.
“This is not a happy place for me,” he said.
He questioned the wisdom of telling her all this. He didn’t talk to anyone about it. He had never told Sylvia about his childhood. And when she had asked him about the slight bit of scarring that remained on his body, he had always deflected. It wasn’t terribly obvious, not overly grotesque, and certainly not something you would notice unless you had spent years being intimate with someone, as a wife did. But he had never told her the truth.
So, he was a bit confused as to why he was prepared to confess all to Allegra.
But then, she had asked to see all of him. She had asked for his mask to be removed. So in this space, in this moment, in his home that was now a pile of rubble, why not? Perhaps it would finally exorcise the demons. Perhaps it would finally steal the power from this place.
“I figured as much,” she said, her tone muted. “But why? Most people would be happy to grow up in a castle.”
“You know as well as I do that money does not make for a perfect upbringing. You certainly feel maligned enough, in spite of the beauty of your surroundings.”
“I know,” she said, sounding subdued.
“My father was the life of the party,” he said. “Always with a new woman. Always with a joke. But the man did like to drink. And when he drank he got careless. In one instance, he got his mistress with child. Of course, he wasn’t as upset about that as he might have been. He was older, and it was most certainly time for him to begin settling down. So, he married her.”
“That was your mother?”
“Yes. But, once I was born, things changed.”
“What?”
“According to her, it was as though a demon possessed him. There was something about me that angered him. He became violent with her.”
“No... Cristian that’s awful.”
“It is. But my father was a terrible man. A son of hell, if ever there was one. And whatever possessed him only sent him after her, for a while. But then, that changed. It was me,” he said. “I was the thing that infuriated him most of all. I’d changed his life, changed his mistress’s body. He despised me. Whatever the reasons. And yet, he needed me. Because I was to be the heir of his title, the heir to his fortune. And so, even though he hated me, there was nothing to be done. Still, he drank.”
“Cristian,” she said, “what happened here?”
“Here specifically?” He looked around the room, his gaze landing on the bar. “Over there, the bar didn’t used to be there. But there was a large piece of furniture, made of marble, I think. He threw me against that. I don’t think he broke anything that time. Bruised ribs? It’s difficult to remember.”
She gasped, covering her mouth with her hand. She looked around the room, and he knew that she was looking for her clothes. Because, for whatever reason, this was not a discussion she felt she could have naked. She needed protection. From him. From his truth. He didn’t blame her. He would probably rot in hell for telling her any of this.
“That evening my transgression was being in the way. But, on countless nights, it was just that he was so full of rage he needed someone to expend it on. So, he would get drunk. And then he would come to my room. Sometimes he would beat me with his fists. More than once, he threw me down the stairs.”
She let out a strangled cry. “Was he trying to kill you?”
“Of course not. How then would I carry on his title?” He let out a cynical laugh. “A broken heir is fine. A dead one is a little bit harder to work with.”
“I can’t... I can’t...” She put her hand to her chest, looking down, breathing hard.
“It’s terrible. Terrible to imagine that someone could do that to such a small child. I know.” He met her gaze. “The best thing my old man ever did for me was drink himself into a stupor and throw himself down the stairs. Quite by accident. But that is what killed him. Here. When I was ten.”
“Cristian...”
“My mother can’t even look at me. I think she blames herself for staying in the situation until my father died. Or, perhaps she blames me.”
“How could she blame you? You were only a child.”
“It wasn’t until after I was born that things changed.”
“But that doesn’t... It doesn’t excuse anything.”
“It also doesn’t mean they didn’t change.” He was matter-of-fact about it. At this point, he had learned to be. But here in the castillo it was a bit difficult to be matter-of-fact. When the walls felt like they were closing in around him, when the past seemed to be bleeding in with the present. Suddenly, he wanted to get out of here. Needed to go and make sure that half the place was still crumbled. That he was indeed living now, and not in some tortured version of the past.
He wrenched open the door, and stalked out into the corridor, making his way down the curved staircase, not caring that he wasn’t dressed. What did it matter? There was no one here to see. And anyway, he could not possibly feel more stripped than he already did.
He moved down to the front room, to the half of the castillo that lay in ruin. He stood and looked out at the scene beyond, at the ink-dark mountains just barely visible in the distance, and the midnight blue sky, dotted with stars.
And then, he heard movement behind him.
“You truly don’t like to leave me alone, do you?” he asked, turning to face Allegra.
“You don’t like to leave me alone either,” she said, taking a step toward him. He turned away from her again, back out toward the scenery.
“It’s almost funny. This half of the castle is just kind of open to the elements now. It might become a new trend.” He tried to force a laugh. “A new way to make the most of the view.”
“Cristian.”
“Careful. You sound perilously close to scolding me.”
“You’re avoiding me. You’re avoiding what you just told me.”
“There is no point turning it over. No point discussing the past. I cannot say that I came out of it unscathed, because that would be untrue, and you and I both know it. You do not come away from that without a mark. And that has nothing to do with the physical.”
She said nothing for a moment. “I’m surprised that you... I mean...”
“You’re surprised I can admit that having my bones broken by my father might have screwed me up psychologically? How emotionally stunted do you think I am?”
“Just enough,” she said.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “It’s in the past. There’s nothing more to say about it.”
“That’s why you were upset when you felt like I didn’t respect my parents. When you felt like I didn’t understand what an amazing thing it is to have both of them.”
He pushed his hands through his hair, taking a deep breath of the night air. It smelled like smoke, and the ocean, and if he closed his eyes, a little bit like Allegra. “That was unfair of me. My trials don’t negate yours. Just because my life was difficult growing up doesn’t mean yours didn’t have challenges.”
“Nobody...broke me.”
“But you were afraid, weren’t you?”
As soon as he spoke the words, he realized they were true.
“Yes. But it wasn’t really fair. It was never anything I tested.”
“Fear doesn’t come from nothing, Allegra. Someone did something to you.”
She shifted, and came to stand beside him. “It was only that my parents used to get very upset at me. I was not like Renzo. Renzo is charming. He always has been. He has that way about him. People are drawn to him like he’s a magnet. Not just women, but everyone. He knows just how to act in every situation, and that has never been me. It was hard for me to learn. To learn how to sit still. To learn to be quiet. To learn that a Christmas ball at my parents’ house was not the time to go out and play in the snow, roll around and come back in
soaking wet and with red cheeks. They never yelled. They never hit. But I feared their silence most of all. I still do.”
“What is the worst that would come from their silence, Allegra, if you were able to live the life that you wanted?” It was at odds with what he had always thought. He had imagined, that because she had parents who treasured her as hers clearly did, that any act against them would be treason. But, looking at Allegra now, hearing her voice her fears, he could no longer see her parents on the same pedestal as he had before.
He didn’t believe they were cruel people, nor did he believe that they intended to hurt their daughter in any way. However, it was clear that she was wounded. That she had been prepared to enter into a marriage with a man she didn’t love, for fear of losing the relationship she had with her family.
And he could see that it terrified her.
“I wouldn’t know who I am,” she said. “Without the Valenti name. Without my family home, without their Christmas parties, even if I do find them boring, I... I wouldn’t know who I was.”
“You have just stated very forcefully to me a few moments ago that you know who you are. That no one else can tell you what you want.”
“I guess that’s how I feel now. But when I... When I met you at the ball,” she said, smiling slightly at the humor in the words. Implying that was the first time they had met. Implying that all they did was meet. “When I met you then, I sort of had this moment where I thought maybe I could just burn it all down. Throw caution to the wind. At least for a moment. To get a glimpse of who I was. Of what I wanted. To see if maybe it was worth chasing.”
He wanted to know more. How it had felt to finally break away. To feel something big enough, strong enough, that it canceled out her fear. What was as large as that? He had no idea. “And how did you feel after?”
“Terrified. I knew that I couldn’t marry him. The moment you left me alone in that hall, I knew I couldn’t marry him. And while the pregnancy certainly made it easier to break it off, I don’t think I would have gone through with it. But it was sort of convenient. To have it smashed into pieces so tiny there would be no repairing it. To know that I had gone too far and that the choice was now taken for my hands. I’m not brave. I had to stumble into my freedom. But now that I have it...I feel like maybe there’s more middle ground than I thought. That I can demand what I want, let everyone know who I am, and while I might not have wholesale approval, I may not have complete rejection either.”
