“Hard,” she managed, her hands flat on the bed, her face buried in the covers. “I want it hard.”
I shifted my gaze to her ass, to my thick cock moving in and out of her, glistening with lotion, her cum wet on her thighs and mine. When she cried out a third time, I drove deep inside her and stilled, my cock throbbing, calling out her name as I emptied inside her, holding her hips tight, knowing in that moment what ecstasy felt like.
I lay holding Sofia, her back to my front, not wanting to tell her what I had to tell her.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
She nodded. “How is Charlie?”
“He misses you. He sleeps beside the door as if he’s waiting for you to walk in.”
She turned to me. “Did you really come because you were so pissed off about my “fuck you”?”
“That and other things.” I wasn’t ready to talk about those things yet. “Sofia, you said something earlier. You said you’d never been slapped, which makes me think…” I paused, changing the way I’d ask the question. “What did you mean?”
She snorted, turning her face away again to lean her head on me. “After you left that day in the office, I confronted my grandfather about…well, everything. Long story short, he called me a whore and slapped me.”
My face tightened and my hands fisted as anger engulfed me.
“That day at the hospital after the fire, when you walked back into my room, I was talking to Lina. She was very upset, that’s why she’d been trying to get ahold of me. Everything you said, Raphael, it was true. Everything and then some. She’d found a notebook, a ledger. My grandfather’s personal notes, account numbers. He hasn’t only been stealing from us, but investors too. Millions of dollars, Raphael.”
I knew that already. Probably in more detail than she realized. And I wasn’t the only one. I was glad she had her back to me, not ready to tell her what I’d come to tell her. Not wanting to spoil this moment.
“I told him I wanted guardianship of Lina, or I’d go public with the truth. Turn him in.”
“I need to talk to you about that, actually.” Moment spoiled.
She sat up, her expression serious.
“Your grandfather was taken into custody yesterday, Sofia. He’s being extradited to the States.”
“What?”
“That evidence you threatened to turn in, well, someone beat you to it. As soon as he deplanes in Philadelphia, he’ll be formally charged.”
We flew to Philadelphia the following morning. I had Sofia’s suitcases in the car and had already made flight arrangements before coming to Venice.
“You didn’t come to Venice because of the annulment papers, did you?” she asked as we pulled through the gates of her family home.
“No.”
“What’s going to happen now?”
“I don’t know. The charges against your grandfather are damning. If he’s smart, he’ll sign a plea deal, but he will go to prison. And he’ll have to pay back what he stole from investors, from you.”
She shook her head, forcing a smile on her face as Lina opened the front door and stepped outside.
“I don’t care about the money. Not mine, anyway. I need to make sure my sister’s okay.”
We parked and got out. Lawyers were already waiting for us when we walked inside. Sofia and Lina spent fifteen minutes together before she emerged alone. I’d expected tears, but instead, her face was set. Hard.
“Okay?” I asked her just outside the study doors.
“I’m fine. It’s Lina I’m worried about.”
“She’s not joining us in there?”
“No.”
We walked into the study together. Sofia knew one of the attorneys by name, Mr. Adams. He was the one to whom I’d sent the annulment paperwork. He introduced the other two, and we sat down.
“I’ve arranged for a criminal attorney for Marcus,” Adams said. “I’ll go see him myself later today, after the bail hearing.
“Will he be released until the trial?”
“It’s unlikely, Sofia.”
The room fell silent until Adams cleared his throat. He spoke briefly about the charges Marcus would be facing but focused more on winery business.
“All bank accounts have been frozen. Any money will be used to repay investors.” He looked around the room. “The house…”
“What about the house?”
“It too will likely be seized.”
“But it’s been in my family—”
“It’s all tied up in the business. If it were in your name, or your sister’s—”
“What do you mean, exactly?”
“I mean you will have to move out.”
“What? But what about the insurance money? Won’t that pay—”
She stopped as Adams shook his head.
“No. And any money that’s leftover will go toward your grandfather’s court fees. It’s all gone, Sofia. I’m sorry.”
Sofia sat mute. I stood to shake hands with the men as they cleared out and walked them to the door. When I got back to the study, I found her in exactly the same place.
“What am I going to do? How am I going to take care of Lina? What about her future?”
“You’re not alone, Sofia.” I stood behind her chair, squeezing her shoulders, then moved around to take her hands. “I won’t leave you to do this alone.”
“Even the money he promised you…”
“It never was mine to begin with.” I paused. “Sofia, your sister… Was she the one who turned over evidence?”
She looked at me, and it took her a long time to answer. “No.”
That was the first lie Sofia told me.
Chapter Thirty
Sofia
The house had never felt like home to me. I didn’t want to stay here and wouldn’t have if it weren’t for Lina. But she’d been closer to our grandfather than I ever had been. And she’d lived here for as long as she could remember.
After the very public scandal, Grandfather took the plea deal he was offered, which meant a reduced prison sentence—they took into consideration his age—in exchange for full disclosure. He’d kept meticulous notes, so much like him. In addition to the notebook Lina had found, there were three others. At least three that were uncovered. I wondered if there were more. If he’d ever tell us. The land in Italy was auctioned off, bought by Vincent Moriarty of all people. And what a deal he got. It was unfair, but it was also finished.
I saw my grandfather during his sentencing. I watched from inside the courtroom. I didn’t make physical contact with him. Seeing him like that, up there looking smaller, older, I wondered if there was something wrong with me because after everything he’d done, after all the destruction and pain he’d caused, I felt regret and a sense of loss I didn’t expect to feel. Maybe it was for Lina. I didn’t know. But when, before they led him away, he turned to me, I didn’t smile. I didn’t go to him. I only watched him with sad, resigned eyes. Justice was being served, everything coming full circle—almost.
Lina had only started to draw her circle, though, when she’d turned Grandfather in.
I knew she felt that burden deeply, and although we shared everything, she never once spoke about it after that first day, after telling me it was her.
Raphael stayed throughout the proceedings and made no demands of me. We didn’t share a bed, and we didn’t talk about it. I felt like he grew more and more distant as I spent more and more time with Lina. I needed to be with my sister. She was hurting, and right now, she was what mattered.
Lina went to bed early on our last night at the house. The bank was set to take possession in the morning. Raphael wasn’t there. He’d gone out, like he seemed to do most nights. I understood. Being here was probably a downer for him. Hell, it was a downer for me. He had the luxury of leaving. Besides, I still didn’t know what would happen with us. Even after Venice, now, now that everything was gone, I wasn’t sure he’d want to stay. If I’d feel good letting him, not after everything t
hat had happened to him.
I’d been tossing and turning for hours when, at close to one in the morning, I gave up and decided to go downstairs and make myself a cup of tea. Most of the furnishings were already gone, but the kitchen table with its two chairs remained. I switched on the light over the stove and put the kettle on, listening to the silence, the stillness of an empty house. It was almost eerie, but in a way, I liked it too. I liked the calm, and I liked the dark. I felt safe, like I was hidden from view. As if no one could see me here. Maybe it was because of all the publicity in the last few weeks.
Once the kettle whistled, I reached to switch off the water. That was when I heard the key slide into the door and, startled, I looked up to find Raphael pushing it open.
He gave me a strange smile and walked into the house.
I wanted to ask where he’d been but couldn’t bring myself to do so. Instead, I cleared my throat and turned my attention to the tea, unwrapped the bag, and set it in the mug.
Raphael didn’t speak. I heard him open a cabinet and take out a glass then pull out a chair and sit at the small table.
“Déjà vu.”
I turned to face him. He pushed the chair across from him out with his foot.
“Sit.”
He had a bottle of whiskey and had poured himself some. His cool eyes remained trained on me.
I walked over and sat down. He tipped the whiskey bottle and poured a little into my tea.
“Thanks.”
“How are you holding up?” he asked.
I shrugged a shoulder and wrapped my hands around the steaming mug before meeting his gaze. “I’ll be okay. Thank you for being here. I’m very grateful. You didn’t have to—”
“Of course I did. What did you think, I’d walk away when things got ugly?”
I shifted my gaze back into my cup.
“Do I still make you nervous?” he asked.
When I met his gaze, I saw he had that cocky look in his eyes. “You don’t scare me. Not anymore, Raphael.”
“Don’t I?”
I shook my head.
“Maybe I should try harder.”
I wasn’t in the mood for laughing. “Where were you? Where do you go at night?”
“Nowhere special.”
“What kind of answer is that?”
“What kind did you want?”
“The true kind.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“You also didn’t really tell me anything.”
“What do you want to know? Exactly?”
He knew what I wanted to know. He just wanted to make me say it. I drank a long swallow of whiskey-tea, squeezing my eyes shut as it burned down my throat.
“Careful. You drink too fast, and I’ll have to put you to bed again.”
A dirty grin lit up his face.
“Well, I wouldn’t want to put you out. You’ve probably been busy tonight, putting someone else to bed.” I didn’t mean for it to come out angry like it did.
“Ah.” He finished his drink and poured another. “The truth.”
“I never lie to you.”
“You did once.”
“When?”
“You lied to protect your sister.”
I felt heat flush my face. How had he known?
“I haven’t put anyone to bed but you since we’ve been together,” he said, cockiness gone.
“Oh.”
“Did you really think otherwise?”
“I don’t know what to think. You don’t have to be married to me anymore. I’m really more of a liability now.”
“I think of you as a human being, not a liability.”
“But I’m not an asset either.”
“Human being. Don’t feel sorry for yourself, Sofia. Shit happened to you. You survived it, and you will now move forward. Welcome to life.”
“Piss off.”
His face changed, hardening a little. “Be careful, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart. God, I loved when he called me Sweetheart. “I’m not feeling sorry for myself.”
“Then ask the questions you want to ask, and don’t hide behind your fear.”
“What’s going to happen with us?” I blurted out.
“There you go. See, it’s not so hard, is it?”
I shook my head and pushed my chair back. “It’s so easy to make fun of me, isn’t it? Do you just set me up for the heck of it? You just enjoy it that much? I thought you’d tired of it already.”
“Sit down, and don’t be so fucking dramatic.”
“You know what? This is a dramatic time in my life. Sorry if it’s annoying to you.”
“Christ. Sit down, Sofia.”
“I’m going to bed.” I moved toward the door.
“No, you’re not.”
His chair scraped across the floor, and just as I reached the door, he caught my arm. He spun me around. I collided with his chest and bounced off and would have fallen if he hadn’t had a hold of me.
“You are so good at running away, aren’t you? You just up and walk away when it suits you. When things get tough. Let’s see, this is the third time now. First, there was your trip to the winery, next was Venice, and now this.”
“I wasn’t running away from you. Not when it was Venice. And you had made it pretty clear you didn’t want me when I went to the winery.”
“And didn’t I make it pretty clear that you were wrong when I came after you?”
“You never said it, Raphael.”
“Don’t actions matter to you? Does the fact that I came after you each time not prove anything to you? The fact that I’m here, still, through all of this? It sure as hell does to me.”
I stopped fighting and bowed my head, leaning my forehead against his chest.
“Sofia, I love you. How many times can I tell you that before you believe it?”
I looked up at him, his gaze holding me, keeping me, even more powerfully than his hands held me physically.
“How in hell can I make this more obvious?”
He walked us backward until my back hit the wall.
“You know what I want to do most right now?”
He lifted me up, tilting my legs so I wrapped them around him.
“What I want to do most right now—”
He unzipped his jeans, never losing eye contact with me, shoved the nightshirt I wore up to my waist, and slid the crotch of my panties over.
“Is to drive into you against this wall.”
As if to make his point, he did just that, thrusting his thick length inside me, making me gasp as he stretched me too fast.
“I want to fuck you so hard, you scream my name and wake the fucking neighborhood.”
I dug my fingernails into his shoulders, breathing short and fast as he pumped before carrying me to the table to lay me on it. He tore my panties off and pushed my knees wide. With one hard thrust, he drove into me and planted his hands on either side of my face.
“I want to fuck you so hard it hurts, Sofia. I want you to feel me for days. I want you to know you belong to me. You will always belong to me.”
“Raphael.”
But he wouldn’t let me pull him to me. Instead, he gripped my thighs and pushed them painfully wide.
“No. Feel it. Feel me. You’re too fucking stubborn to fuck softly. You need it good and hard, don’t you?”
He moved differently now, my pussy so wet, he slid in and out easily.
“Is that right?”
The cocky grin was back on his face.
“You need it hard?”
“Yes.”
“That’s a good girl,” he said. “Truth. Always truth.”
He drew out of me.
“No,” I whined, looking at his thick cock wet with my arousal.
He grabbed hold of my hair and dragged me down to my knees.
“On your knees, Sofia. Suck my cock. Fucking worship it if you want it inside you again.”
He didn’t give me a moment to think, to react, not a si
ngle second. Instead, with his hand gripping my hair, he slid himself into my willing mouth, thrusting in and out fast and hard. True to his word, he wanted me to feel him, to know he owned me. To know he liked hurting me a little.
“I should come all over your pretty little face.”
Instead, though, he drew himself out of my mouth and lifted me to my feet. He claimed my mouth, moaning as he kissed me, his tongue inside, one hand in my hair, the other kneading my ass.
He pulled back and, without ever taking his eyes from mine, ripped my nightshirt off.
“You need to be naked more often.”
He looked down at me, leaning forward so he could take one nipple into his mouth, then the other, sucking hard, drawing out each nipple in turn with his teeth.
“I need you inside me,” I managed, reaching for him, drawing him to me. “Please.”
He straightened, grinning, and bent me over the table. Gripping my hips in either hand, he spread me open and slid his cock into my pussy and his finger into my ass.
“Fuck me, Raphael. Hard. Make me come.”
He did. No more words, just fucking. Just taking and owning and hurting me a little, making it feel so damn good. He swelled inside me, and when he wrapped one hand around the back of my neck and squeezed, I came. I came so hard that when I closed my eyes, I saw stars, and when he squeezed harder, I thought I’d die, I’d stop breathing, that I’d never be able to catch my breath again.
We slid to the floor together, Raphael cradling me in his arms, holding me to him, my head resting against his chest. Our breathing slowed down in time, but when I tried to move, he wouldn’t let me. He just held me to him, and I clung tight, closed my eyes, and turned my face into his chest.
“Was that clear enough that I want you?” he asked eventually.
“Was it clear enough that I want you?” I asked in turn.
He carried me upstairs and into my old bedroom, where he’d been sleeping. There, he laid me on the bed and lay down beside me, holding me to him like he had the first night we’d slept together, just slept together after I’d found him in that cellar. He held me like he couldn’t let me go, and I knew I would never be able to let him go.
Epilogue
Dishonorable Page 24
