He slides in beside me. “All day long and I didn’t know you weren’t wearing a bra?” It takes him seconds to slide his rough palm down the front of my dress.
“Hey!”
“Don’t try to stop me, wife,” he says with a warning shake of his head. “You’re mine now.”
I’ve been his since my feet touched American soil ten months ago, but I’m not sure it’s a very good time to remind him of that. When his fingers touch bare skin, he groans. The evidence of his arousal tents in the rich cut of his tux. Ha.
“How long ’til we get to the plane?” I ask.
“Long enough,” he responds. “C’mere.”
To my surprise, he slides onto his knees in front of me before he smacks a black button on the door. A privacy screen noiselessly rises behind him.
“Lift it up, Mrs. Rossi,” he says, his eyes trained on me. “The train, the bust, whatever the fuck you call that thing.”
I bite my lip and hike the skirt up. I’m wearing a thin, satin thong I bought just for this occasion. He groans at the sight before him, bends, and presses his mouth to the vee of satin between my thighs. My head falls back on the seat behind me as he positions himself in front of me and drapes my legs over his shoulders.
“Goddamn,” he curses, when he kisses me again and inhales deeply. “Fuckin’ exotic.”
“My…” I giggle. “My pussy’s exotic?”
“Mmm,” he says, without a trace of amusement. I gasp when he presses the tip of his tongue on the satin. My clit pulses and I feel myself go slick. I want more.
“I want to taste you. I want to hear you call me husband when you come.”
“Hel-lo.”
“Shh, baby. I want to eat my wife out. Don’t interrupt me again unless you want to be punished on your wedding day.”
I love it when he talks dirty to me. And then my mind’s wiped clean, a blank slate, as he pulls the tiny scrap of fabric down my thighs. He moves one leg so he can pull it down to my ankle, then positions me right over his strong, sturdy shoulders again.
“There,” he says with a low groan. “Fuckin’ gorgeous. Later, we make love, baby. I want a taste before we do.”
I close my eyes and lose myself to everything. The way his mouth works its magic, licking his way up my seam to where I’m pulsing with need. The way he grips my ass like he owns it, so hard it’s nearly painful. The way he alternates suckling and fucking me with his tongue, savage thrusts in and out. I can’t think of anything but the new stroke of his tongue, the pulse of heat between my legs, my racing pulse and yearning sense of need.
This. God, this. This is what I need. This is what I crave.
The limo glides effortlessly over every bump, and he never loses his position, works me perfectly to the edge of climax with the tip of his tongue. When he takes his mouth off me to whisper dirty, seductive things, I want the feel of him again. I whimper with need and claw at his hair. I stab my fingers in the dark, silky, tousled locks.
“Do you trust me?” he asks. I nod crazily, eager for him to finish what he started. “I love you, Elise. And we’re starting over now, the two of us. We chose this. We’re here. And every day forward, we’ll learn how to do this.” He laps lazily at me, and my hips jerk. “Won’t we, baby?”
I nod. “Yes. Yes, we will. Oh God, Tavi, that feels good.”
“We’ll learn together,” he says, as if trying to convince himself, too. “We start over. Right here. Right now.”
I like that. I don’t want to remember who I was or where I’ve been. I’m Elise Rossi. Wife to Ottavio Rossi.
He grins against me and licks me again. “There. That’s my girl. Come on my tongue, baby. Come for me.”
I do exactly what he tells me just as we cruise to a stop. He slams his palm to lock the door, giving me space to fully relish every spasm of perfection as I come so hard I feel as if I’ll shatter.
CHAPTER 15
Tavi
It’s a goddamn copout, and I know it, but I don’t want even the glimmer of dissension or sadness on our wedding day.
I managed to get her out of there without seeing her bitch of a mom.
Now I need to get her to Tuscany.
We told each other we forgave the past and moved forward into the present.
We’ll forgive and forget everything.
But I know it’s an excuse that I haven’t told her about Piero.
I was afraid doing it on our wedding day would ruin everything. I will tell her.
I start with her mother.
When we’re secured on the plane, she digs her fingers into my palm.
Oh, right. Damn near forgot she’s terrified of flying.
“How’d you make it back and forth from America to Tuscany? How’d you handle the to and fro?”
“Honey,” she says, digging her fingernails into my palm until they look like they’re ready to bleed. “There was not a lot of fro. I mostly lived in Tuscany. I didn’t come home very often. Before my last trip to America, when I came to the Rossi house when Angelina was still your prisoner?”
I nod and swallow. I don’t like to talk about this time. “Yeah?”
“I hadn’t come here in years before then.”
I nod. Interesting.
“Alright, well, you asked me to drug you up on the way back, so I got something that will help.”
“Why Mr. Rossi, have you gone back on your standards? First we share a joint, and now you’re handing me prescription sedatives?”
“Operative word prescription,” I grunt. “This one will take twenty minutes to kick in. But listen, before you take it—”
Too late. She’s already reached her trembling hand to mine and shoved the pill in her mouth. I shake my head when she sips from a small glass of water.
“Oops.” She gives me a sheepish grin.
“I’ll talk fast, then.” I draw in a breath. “During the wedding today, we had a visitor.” There is no easy way to say this.
I love the way she tips her head to the side. “Who?”
I swallow hard. “Your mother.”
The only reaction she has is her eyes widening for a fraction of a second before she schools her features again.
“Think you might have the wrong person?” she says with a self-deprecating laugh. “Surely not Anna Regazza.” She makes a sound of disgust and looks out the window. “Figures, though.”
I lace my fingers through hers. “Why?”
“Probably wants money. Believe me, when there was anything of any materialistic value to be had, she was on it. But Tavi, why didn’t you come and get me? I would’ve liked to talk with her.”
Why? It’s a good question. One I’d ask myself if I were in her position. “Because she was volatile, Elise. And we weren’t prepared for her. Hadn’t run a check, nothing.”
She sits up suddenly, spilling the water all over herself. “Did you bring her to the dungeon?” The tone of her voice suggests that’d be unthinkable.
I shake my head. “No. Why would we?”
“I don’t know,” she says coolly, looking away. “You put me there.”