“Now it is your turn,” she murmured. “You will come apart for me.”
“Will I?”
She made a sound low in her throat, then she moved against him, clearly testing. When he sucked in a breath through his teeth, her grin was self-satisfied and gorgeous. What an unexpected siren she was.
And since she was, he let her take over, with her teasing moves, her careful strokes, her breath fluttering against his sweat-slicked skin. Her breasts brushed against his chest, and every time she sighed, it was in pleasure. Because she was building herself up again. Finding what she liked along with him.
He let her. He tried to let her. Until he could not control it because she was tightening around him yet again, breaking that last grip on his command. He moved her onto her back and thrust home one last obliterating time. The climax exploded in a preternatural burst of pleasure that made very little sense to him. That something he had done many a time could feel different and unique andimportant.
He would deal with that later. When he could breathe. When he could see. When he came down from whatever high he was on. When he could find the sense to roll off her.
It should have come when she stroked a hand down his back, then up again, as if to comfort. It should have come when she gently raked her fingers through his hair.
It was such a soft, gentle gesture that everything inside of him tensed. Iced. A strange niggle of something that felt likefearchased through him.
Her hand slipped from his hair. Her expression grew grim. But she did not look away.
“Well,” she said. “I suppose that is done.”
But everything in him, no matter the fear or the ice, rejected that sentiment. Becauseno. No. It wasn’tdone.
“Not yet.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SERENA AWOKE INa strange bed, in a strange room dimly lit by the faint glow of daylight coming through a corner of the window.
Alone. In a room that smelled like Luciano’s expensive cologne.
She took a slow, careful inhale, trying not to catalogue the way her body felt. If she could be still in her mind,feelingswouldn’t start infiltrating her decision making.
Andboydid she have some decisions to make.
It was good to be alone. It gave her a moment to come to terms with all that had changed. Because as much as she’d like to be cosmopolitan enough to pretend as though this had just been a fun one-off, all that lingered in their future was notfun.
And she had to know how to proceed before she faced him.
Maybe she wouldn’t have to face him at all. Maybe he was so embarrassed he’d left fully. She half wanted it to be true, half felt bereft at the thought.
Surely if he wasthatembarrassed, he wouldn’t have turned to her in the night. He wouldn’t have gruffly told her she wasn’t going anywhere when she had suggested she return home, late into the evening.
Surely.
But maybe it was the heat of the moment talking. And now that the heat had cooled into the morning after, he felt… Oh, she didn’t know.
She squeezed her eyes shut, focusing on breathing. She was not and had never been a catastrophizer. She dealt with problems coolly, rationally. She wasn’t going to sit here and panic over uncertainty. Over what a man might feel or not feel here in the aftermath of what they’d done to each other.
Because it didn’t matter whathefelt. It mattered what she did. And here in this moment alone, she needed to decide what that was and how to go forward. Only once she was sure of herself would it matter what was onhismind.
Sex had been revelatory. She didn’trelishthat realization, but it was true so there was no use denying it. Would it feel that way with anyone else? She had concerns it would not. There was something too…elemental about Luciano. About who he was and how he saw her.
It did not fully make sense, but in so many ways, the past week of working together had begun to show how much they were alike. There were still many differences, but there was so much core similarity, it was almost as if theycomplementedeach other when they wanted to, rather than opposed each other.
Of course, that was neither here nor there either. The question was, how would this move forward with Luciano? He was the crux of her business plan moving forward. Which also involved him becoming her husband. So perhaps sex was simply…part of that. Perhaps, no matter how it had felt, it didn’tneedto be a big deal. It could be something they indulged in when they felt like it. Like an overly rich dessert.
She considered that for a few moments. Was it sensible? Or did she just want to feel him inside her again and that was clouding her judgement? She wasn’t sure, because her judgement had never truly been clouded before.
She really wished she had one of her notebooks. She could create a pro and con list. She could remind herself of her goals, center herself on the mission statement she’d created for this little plot.
