In timeshe translated, and then started to hum the tune of “Happy Birthday.” The only person brave enough to sing to me. The truth was, coming from her, I liked it.
* * *
Much later, in the still of the night, I found myself creeping around the house. Scarlett and Mia had been asleep for quite some time, but I felt the need to check once more to make sure all was secure. I placed a hand over Mia’s heart and left it there for a minute, feeling the steady pulse of it underneath my palm. She slept with her hands next to her head, making a sucking motion with her mouth.
After I felt secure leaving her, I passed a few men on night duty, giving them a nod, before I went back to our room.
“She’s all right,mio angelo,” Scarlett muttered from the bed, half asleep. “Come to bed.”
I motioned for her to scoot over, and she made room to accommodate me. I removed my sweatpants before slipping in beside her, bare skin to bare skin. I had shed her layers earlier, leaving no barrier between the two of us. Remnants of tattered fabric was strewn about the room.
I ran my hand over her behind, palming her bottom, pulling her even closer, keeping my hand there. She responded, pushing her full breasts against my chest. Her nipples were hard.
A pleasurable noise came from her mouth as my nose ran up her throat, breathing her in, and then I sucked on her neck.
“Can’t sleep?” she breathed out.
“No,” I said. “My mind won’t shut off.”
“Even after earlier?”
I grinned against her, and she shivered.
“Occhi affamato,” she whispered.Hungry eyes, she meant. “Bite me, Brando. Please.” She lifted her chin to give me more room to maneuver.
Putting my mouth right over the pulse in her neck, my teeth found her skin. She started to squirm, and the sweet noises that came from her mouth became louder, more ragged. Her nails dug into my back, ready to rip me apart.
“Thoughts can be stronger than flesh,” I said after my mouth closed over the spot. A fast pulse that echoed the beating of my own heart drummed against my lips.
Her movements slowed, and rather than tell me she wanted to see me, I felt it.
Doing as she silently asked, I gave her only enough room to see me. I ached to keep the heat between us, to keep our bodies close. Her marrow was an electromagnet to the iron currents running through my blood.
“Talk to me,” she said, running her finger over the shape of my lips. “Perhaps you’ll find rest if you do.”
I went to bite her, but she moved her finger. She brought it right back, though, running a hand through my hair. Then she rubbed the bulging vein on my forehead.
She shook her head. “Whatever it is, it’s here to stay, unless you tell me. It’s just us.” She gazed at me for a second, eyes serious. “After, I’ll sendil mio cavaliere oscurooff to slay the magical creature of sleep properly.”
My dark knight,she’d called me.
“I don’t even know why it came to mind,” I said. “Or why I can’t stop thinking about it.”
We rested in the darkness, both of us still waiting for me to continue, and while we did, I battled.
A savage need came over me and almost made me forget everything else but her. I ached to take her wrists in my hands, pin them to the side of her head, give her a look that would part her legs, and fuck her, hard and relentless, until she was delirious with lust, screaming my name because she forgot any other word. But she was right. It wouldn’t solve anything. Not now. Later? I’d slay more than just sleep.
“My birthday,” I said, turning on my back, facing the ceiling. Lifting my hands, I let them fall. “I’d just turned six. He beat me.”
I heard her exhale, but she didn’t say a word, or touch me.
I’d never forget Luca’s visits before he went to prison.
He expected his sons to be hardened soldiers, ready for war on his command. You were five? Just an excuse. One wrong move and you’d find yourself flung up against the wall with just a slap from his backhand.
He had only laid his hands on me twice.
That was all it took for me to learn my lessons.
