I can’t stop my snort at that. “Oh, yes. Lucky.”
“I mean it,” he says earnestly, stripping off his pants. He’s about to pull down his underwear until I pat the bed next to me, and he bounces over to snuggle into my arms. “Plus she really loves you. Although…she hates Julian just as much as she loves you, doesn’t she?”
“Yes.” There’s no point denying it. “Now, let’s leave my mother out of the rest of tonight, can we? I want to make love to you for hours, and Idon’twant to be thinking about her while I do.”
I wonder if I’ll ever get tired of making him blush like that.
“That sounds great,” Teddy says, “but, um. I’d like to freshen up first, if that’s okay.”
“Off you go.” I slap his ass as he crawls off the bed, making him squeak just like the little mouse I first thought he was. I think about that night again and can’t help but smile when I think of how much things have changed between us in such a short time.
Five days. Five days I have known him.
Five short days…
* * *
“What’s wrong?” Teddy has come back into the room wearing my robe. He seems to prefer it to the guest robe provided, though he never wears the tie around the waist.
He’s out of the bathroom already? But when I glance at my phone I see I have been sitting here, thinking, for much longer than I realized.
“Five days,” I tell him. “Five days I have known you,topolino, and yet I hardlydoknow you.”
He grins and clambers onto the bed, kneeling to one side of me. The robe shifts, falls open. “You know the important things.Cute Crimsand you. That’s…pretty much my life.” He gives a little shrug. “I’m boring,” he mumbles. “I guess that’s why I don’t have many friends.”
“But there’s so much more Idon’tknow,” I prompt him. “Where you grew up. Where you went to school. Or your family, your parents—why did they divorce? And doesn’t your mother worry about you being gone for so long?”
He looks away, stroking his fingers through the plush material of the robe. “My mother isn’t like yours. She doesn’t have much interest in me day-to-day.”
My own background checks on Teddy stated that his mother is the CEO for a pharmaceutical company. “And your father?”
“Silicon Valley. Tech billionaire.” He names the company his father founded, and again, it aligns with my intel. “That’s how come I’m so into computers,” he offers. “For a long time it was the only thing I had in common with my Dad, especially after he and Mom divorced. But I haven’t seen him in a long time. He still sends me all the tech and security prototypes his company comes up with—but that’s it. Last year he even forgot to call me on my birthday.”
My heart aches for him, obliterating the small seed of suspicion that started when I was left brooding on my own.
He looks up with a determinedly cheerful look. “That’s part of the reason I find your world so interesting, Alessandro!” he tells me. “You Mafia guys, you’re all so close. Brothers.Family.”
“And now you find out we’re just like any other family,” I say. “Full of resentments and betrayals and petty disputes. It must disappoint you.”
He’s spread his thighs wider, the robe falling away by inches. My mouth waters as I think about having him again. Having himentirely. The need to get inside that slim, golden-limbed body is building.
“Oh, no,” he says politely. “I’m not at all disappointed. I know I came into your life at a—a difficult time.”
I laugh. And I keep laughing, until I hold out my arms to him and he crawls into my embrace. “Little mouse, you are one of a kind,” I tell him. “One of a very strange kind.”
A tiny crease appears between those perfect brows. “Is that okay? Would you prefer me if I was different? Normal?”
“Normal? You mean ordinary? No. No ordinary man could make me feel the way you do.” I’m still laughing as I say it, but my chuckles die away as I think about what I’ve just admitted.
This is dangerous ground.
“Let’s speak no more about mothers or fathers or families,” I say quickly, gliding a hand up his thigh. “I have a craving for you,mio dolce. Will you let me have you?”
He gives an eager nod. “Yes, please. And Alessandro…”
“Mm?” I’m already sliding my hand around to his ass, relishing the curve of it as it fits into my palm.
“I’ve enjoyed everything we’ve done, but…” He tips his face up to mine. “Will youpleasefuck me tonight?”
