She looks up at me. All that earlier pain washed away by joy.
"This is the best news," she breathes. "The absolute best news."
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Vittoria
The Chicago skyline blurs past the tinted windows as Dmitri carries me through the entrance of the Grand Theatre. My wedding dress billows around us like a cloud of silk and lace, the train dragging across the marble floor.
I laugh against his neck. "You're insane. We left three hundred guests at the reception."
"I don't give a damn about them."
His voice is rough. Hungry. The same voice he uses when he's about to devour me.
"Dmitri, my mother is going to murder us both."
"Let her try." He kicks open the inner doors without breaking stride. "I need to fuck my wife while she's wearing this incredible dress."
Wife.
The word sends a shiver down my spine. We've been married for exactly two hours and forty-seven minutes. The ceremony was beautiful. Traditional. Everything my mother dreamed of.
But the moment the reception started, Dmitri pulled me aside. Whispered in my ear that he had a surprise. Then threw me over his shoulder and carried me to the waiting car while our guests gaped.
Pietro is probably losing his mind right now.
I don't care.
"Where are we going?" I ask as he navigates the familiar hallways.
He doesn't answer. Just keeps walking with that predatory determination that makes my thighs clench.
We pass the main auditorium. The balcony level. The private boxes where Chicago's elite once watched performances.
Then he stops in front of a door I recognize.
The grand movies room.
Where he tied me to that antique chair. Where he made me scream his name until my throat was raw. Where he claimed me in ways I never knew I wanted.
Dmitri shifts me in his arms and pushes the door open.
I gasp.
The antique chair is gone. In its place sits a massive bed draped in white silk sheets. Rose petals scatter across the floor. Candles flicker on every surface, casting dancing shadows across the ornate walls.
The spotlight that once illuminated my naked body now bathes the bed in soft golden light.
I start laughing. Deep, genuine laughter that shakes my entire body.
"You put a bed in here?"
"I put a bed in here."
"In the middle of a historic theater?"
"In the middle of our historic theater." He sets me down gently, my heels clicking against the hardwood. "We own it, remember?"
