She resumes eating, and I drag a hand down my face. “You’re right. It won’t happen again. Discover my secrets at your own pace.”
The relief shining in her eyes undoes me. “Thank you.”
“I’m not used to people seeing something other than what I present.”
“You said I am yours. Then, you’re mine. We’re always truthful with one another.”
Her claiming me does things to me I can’t even explain, but fuck, I like it. Even though she’ll think the prelude was all a lie. Even though she will regret giving in, trusting me. Even though it won’t last, I will take whatever she offers and give her anything she desires in return. Until…
Not liking where my thoughts head, I nod.
It feels like a sentence—a lifetime of misery over one seemingly white lie. My good intentions will appear as deception to her. The mistake of her life.
She grins, proud of herself, twisting my heart.
I want to open my mouth and say that I am sorry, beg for forgiveness, but it’s too late—for both of us.
Thinking about the end goal, ease seeps through the heavy feeling sitting on my chest.
“Anything else?” I ask, wanting her to feel comfortable in my presence so that, at some point, she can forgive me.
She shakes her head, voice laced with incredulity. “This is crazy.”
“Perhaps.”
Our eyes lock, and she wields magic over me, a net of potent spells trapping me for good. There’s no escape.
I don’t even want a way out, accepting her innate power over me.
Embracing madness, I smile, facing the one aspect beyond my control.
7
VIVIANA
Once again, I debate whether this is happening.
The man I haven’t stopped thinking about is my best friend’s brother. His showing up and disrupting my attempt to stop thinking about him leaves me in utter disbelief.
I shouldn’t even consider the possibility of us. It will end in catastrophe, yet I ignore common sense, wanting to see where this thing transpiring between us leads.
With him, I am not Viviana Bertinelli, a Mafia princess, but simply a woman. A woman who has been slowly dying under the pressure—internal and external—is burying me.
There’s a strange connection linking me to him. As if destiny had been resting, it then stirred to inflict mayhem.
What have I even agreed to?
An illicit affair? A secret relationship?
The fact is, it will have to end. But not now. Wishing to live for a while, experience more of the wondrous things he evokes. I’ve been hungering for some passion, and now I might choke on it.
He gazes at me with intense, deep brown eyes that bore straight into my soul, thrusting an anchor straight into my being, roping me in for good—hook, line, and sinker.
I hide my face behind my palms, incapable of understanding my unruly behavior.
“Don’t hide from me,” he says in that deep husky voice that has butterflies clapping their wings erratically in my belly.
Reaching his hand over the table, he pries my hands away, leaving me bare and open for him, vulnerable yet emboldened. Strange how he can peel my layers with such ease, and I can’t do a thing but let it happen.
