He stood waiting for me, and for a moment I forgot how to breathe.
No suit tonight. Just dark jeans and a charcoal sweater that somehow looked just as expensive as his usual tailored perfection. His hair was less styled than usual, falling slightly across his forehead. He looked more like that young fighter in the photograph and less like the persona.
He looked real.
"Valentino." His voice was warm. Genuine. "Come in."
I stepped off the elevator and the doors closed behind me with a quiet whoosh that felt final.
No going back now.
I was here. I'd made my choice.
I just hoped I wouldn't regret it.
CHAPTER 4: LUCA
I'D BEEN STANDINGin the foyer for ten minutes waiting for the elevator to arrive.
Pathetic. That's what this was. Luca Romano, the architect of the Vitale empire, reduced to pacing in front of an elevator like a nervous teenager waiting for his prom date.
I checked my phone again. 7:58 PM. Valentino would be here any minute if he was coming at all.
The "if" was the part that had been eating at me all week.
I'd given him a choice. Real freedom to walk away. And for seven days I'd lived with the very real possibility that he'd choose to never see me again.
Seven days of not calling him. Not texting except for that one message about dinner preferences—casual, giving him space, proving I meant what I'd said about not controlling him anymore.
Seven days of questioning every decision I'd made in that office after I'd fucked him against the wall.
What if offering him freedom had been the wrong move? What if I should have kept the control, maintained the arrangement, not shown that much of my hand?
Except I couldn't. Not anymore. Something had shifted in me when I'd watched him come undone beneath my hands. When I'd heard my name fall from his lips like a prayer and a curse. When I'd realized I didn't just want to possess him—I wanted him to choose me.
The elevator dinged.
My heart rate spiked in a way that was completely inappropriate for someone who prided himself on control.
The doors slid open and there he was.
Valentino stepped into my foyer and for a moment we just looked at each other. He wore dark jeans and a button-down shirt in deep blue that made his hazel eyes look almost green. His curly hair was slightly disheveled like he'd been running his hands through it nervously. He looked beautiful and uncertain and real.
Not the defiant journalist who'd glared at me over coffee three months ago. Not the resentful captive who'd submitted because he had no choice. Just Valentino, standing in my home because he'd decided to be here.
"Valentino." I kept my voice warm, genuine. "Come in."
He stepped fully off the elevator and the doors closed behind him with a quiet whoosh. Trapped. Except this time it was his choice to be trapped here with me.
"Hi." His voice was quieter than usual. Nervous energy radiated off him.
"I'm glad you came." I moved closer but kept space between us. Not crowding. Not using my physical presence to intimidate or seduce. Just... existing in the same space. "Can I take your jacket?"
He shrugged out of the light jacket and handed it to me. I hung it in the foyer closet, hyperaware of how domestic the gesture was. How normal. Like this was an actual date and not... whatever complicated thing we were doing.
"Your place is..." He looked around the foyer, taking in the modern art on the walls, the marble floors, the floor-to-ceiling windows visible through the archway leading to the main living space. "Exactly what I expected, actually."
"Should I be offended by that?"
