Sienna hasn't stopped moving since I cornered her in the kitchen ten minutes ago. She is wrapped in the heavy black silk robe I had Nico procure for her at 4:00 a.m. The rich, dark fabric slides dangerously over her shoulders, the black silk a stark, lethal contrast against the pale cream of her skin and the copper fire of her hair. It pools against the lush curves of her hips and the pale, smooth skin of her thighs, while her copper hair forms a wild, tangled halo around her face, catching the morning light filtering through the bulletproof, Kevlar-woven curtains.
She stops pacing the second the door clicks shut behind me. Her wide, hazel eyes lock onto mine, dilated with a mixture of raw panic and simmering fury.
"Did you talk to him?" she demands, her voice strained but remarkably loud. Her small hands grip the lapels of the silk robe, holding it tightly closed over her chest. "Did you tell your... your mobster friend out there that you're letting me go? Because this is insane, Dominic. You paying my rent? You refunding my clients? You can't just buy my existence and lock me in a tower!"
I walk toward her, my footsteps are silent on the hardwood floor. I don't rush. I track her like a predator cornering its absolute obsession. Every step I take eats up the distance between my dark, blood-stained reality and her vibrant, breathing life.
"I didn't buy your existence, Sienna," I say, my voice is a low, soothing rasp meant to calm an animal before the trap snaps shut. "I severed the threads. The men you saw in that private dining room last night... they belong to a family that has spent twenty years hunting mine. They are cockroaches. They look for any crack in the foundation to crawl through. If you went back to that flower shop today, they would find you. They would use you to get to me."
"Then let me leave Chicago!" she yells, taking a step back as I take a step forward. Her bare heel hits the edge of the velvet sofa. "I'll go to Ohio. I have an aunt in Ohio. I'll change my name. I don't care about your mafia war, Dominic! I just want my life back!"
"Your life is here."
"I don't belong to you!"
"You do." I close the final few feet between us, my sheer size forcing her to tilt her chin up to maintain eye contact. I am a massive man, broad-shouldered and thick-chested, carrying two hundred and twenty pounds of muscle honed by paranoia and violence. Sienna is five-foot-four, a delicate, vibrant creature composed of soft curves and floral scents.
I crowd her against the edge of the sofa, lifting my hands. She flinches, a tiny, involuntary movement that makes my chest physically ache. I don't grab her wrists. I don't restrain her. Instead, I bring my hands up and carefully, deliberately, cup her face.
My palms are large enough to cradle her entire jawline. My thumbs brush over the high, flushed apples of her cheeks. Her skin is impossibly warm, practically radiating heat into the calluses of my hands. I can smell the expensive French hand cream I mapped into her thorn-scraped fingers last night, mingling with the erratic, terrified scent of her sweat.
"Look at me, Sienna," I command softly.
She swallows hard. The pulse at the base of her throat beats against her delicate skin like a trapped bird. Her hazel eyes are bright with unshed tears, but beneath the fear, I see the fire. I see the woman who walked into a room full of torture and dropped a vase of peonies, refusing to look away.
"I am a violent man," I tell her, the truth of it scraping against my vocal cords. "I have done things that would make you sick to your stomach. I have traded lives like currency. I have ruined people I love. But the moment I looked up from that floor and saw you standing in the doorway, every single priority I have ever had ceased to exist."
My thumbs slide over her cheekbones, tilting her face up a fraction of an inch higher. I study the exact anatomy of her mouth. The plush, pink fullness of her lower lip. The sharp, perfect bow of her upper lip.
"I cannot let you go to Ohio," I whisper, the obsession bleeding freely into my words. "I cannot let you walk out that door. The thought of another man looking at you—of a Bellanti soldier even knowing your name—makes me want to burn this entire city to the foundation."
Sienna's chest heaves. Her chest rises and falls rapidly against the black silk. She reaches up, her small hands wrapping around my thick wrists as if to push me away, but her grip is weak. Her fingers curl against my skin, grounding herself.
"You don't even know me," she breathes, a desperate, wavering protest.
"I know you," I reply, leaning in until the tips of our noses graze. The heat radiating between our bodies is a physical, palpable force. Gravity shifts in the room, pulling my center directly into hers. "I know that you smell like rain and wet earth. I know that you take your tea with honey, because I watched you pour it via the L'Ombra security feed while I was reviewing the Saturday vendor rotations."
Her eyes snap wide open. The shock eclipses the fear. "You... you were watching me?"
"You've delivered to L'Ombra every Saturday for four months," I tell her, the dark possessive truth finally given air. "I approved the vendor list. I saw your photograph on the file. I convinced myself it was just a formality—a Don checks every contractor involved in his operations. But I kept pulling up that feed. WhenI was finally on the ground in Chicago, I sat in my SUV across the street and watched you arrange lilies in the window. I told myself I was assessing risk." A pause. "I was hunting. I just hadn't admitted it yet."
"Dominic—"
I don't let her finish the sentence. I can't take another second of the distance.
My right hand slides from her cheek, plunging deep into the heavy, copper mass of her hair at the back of her head. I grip the thick strands, anchoring her skull, and bring my mouth crashing down onto hers, my left hand coming up to cup her face and hold her still.
The impact is explosive.
It isn't a gentle kiss. It is a collision of twenty years of starving restraint and an instant, catastrophic biological demand. My lips part hers with blunt force, swallowing her startled gasp. The taste of her detonates across my tongue—sweet, clean, intoxicatingly pure.
Sienna's hands tighten convulsively around my wrists. She pushes against me for exactly one second, a token resistance, before the undeniable, chaotic chemistry between us completely shatters her defenses.
Her lips soften under the punishing pressure of mine. She opens for me, and I take everything. I sweep my tongue into the hot, wet cavern of her mouth, stroking against hers with a heavy, claiming rhythm. The friction sends a violent jolt of pure heat straight to my cock, the thick, rigid length of it straining against my tailored trousers, aching to split her open.
A tiny, desperate whimper vibrates in the back of Sienna's throat. The sound destroys the last remaining shred of my control.
I wrap my left arm tightly around her waist, my large hand splaying wide across the small of her back. I haul her flush against my body, lifting her slightly so her toes barely brush the hardwood floor. The physical contact is a revelation. I can feel the soft, yielding curve of her belly pressing into the hard, thick ridge of my erection. Through the thin, slippery barrier of the black silk, I feel the exact shape of her.
