There’s no illusion of romance here, only animal purpose. He fucks me with an economy that feels like punishment. But every time the angle shifts, every time his grip adjusts, it spikes pleasure so intense, my vision grays at the edges.
His breath is hot on my neck, each exhale harsh with restraint. I’m allowed nowhere, denied everything, until I’m given it all in sudden, flooding increments. My legs tremble. My wrists ache where he pins them. My slick paints my thighs, messy and real.
I love every damn second of it.
He mutters something in Italian, a word I can’t catch, and bites down on the curve of my shoulder. Not hard enough to break skin, but enough to leave proof. Marks to wake up with. Hard evidence.
I want him to do it again, make the imprint of his teeth a language I can read with my eyes closed. I want him to lose control, just once, and I want it to be because of me.
He lets go of my wrists, and for a wild second, I think I’m free. But his arm slides around my chest, parking under my breasts and holding me up as he fucks into me with a rhythm that starts evenly, then gets ragged as pleasure burns the caution out of him.
My cheek grinds against the wood, limp and drooling, the spit cooling as it runs down my face. This should humiliate me, but instead I feel incandescent, needed, like the vessel of some essential element he’s been dying to siphon from the air and pour back into himself through my pussy.
He shudders, moans something soft and desperate into my hair. There’s a split second where he almost pulls out, but he grinds back in deeper, pinned to me, jaw gritted like survival depends on it.
He empties himself inside me with a snarl that vibrates against my back. The heat of it spills out around the overlap of us. There is no softness to it, but there is a certainty. I almost cry with the force of it, how right the violation feels, how hungry I am for the ruin.
He doesn’t pull out. Not right away. His breath cools my neck as it slows. The weight of his body on mine is so absolute, I can’t recall the person who used to wear my skin before this. My face is mashed into the desk, drool and mascara and tears pooling beneath one eye, but I can’t bring myself to care. I’m a shape he’s molded, and I want to stay this way forever.
Eventually, he slides out, a slick tremor leaving me achingly empty. The air is cold on my wet thighs, as is the iciness trembling through my body now.
Without the heated lust, the need, the desperation, all I’m left with is the shock of what just happened.
I might have been testing boundaries, but I wasn’t expectingthisto happen.
What the hell do I do now?
Chapter 10
The Tightening
POV:Alessandro
The council chamber settles incorrectly. Not visibly. No chair scrapes too sharply. No voice rises before its time. No man arrives late enough to signal disrespect. Still, the room is wrong.
Pressure has a structure. It gathers before it speaks, collects in pauses, settles into posture, shapes the space between men before a single word is said aloud.
I remove my gloves and place them beside the saucer. Three strips of candied orange peel. Parallel. Unbroken.
Giulio notices first. He always does. Salvatore notices that Giulio notices, which is why he lowers his gaze a fraction too early, choosing neutrality before the question is asked. Marco notices nothing because Marco is watching the door.
Good.
The meeting opens with numbers. It always does when men intend to discuss blood later. Numbers create the illusion of order. They allow us to pretend the system is governed by accounts instead of appetite.
“Boston holds,” Marco begins, opening the first file. “The port agreements remain stable. Customs channels are intact, and the Irish routes haven’t been disrupted.”
Boston is the hinge. Irish territory feeds through it. Goods, money, information—everything that moves between coasts touches that port in some form. Stability there means the alliance still breathes.
“For now,” Giulio murmurs.
Marco continues without acknowledging him. “New Jersey is clean. Collections are up eight percent. No external interference.”
Routine income. Protection. Waste management. Construction fronts. The ordinary business that keeps the structure funded.
“Chicago requires correction,” Marco says next. “Two crews overlapping south of Cicero. They’re skimming off transport and delaying shipments.”
Chicago is never stable. Too many independent operators. Too much history. Territory there isn’t owned; it’s negotiated daily.
