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Heat blazes across my cheeks. “Okay, that’s enough of that. Time for a distraction.”

“How about a puzzle?”

“Like, an old person jigsaw puzzle?” I ask, teasing.

Evie shoots me an award-winning glare. “Watch it, missy. You’re going to puzzle, and you’re going to love it.”

I devolve into a fit of giggles. “I’m kidding. Who doesn’t love a puzzle? Let’s do this.”

We put on some classic pop hits and bop around while piecing together a puzzle of a Mediterranean cliffside village. The afternoon passes quickly. I decide to shower before dinner and head downstairs.

Before I get in the steaming water, I pause and study my scars in the mirror. I’m still a little stunned that I told him what happened—that I can never have kids—and he wasn’t at all rebuffed. His primary response seemed to be worry over how that made me feel. Maybe he never wanted kids, so being with someone like me wouldn’t bother him.

Maybe he simply wants you and the rest doesn’t matter to him.

I trail my fingers over the bumpy pink lines marring my skin. Whatever the reason, I’m glad it didn’t bother him. I’m glad because … I want him, too.

I shouldn’t. He’s a little crazy, and he kidnapped me, but I can’t deny that being around him feels like coming home. I would be an idiot to ignore that, wouldn’t I?

Get in the shower, crazy lady. You’re just as nuts as he is.

It would explain a lot.

I giggle as I step into the shower.

Yup. Crazy.

I’m only in the shower a minute when the double doors open and Elio appears. His enormous presence dwarfs the room. All in black surrounded by white marble, he looks like a fallen angel returning to heaven with trouble on his mind. Stormy eyes locked on me, he lifts his sweater over his head.

Mesmerized, I stare unabashedly.

While he stares at me, too, his gaze doesn’t stray like mine does. Not to my breasts or my scars. He’s drinking up my reaction while I lap up the sight of his perfect body. Large, strong hands that unclasp his belt and tug it through his belt loops. Sculpted obliques that transition to a masterful Adonis V where his pants rest below his hips.

I even get a full view of his wide shoulders when he bends to remove his black work boots. And when he unzips his pants, I have no choice but to devour the sight of his straining cock beneath his boxer briefs.

He’s getting in here with that thing, isn’t he?

My breathing hitches.

Is he going to fuck me in the shower? Images of me up against the wall flash in my mind and send a powerful bolt of pleasure to my center. It’s so intense, I realize I’m cupping myself to help relieve the ache.

“I told you what I’d do if you looked at me like that again.” The seductive tenor of his voice could probably bring me to orgasm simply by saying the alphabet. Combine it with his domineering words, and I’m helpless to resist. Not that I want to. This feels too damn good to fight.

I bite my lip, and he rips off the last scrap of his clothes with a curse. His heavy cock bobs free, thick as my wrist. Thicker. It’s all I can do to tear my eyes away when he joins me in the shower.

In a flash, he has me spun around facing the wall, my hands flat on the marble with his body flush against mine.

“I will fuck you like an animal up against this shower wall one of these days, but not today. I refuse to let that be our first time back together.” His ragged words drip with primal need. A need so intense it speaks to me on a physiological level.

My core weeps. “El, I need to come.”

I arch into him with a moan.

“You will, and I will, too. I’m going to paint your back with every drop of cum inside me.” He soaps one hand, then I feel him fisting himself behind me, but only briefly. That hand returns to splay wide over my stomach. The other hand first swipes my hair over my shoulder, then lowers to my core.

Elio scrapes his teeth in a gentle bite where my neck meets my shoulder.

The sound that claws its way up my throat traveled up from the Dark Ages—somewhere prehistoric and wild. This time, when I arch at his touch, his cock glides easily between the cleft of my ass cheeks. Knees bent, he holds me against him and rocks his pelvis, grinding his rigid length against my backside. All the while, his other hand deftly explores my folds, dipping inside me and working my clit.