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Nope.

"Is it possible...that you're blushing because you've finally realized how filthy fucking good it would feel...when we become each other's owner in marriage?"

Yes! No!I mean, I don't know at all, with how diabolically good he is at using really dirty words to mess with my senses.

When I ran away from my foster home, I already knew to expect the worst once I became homeless, and I think that was what helped me survive my first few days in the streets.

I knew what I was getting into that time...unlike now.

Nothing in this world has prepared me for the reality of having to match wits with Boston's underworld royalty—-or resisting the wiles of a smolderingly hotmafiaboss like Cesare Marchetti.

Everything that's happened today has completely blindsided me, and I have the craziest urge to laugh and cry when Cesare offers me his hand, and I realize how absolutely none of the thoughts racing in my mind has to do with rejecting his touch.

This man already owns me.

But can I really believe him when he says he'll also be mine?

Chapter Four

Cesare

HE HEARD HER BREATHcatch as their fingers twined, and Cesare's grip on her hand involuntarily tightened. The sound she had made was delicate, just like the rest of her was, and it had him feeling fiercely protective, in a way that he had never been in his life.

Why did this girl seem so different from all the others?

With her head still bent, and her gaze on their clasped hands, he was able to run his gaze over her from head to toe, broodingly.

She was eighteen to his twenty-eight. Too damn young, in other words, and especially since Cesare had always preferred his lovers to be closer to his age, as this made them less likely to be emotional and clingy.

She was also too pale and too thin, all skin and bones actually, and he wondered grimly if this meant she was the type to go crazy on her diet.

Nothing about Penelope matched his usual type in women, and while he had been mentally prepared to still go through with their wedding even if he were to find her completely unattractive—-

That was the fucking irony, really.

The moment he had seen her, he wanted her, and he wanted her with the kind of intensity and hunger that he had never felt with any other woman.

Big, dark eyes suddenly lifted up to his, and Cesare sucked his breath at how everything about her effortlessly seduced him...despite her sexual innocence. Just looking at her had him so fucking hard...and for better or for worse, it was just as fucking clear that she wanted him back.

Penelope's heart-shaped face was like an open book, and while both her fear and confusion were patently evident, there was also no mistaking the sweetly imploring plea in her lovely, dark gaze.

I want you,those eyes said.

I want to fuck you.

But I don't know where to start.

His Penelope was a virgin in short...and while in the past he had never given a fuck about being any woman's first—-

With her, it was different.

With her, it mattered a fucking lot that he would be her first—-and her last.

His cock would be theonlycock she would ever know the shape, taste, and feel of—-and this, too, was different, since he had never felt this possessive with any of his previous lovers.

She was starting to change him,Cesare realized, and what was more disconcerting was how completely unaware she was of her effect on him.

He could feel her nervousness growing as he led her further down the hallway, and Cesare slowed his steps to a halt.