Page 38 of Anti-Heroes in Love Duet

And even though that wasn’t exactly her fault, I wouldn’t have her berating the only man who had taught me what it meant to be loved.

“You should ask your sister about that day,” I suggested, my mouth a cruel sneer as I glared at her. “For a woman who values knowledge, you do not ask questions when you should.”

“Dante.” Tore tried to soothe the tension with a chuckle. “Please excuse him, Elena, as he is fiercely protective.Figlio, have some of Caprice’s tiramisu to sweeten your disposition, si?”

I shook my head at him, but I did take one of the bowls filled with sweet cream and cake from the counter. Elena’s eyes tracked me as I brought the spoon to my mouth, as I hummed a little louder than necessary at the explosion of the flavors on my tongue.

“Perfetto,” I praised, then offered a spoonful to Elena with a brow raised in a silent dare. “You could use some sweetening too.”

“Boss,” Frankie interrupted, his face pinched with concern as he stopped in front of him. “Gotta talk to you.”

I opened my mouth to reply, but Tore got there first.

“Enough talk,” he decided, a wicked gleam in his eyes as he took Elena’s hand and pressed it into my own. “This is the feast of San Gennaro! We must be dancing.”

He shot me a hard look before I could argue with him, and I knew he wanted me to get her away from whatever grim news Frankie was carrying before her curiosity got the better of her. So I tucked Elena’s stiff arm through mine and tugged her into the living room, where a number of people were dancing between it and the terrace.

When I pulled her close, she went as stiff as a board in my arms.

“Dancing typically requires coordination,” I drawled. “Are you capable of that?”

She blinked at me blandly and rolled her shoulders back as she adjusted her hands on my shoulders. “I was concerned about you. It can’t be easy to move all that weight around.”

I tipped my head back to laugh at the ceiling as I hauled her even closer, flush against my chest. Through the thin silk of her dress and the crisp linen of my shirt, I imagined I could feel the hard points of her nipples.

“What are you doing?” she demanded, struggling slightly to pull away.

I clamped my hand over her hip and engulfed her hand on the opposite in my own before I ducked down to whisper over her lips. “I am dancing with you.”

“Indecently,” she hissed, her eyes scanning the crowd for any judgmental eyes. “Yara is watching.”

“Yara doesn’t care,” I countered as I moved us fluidly to the music, grinning at my man Davide as he spun his wife out beside us. “If you know the steps to the Saltarello, we could dance that instead.”

She rolled those pretty eyes at me, but her body was relaxing in increments against mine. I was reminded of her piano playing and made a note to play music around her more often. It was evident she was moved spiritually by it, even if the words were in her dreaded native tongue.

“Only old people dance the Saltarello,” she said. “Then again, you’re basically an old man, aren’t you?”

I scowled at her, the hand on her hip moving to the small of her back so I could press her fully to the quilted muscles beneath my suit. “I assure you, I’m still incredibly virile.”

“For an old man, maybe.”

“I’m thirty-five, Elena. I’m hardly ancient.”

She shrugged flippantly, but I caught a hint of a smile at the edge of her mouth.

We danced then for the length of one song, and when she would have pulled away, I spun her back into my arms for another. I liked the way she fit there against me, tall enough I didn’t have to break my back to look down into her romantic face, slim enough I got an aroused kick out of knowing I could bend her easily beneath my hands.

Her eyes caught mine as I moved us in a bastardized version of the salsa. Our bodies moved together with a synchronicity that surprised us both. I stepped; she followed. I indicated an upcoming spin with a twist of my wrist, and she was already swirling out in a flare of red silk. We moved faster, tighter against each other. Her breath fanned against the open skin at my collar as she panted with her efforts, her chest cresting again and again pressed to mine, her nipples hard as diamonds abrading my skin beneath the fabric.

A fire built in my gut, a slow burn that built deeper and deeper than the ache in an overused muscle. Sweat beaded on my brow, but it had more to do with the effort to restrain myself from savagely taking her mouth with mine than from the dance.

“This is inappropriate,” Elena panted at one point, but even her eyes were dancing beautifully in time with me.

“Si, indecente,” I agreed.

Indecent.

And she was. Indecently tantalizing warmed with amusement and the heat of excursion. I wanted to trail the flush from her neck down her chest, discover if her nipples were pink or brown, sweet or salty with sweat.