Page 22

Diletta

Six Months Later

The clubhouse is well on its way to the usual Friday night rowdy debauchery. Lark and Penny head out with me before the real madness starts. The club’s women have yet to arrive and out of respect for the old ladies and children being there, the guys refrained from drinking and cussing too much. They smoked their cigarettes outside. The unofficial cut off time for family friendly anything is around ten, so Lark makes sure she has Penny ready to go before then, even though her daughter is quite reluctant to say goodbye to all the bikers. They dote on her a ridiculous amount. After she asked Bullet about guns for the millionth time, he built her one out of cardboard and elastic bands and showed her how to knock empty cans off the TV stand in the lounge.

That got everyone else going. Soon there were lessons on darts, pool, and promises that they’d all be the first to teach her how to ride and drive, even though that’s not going to be for almost a decade.

I remember the day the guys presented Penny with a leather vest just like her dad’s, with adorable patches like ‘Club Princess’ and ‘Daughter of Tyrant’ sewn on the front, the club’s stone angel with her bowed head on the back. Penny was as excited on the outside as Ronan was on the inside when the club presented him with his new cut to replace the one that got wrecked that night in the rain.

Literally, the minute we step outside into the brisk fall night, we hear the music crank up a few decibels from inside.

“I’m so glad that the guys in this club are good guys. The smell of everything makes me so nauseous right now, but especially smoke. And it’s not good for Penny to be in there when the air is blue.”

“Mom’s having a baby,” Penny announces, grinning wide. “I’m going to be a big sister.”

“Yes, sweetheart. That’s so exciting!”

Lark bends to zip up Penny’s little leather jacket. She’s so adorable in it and her sparkly jeans and pink hiking boots. I thought of Lark as a boho queen in that shoe store and she’s still every bit of one. She hasn’t traded her long floral dresses in for denim and leather yet. Everyone knows that her heart belongs to the club. There’s no dress code required.

“Diletta is also having a baby,” Lark tells Penny. “Remember?”

“Right!” Penny rushes for me and wraps her arms around my waist. I’m almost six months pregnant and my bump has yet to really pop. She lays her cheek on my stomach. “Baby? Are you in there? Can you hear me?”

“She’s in there, sweetheart.” I bend down and kiss the top of her curls. “I just don’t have a big tummy yet, but I’m sure it’s coming.”

The baby had been unexpected, thanks to mine and Ronan’s one night of letting our hormones overtake our heads. With everything that happened afterward, my thoughts of Plan B went out the window, and by the time I remembered it was too late. As soon as I saw the lines on the test, I knew that I wanted this baby. It was like the universe was giving me a new start. And Ronan too, I’d been worried about his reaction, but when I’d told him, he’d fallen to his knees and pressed kisses against my stomach. Our little girl was going to be so loved.

Penny jerks her head up, huge eyes staring straight at me. “You know it’s a girl?”

“Yes. We could see it on the ultrasound.”

“Why don’t you know, mom?”

“Because, sweetheart, you have to be further along to find out. I need at least another two months before it’s going to be possible, but your daddy and I want it to be a surprise. Some people wait to find out and others want to know.”

“I want to know!”

Lark laughs. “You’ll know in seven months. Either way, you’re going to be the best big sister.”

Lark picks Penny up and walks her to her car. Mine is parked right beside them. The prospects are standing at the compound gates, ready to let us out. They’re manual gates, but Tyrant likes having them out there keeping watch at the outside door and over all the bikes and cars.

Lark gets Penny in her booster seat in the back, and I wave at them both as I slip into the front seat of mine. It’s been a beautiful summer and even a great fall, but winter is slowly creeping in. They’re mild here, but never as mild as it was in Italy.

I think about my father all the way home. He hasn’t given up his empire and I’m not sure if he ever will, but two months ago he flew to Florida. We joined him for two weeks. Once he landed, he took care to pretty much disguise himself and Ronan made sure that we also flew under the radar. My father is still worried about attracting attention to me. He’ll always be worried about my safety. And the one time he let up on security because I asked him to, I was kidnapped and that’s always going to haunt him.

I still miss Italy and my papa very much, but I can’t wish things were different.

I wouldn’t have Ronan if they had been, and I wouldn’t have the little life growing inside of me now.

What other people think of as crazy is pretty much our version of normal. You can’t grow up like we did and not have your quirks.

***

I pull up in front of the house, parking on the street.

Ronan installed all new cameras in and around the house as soon as he moved in, which was literally the same day I didn’t get on that plane with my father. Like I said… quirks. For us, it works. He was at the clubhouse a good portion of the time and I was teaching up until the summer, so we weren’t always together and that probably had a good deal to do with how we made it work. We were able to acclimate to each other slowly, even though we’d been pushed into the deep end pretty much right away.

I did give my resignation at the school. I thought about taking a year of maternity leave, but I want to be there for our daughter and any other children we have. I don’t want to rush going straight back to work. I’m lucky enough that I have the luxury of doing that while others do not, and I’ll never take a second of it for granted. My father put a large amount of money into my bank account when I came here. The house is paid for and so is my car. Ronan also has a big chunk of my father’s money, as it turns out. Does it bother me that the money is ill gotten? Yes. It does. It always has. I guess I made my peace with it the same way I don’t like what my father does, but I love him. I always spent as little as I could to live and used most of my teaching money instead of touching that account.

I have my own savings now, and one day, I hope to be able to donate most of that money. I’ll do the same with anything my father ever gives me. I’ll make sure it all goes back to charity. It will never heal the pain that my father has caused. I know one won’t cancel out the other. I just can’t think of a better use for it.

My father was astonished to find out about the pregnancy, and if I’m being honest, he was afraid, like he was afraid for me when I was born. I was his greatest treasure, along with my mom. He said he was glad that I’m over here, living under this identity. I might have to be Haley Black, but on the inside, I’ll always be Diletta Cosmo. I’m away from Italy and that life now. I want my children to know their grandfather, and I’ll never lie to them when they’re old enough to understand, but I’m also relieved that they can grow up here in a small city, where there’s peace and love and innocence, for as long as I can give it to them.

The house is quiet when I step inside. I lock the door, take one step and immediately freeze as a black gloved hand grasps my shoulder. A dark figure looms in front of me, clad entirely in black, wearing a black hood over his face. The man is a mountain of granite muscle. I wasn’t expecting this, but it’s not the first time Ronan has greeted me this way when I’ve come home. He knows how much I love it.

My jeans are already soaked. I’m a bundle of nerves, all needy, screaming out for his touch.

He left the clubhouse ten minutes before I did, on his bike, and I pretty much knew that he’d have something exciting waiting for me when I arrived home.

“Ooh, I’m so defenseless, Mr. Masked Man. So unable to kick your ass and fight back. You better just hurry up and ravish me. I can hardly stand the waiting. I mean… I hope I can outrun you.”

He rips the hood off and tilts his head back, his great big laugh filling up the tiny living room. His hand shoots past me to flick on the light.

“Christ, Dil. That’s hardly convincing roleplay.”

“Put the hood back on,” I’m sure it’s clear from my massive smile just how much I love seeing his face and hearing the sound of his laughter. “That’s hardly convincing either.”

“But how will I kiss you breathless with it on?”

“That is a fair point…”

He chuckles, never losing his grin. I feel absurdly proud of putting that smile on his face. Ronan is a good man beneath the hard exterior. We’ve been working on showing more people that part of him.

Ronan scoops me and up carries me to our bedroom. In an instant, he has my leather jacket unzipped, my tank top peeled off, my bra undone, and then he does a number on my boots and jeans. He sits down on the bed, hugging my legs with his arms, his face right near my lace clad pussy.

“I’m going to devour my favorite meal in the whole world. I waited all night for this.”

“You ate me out right before we left, which was at five. It’s only just past ten.”

“Five whole hours, Dil. I’ve been deprived of this beautiful pussy for far longer than I can stand.”

He pulls me in against his face, kissing my pretty much still flat stomach. It maybe is slightly round, but in that way that a stomach can get after a big meal.

“How’s our daughter?”

“Sleeping.”

“If I feast on you for the next hour and then put you on your hands and knees and fuck you from behind, is that going to be an issue?”

Holy shit, this room just got hot. “The only issue would be the hour thing. You’re going to keep me on the edge of a climax for sixty fucking minutes?”

He kisses my stomach and slips his hands under my panties, peeling them down my legs. They’re far too thick for him to tear and my tender skin is thankful that he didn’t try. “I was planning on giving you multiple climaxes, but if you don’t want them…”

“I want them.”

I dodge away from his hold, kicking my panties off my ankles and scrambling onto the bed. I get my ass in the air, my legs spread apart. “There. I saved you some time. You can start now.”

His hand cracks down on my ass, but like always, it’s more noise than sting. He doesn’t waste time getting between my spread legs. He eats me like it’s been five years, not five hours. In short order, I’m a moaning, soaking mess.

He was lying about the multiple climaxes. He doesn’t let me come. He’s cruel, teasing me, circling a finger around my asshole to heighten the sensation, but he doesn’t let me come.

I gasp and clutch the blankets in both hands at the clank of his belt buckle coming undone followed by his fly.

He grasps my hips and lines himself up with my entrance. “If you weren’t already pregnant, Dil, I swear you’d be knocked up just from how deep I’m going to come inside of you.”

He’s been so overprotective of me since he found out I was pregnant that at first, he was treating me like glass. He would barely let me take two steps without worrying. I finally had to sit down and make him promise he was going to stop smothering me before I legit smothered him and not with my good intentions and love, and that fucking in any position was still on the cards—at least until I got too big, then we’d have to be creative.

I rock my hips back, arching into him until his cock slides into me, filling me. I groan at that familiar, wonderful stretch. He moves ridiculously slowly, his thrusts more agonizing than they are pleasurable until I can’t control myself any longer and my hips are the ones doing the work. He has to grasp my hip and ass either hand, but he does and finally he drives into me. He’s still careful, scared shitless of going too deep even though I’ve told him that the baby is tucked up safely inside of me.

We’ve both taken care to be gentler with each other. There certainly aren’t any booby traps in the backyard any longer. Ronan and the club fixed the fence around the yard. There isn’t a rusty nail hazard to be seen. We have security cameras, because we aren’t totally na?ve, but here, in this little slice of northern Washington, we’ve both managed to start afresh from our pasts. After my father’s men trashed the cabin, the club had to do more repairs. This summer was spent mostly on landscaping. Despite what happened there, it might be one of my favorite places, and I know for Ronan, it’s special. He loves being out there, whether it’s with the club or just us. The times we’ve gone, he’s been manic about security. There’s no turning off cameras, so there’s also no running around naked or fucking up against windows.

I urge him on, taking his deep thrusts and driving forward so that he has to chase me and go deeper. I grind back on him and then his hand snakes between my legs while he’s fucking the hell out of me. He’s nice for about half a second and then he pinches my clit, tumbling me into oblivion.

My pussy spasms around his cock, driving him to his own climax. I’ll never get tired of that feeling of him clutching me tight while he spills himself inside of me.

After, he carefully turns me onto my side and tucks his massive body behind me. I love the foreplay, the hard fucking, the thrill of the games we play, the temptation that is just Ronan all around, but this is my favorite.

I never want him to let me go.

I never want to let go of him either.

“I had no idea what love meant until I met you. Literally, Dil. You’ve shown me how to love, how to care, how to nurture. You’ve given me everything a man could ever dream of.” His hand rests on my tiny, barely-there bump.

I know he never had a family, not a proper one at least. Not until his club brothers, and now we’re going to have one of our own.

“I never had a reason to love until I met you. I wanted to. I was waiting. I’m so thankful you never gave up watching me. When you reached out to the dark for me that night… I’ll forever be grateful. We saved each other and we’ll never stop. I love you before I knew your name or your face. I’ll always love you.”

He snuggles together, our bodies clinging together on top of the blankets. He’ll sweep them over us eventually, when we’ve cooled down. I don’t need a blanket now. He’s a roaring furnace of body heat.

“How am I supposed to up a declaration like that?”

“You could go get that hood for starters.”

He kisses my shoulder, scraping his teeth there playfully. “You’re fixated on that hood tonight. Should I be worried?”

“That I no longer adore the sight of your beautiful face? Never. Never in a million lifetimes, Ronan. But go get the mask. Haven’t you heard that pregnant women have voracious sexual appetites? I think it’s the hormones.”

“I’m not complaining.” He cups my breast, rolling his fingers over my nipple until I whimper. “But can you give me a minute? Just one minute and I’ll be ready.”

I’ll give him as long as he needs. I rather enjoy lying here like this. I enjoy everything about this man and our life.

His hand shifts between my legs, circling my clit slowly, and my eyes practically roll back in my head.

A minute of sweet torture, more like.

“Just one minute,” he grunts thickly right near my ear, sending a wave of goosebumps over my skin.

A minute, ten, an hour, all night—I know that no matter how long I wait, I won’t be disappointed. Ronan knows my body, my needs, my heart and my dreams. I really did wait a lifetime for him.

It was so worth it.

THE END

Hope you enjoyed the book!

The next book in the Satan’s Angels MC

series is Crow