Page 33

MATTEO

I take her into my arms, her body molding against mine like she is made for me. Her lips trail along my neck, slow and warm, then nip at my pulse point. A full-body shiver ripples through me.

Fuck. She’s sin and salvation wrapped in skin. My kryptonite.

I carry her up the stairs, her mouth still working the sensitive spot where my neck meets my shoulder. When she sucks harder, a harsh exhale leaves my lips. Blood surges straight to my cock, and it’s already throbbing behind my zipper.

“Maria,” I warn, voice rough with restraint. “You’re playing with fire, amore.”

“Shh.” Her breath ghosts over my throat. “Then let me burn.”

She bites down, and I stumble slightly. Jesus. I tighten my grip on her thighs, then pick up speed, slamming the bedroom door behind us.

“My turn,” I growl, tossing her onto the bed. She lands with a squeal, and before she can blink, I’m over her. I crash my lips into hers, devouring her mouth like I’ve been starving.

She moans into me, and I drink every sound like it’s my last breath.

We kiss like we’ve done it a thousand times in dreams—tongues tangling, teeth scraping, a dance of hunger and heat. Her hips roll against mine, rubbing her soft core over my hard length. The friction damn near ends me.

I break the kiss, panting, my forehead pressed to hers, staring into her hunger-ridden eyes. The air between us is thick with sex. Her fingers thread through my hair, tugging gently at the small strands at the nape of my neck.

“You’re perfect, Maria,” I pant. “Utter perfection and no woman on this earth compares. Fuck, I need you.”

“I need you too.” Her hand glides down my chest before resting over my heart. There’s a warmth in her gaze that both scares and thrills me. Like she sees past the want—into all the broken, buried parts I never let anyone touch.

Her eyes flicker with something deeper—hunger, maybe. Or something that terrifies me even more: trust.

“But first… I want to taste you.”

She pushes me onto my back and straddles me. Her hands go straight for my zipper, and within seconds, my cock is free—rock hard and aching.

“Maria—”

She silences me with a kiss that brands my soul. It’s not sweet. It’s conquest. She kisses me like I already belong to her.

When she pulls back, her fingers grip my jaw.

“I’m doing this,” she says, voice husky. “So shut up and let me.”

Her hand wraps around my cock, and her tongue flicks the head. My hips buck. I groan—loud.

She takes me in, slow at first, then deeper. Her tongue swirls around the shaft, teasing every nerve. Inch by inch, she devours me until she gags, pulls back, then does it again.

She strokes my balls with one hand while working my cock like it’s her goddamn mission.

“Fuck, Maria,” I hiss, grabbing the back of her head. “You’re gonna make me lose it.”

I thrust gently into her mouth, her gag making my abs clench. My hand guides her rhythm as she takes me, owns me.

She works my cock like it’s the only thing she wants in her mouth, and I’m close—too close. I yank her up before I come down her throat.

She lets out a frustrated sound, but I flip her fast, pinning her beneath me. Her protest is swallowed by my kiss.

She fights for dominance, but I’m not giving her an inch. Not now.

I tear her clothes off while our mouths stay locked—kissing like it hurts to stop. She fumbles with my pants until I finally sit up and rip my shirt off.

We’re both bare, panting, high on each other. I can’t remember ever needing someone like this.

Never again, I think. I won’t lose her. I won’t let her go. Not ever.

Her hand cups my face. “What is it?”

I kiss her palm, voice a whisper. “You’re exquisite, Maria Davacalli.”

And maybe that’s what scares me most—how easy it is to fall for her. How impossible it is not to.

She lies beneath me, vulnerable but powerful. Something primal roars in my chest.

I’m in love with her. Maybe I always was.

“Fuck me, Matteo,” she whispers. “Hard.”

I don’t need to be told twice. I line up with her entrance and drive in slow. Her eyes roll back, her back arches, and she lets out a guttural moan.

“Matteo… oh, fuck.”

She’s tight. So tight I forget how to breathe. I bury myself to the hilt, balls flush against her ass. I hold still, let her adjust. She stares up at me with wild eyes, and the last of my control slips.

“Move,” she commands.

“Gladly.” I pull out, then slam back in, dropping my face to her neck as I thrust.

“Ah!” she cries.

“You okay?” I ask, teeth grazing her shoulder, voice tight with restraint.

Instead of answering, she wraps her legs around me and pulls me in deeper. “Don’t stop.”

Her nails dig into my back, and I obey—pounding into her, searching for that rhythm only our bodies know. “That’s it, baby,” I growl into her ear. “Take it. Take every inch of me.” Her cries rise with every thrust, raw and breathless.

I kiss her hard, swallowing every moan.

She’s still so innocent in some ways, but it’s intoxicating watching her unravel, learning her own hunger.

Our skin slaps together, sweat glistening under the dim light.

“Matteo,” she gasps. “I didn’t know it could feel like this.”

I fuck her harder, chasing the edge. Her face twists in pleasure, hair fanned out like a halo while I wreck her body beneath me.

“You like being filled like this, don’t you?” I growl, watching her fall apart. “Say it.”

“Yes… Matteo!” she screams, and that name—my name—on her lips undoes me.

“Say you want more.”

“Yes,” she whimpers, hips rolling up to meet me. “More. Fuck me harder, please. Use me, Matteo. Make me yours.”

I’m right there, held on the brink by her pulsing walls.

I don’t just want to come inside her—I want to pour every broken part of me into her, like she could make me whole again.

“Let go for me, Maria,” I growl, my thumb circling her clit. “I want to watch you fall apart.”

Her breath catches—and then she shatters.

She convulses beneath me, thighs trembling, pussy clenching my cock so tight it rips the orgasm from me too. I groan as I spill inside her, buried deep, riding the high with her.

She looks like freedom. Like peace. Like everything I never believed I deserved—until now.

We stay tangled for a long moment, our breathing ragged and heavy in the silence.

I brush a few strands of hair from her damp forehead, my eyes drinking in the soft flush of her face as I marvel at her beauty. Her eyes flutter open, heavy-lidded and warm, filled with a slow-burning mix of satisfaction and longing.

“That was…” she whispers, seemingly at a loss for words.

“Incredible,” I say, pressing a gentle kiss to her forehead.

She smiles. “I didn’t know it could be like that between us. I hoped it would be. But this… this is more.”

She traces lazy circles on my chest. I pull her closer, her body melting into mine like she was made to fit the pieces I thought would stay broken forever.

There’s a world waiting for us—messy, dangerous, uncertain. But for now? For this breath, this night, this warmth between us?

Nothing else matters.

I close my eyes, her heartbeat steady against my chest, and for the first time in years… I find peace. Not just in her arms—but in the way she sees me. And still stays.

I jolt awake before dawn, reaching for Maria instinctively. My hand finds nothing but cold cotton sheets. My stomach plummets.

“Maria?”

I’m already moving before my brain catches up. The bed feels too empty, the silence too loud. Panic grips my chest like a vice, the ghost of that night—the hospital, the monitors, the poison—seizing me without warning.

I call her name, but there’s no answer. I throw back the sheets, my heart already pounding. The panic that I felt that day returns and it takes every mental ounce of strength I have not to lose my shit.

I get my boxers on and head straight out of the room. I walk down the stairs and make my way to the kitchen, but I find it empty. I look to the living room, but no one is there. My mind goes to the worst possible place until I see the light that comes from her new studio room.

I make my way to the room, and my heart instantly eases when I see my wife—her messy bun and my white button-down—as she stands by her easel.

I step forward, but I pause and just observe her for a moment. Instead, I lean against the doorframe, mesmerized.

Her fingers move with practiced ease, coaxing color into life, breathing existence onto the canvas. She is completely lost in her art, unaware of the way she commands the space around her. The tip of her tongue peeks out in concentration, a habit I find both adorable and devastating.

How can she create beauty with hands that should be shaking? How can she love me with a heart I helped break?

I lean against the wooden doorframe and drink her in. Those legs had been wrapped around my waist not too long ago. Her mouth has screamed the most ungodly things in my ear and she?—

“I can feel you staring, Matteo.” She doesn’t turn back. Her eyes never leave the canvas. “Instead of being a creep by watching me, you should come to greet your wife good morning.”

The humor in her tone is apparent; I can even hear the smile in it.

“I like stalking you, don’t you know?” I push off the doorframe and make my way into the studio. I feel proud every time I see this room. It is the first good thing that I did for my wife. “What are we drawing?”

I come up behind her, wind my arms around her waist, and kiss the side of her face, pulling her into me. I bury my nose in her thick locks and breathe a sigh of contentment.

I don’t know how I ever survived without her. She eases all the aches and pains. She makes life make sense again.

Maria exhales a small breath, a wistful smile tugging at her lips. She melts her back into me and pauses for a moment to turn to the side and kiss me. Her kiss is brief but it is enough to shake the very foundation that I stand on.

She pulls away far too quickly for my liking and then turns back to her work. I move my eyes to the canvas and get a better look at what she is doing.

“A lake?”

“It’s the one by our farmhouse in Tuscany. My brother and I used to love going there every time we went down south for the summer.” The sadness in her voice is hard to miss. “I just woke up thinking of him. I had a dream that we were back there, and I… I just wanted to paint it, in honor of him.”

The guilt moves like a thick sludge in the middle of my chest. Antonio. A name I will never forget and I will never be able to pay enough penance for.

“He loved it there. He said the world made sense when he was near the water and me. I didn’t get what he meant back then but now, since being deprived of the water, I get it.

” She moves her brush over the canvas. “There is a calmness that comes with the push and pull of the waves. It’s like nature’s melody. ”

I say nothing, allowing her this moment to speak of her brother. She carries her grief so well that I often forget she is still in mourning. I need to be more mindful of that. Especially the fact that I am the cause of that pain.

She dips her brush into a deep shade of blue, dragging it softly along the surface of the water she’s creating. “Sometimes, I feel like I’m losing pieces of him,” she murmurs. “But when I paint, I remember as the memories come flooding back to me. I can almost hear his voice again.”

The truth is a curse I carry alone—a wound that festers, never healing, never fading. If I rip it open for her, it will only poison her too.

I should tell her. I should have told her the second she spoke his name. But how do you confess to the woman you love that you were the one who took away the person she loved most?

Her brother’s blood is still on my hands, no matter how many times I’ve washed them. And if she ever finds out, she will never look at me the same way again.

I would rather live with this sin buried in my chest than watch the light in her eyes dim when she realizes who I really am.

So I lodge the truth deep into my psyche and lock it away.

I can’t tell her…

“You won’t forget him,” I say, my voice lower than before. “He will forever be a part of you. And that will never change no matter how much time passes. He lives on in you, Maria.”

She looks up at me then, her warm eyes searching mine. I wonder if she can see it: the weight I’m carrying, the sins I haven’t confessed. But if she does, she doesn’t say anything.

She presses her lips to mine and turns back to her painting. “I wish you could have met him. I think he would have liked you.”

I did meet him, amore. And I was the one to lodge a bullet into his heart.