Page 41 of Modern Romance December 2025 5-8

“I know that,” she said breathily.

“I meant that I’m in a devouring mood.”

Her silk top pulled across her breasts, calling his attention to the tight nipples beading against it. “What do you mean?” Her breath gushed out in a pant as he swiped a knuckle over one proud peak.

Under his hand, her hip was lush and thick. He let his gaze wander over her, from her smooth golden skin to the lushness of her curves as a result of the pregnancy. Everything about her…glowed, inside and out.

And Renzo had the recurring thought that she wouldn’t have crossed the orbit into his life if not for the surrogacy. Colored by his own prejudices and his ego, he would’ve never given her another glance. Never acknowledged the simmering connection between them.

And yet, as he looked at her now, staring up at him with achingly naked desire, sharp resentment at his own inadequacy pricked him.

She was too good for him, too smart, too self-sufficient, too…capable. That was at the root of his frustration, his anger. She made him wonder if there was anything he could offer her that would bind her to him. Other than their son.

Nor was he so full of honor that he would give her up.

“Renzo?”

“You’re eager to soothe me? To talk me off the ledge of this dark mood?”

“Yes. I’ll do anything.”

“Then let me bury my face between your thighs and taste you.”

It was the last thing Mimi had expected her brooding husband to say.

The wordhusbandstill tasted strange on her tongue, but she was beginning to like it more every day. And tonight, at the party, she had a true taste of what it was to have a man like Renzo DiCarlo be her husband in the real sense.

A partner, a protector, a caregiver, and a fierce ally if someone else came for her, even if that was his family.

Cracks had splintered in the hard shell she’d built around her heart. Suddenly she felt helpless against all the longings he set loose inside her. With each sly comment and innuendo-riddled glance, Mimi had only found herself growing stronger.

With Renzo by her side, no one could touch her. But she also realized that they were curious about not just her or Luca, but the hold she had on her powerful husband.

True to the vow he’d made to her at their wedding ceremony, despite her own reluctance to be a part of it, Renzo had kept every word.

With each brush of his body against her, with each little touch—his hand on her lower back, his arm around her waist, his fingers dancing over her nape—she’d found herself falling deeper and deeper into her own desire.

“Do you want to go into the bedroom?” she asked, sounding like a frightened virgin. Which she was not. But from the first moment she had laid eyes on him years ago, Renzo made her feel defensive. Even now, he provoked the wildness inside her, pushing her to prove something to him. And to herself.

Or was it that he made her feel so safe that she could let out all the desires and wants she’d buried deep beneath rationale? Was it her trust in him that she’d never known with any other man that made her not want to back down?

Renzo’s smirk was full of devilish teasing. “No,bella. Unless you’re shy about these things and want the cover of darkness?”

This was what he meant when he said his control was thin tonight. He meant to demand her surrender in a way she’d never given any man. “I’m not…a virgin,” Mimi said, full-on blushing now. She needed to get this out, though. “But I don’t have a lot of experience. I mean…”

“I guess we could do this under the covers then.” Something dark danced in Renzo’s eyes, and every inch of her trembled in response. “It’s not what I want for tonight, but I guess I shall make do.”

She bristled and straightened her shoulders. “You’re pushing me, knowing how much I hate to look incompetent.”

He laughed then, and it was full of a…strange emotion she seemed to provoke in him. A shiver zinged down her spine as she wondered if it could be fondness or even affection. “Competence has nothing to do with this, Mimi.”

His hands danced on the band of her silk shorts, pulling at the soft elastic and then letting it go, so that it snapped over and over. And then, in that little gap between, he brushed his fingers over her skin. Going a sliver lower each time.

Such fleeting contact, and yet she felt it as if he were branding her with a hot poker. The tips of his fingers could be leaving scorch marks on her flesh for how seared she felt.

Slowly, fisting her fingers tight in his shirt, Mimi pushed herself back. The muscles in her belly strained, but she kept going.

Dark, hungry eyes watched every movement, and she wondered if this was their own version of a trust fall. She had no doubt that he was testing her and expecting, almost wanting, her to fail. The latter she didn’t understand.