Page 8 of Scorned Beauty

I narrowed my eyes. “What exactly are you saying?”

“You’re a nurse, right?”

“A nursing student.”

“What would you say to a patient who has my injury?”

I grabbed a towel from under the cabinet and laid it on the vanity.

“Take off your clothes and put this on.”

He raked his teeth over his bottom lip. Dom didn’t move a muscle, but his gaze was veiled and his mouth twitched. “This should be interesting.”

Why was I still staring? I pivoted and escaped the sudden suffocating confines of the bathroom, shockingly inadequate to contain Dom’s overpowering presence.

I closed the door and leaned against it.

I let the devil into my domain and his name was Dominic De Lucci.

What have I done?

Chapter

Three

Sloane

“Where do you want me?”

I didn’t turn around when I heard the bathroom door open. I didn’t turn around when steam saturated my tiny apartment with its warmth. I simply didn’t turn around. I had drawn the curtains, so I wouldn’t see his reflection in the window, hoping I’d imagined the whole night and I didn’t have Dom inside my apartment, but hearing his voice made him real.

I debated having him lie on the couch, but it was too small for him. I had a keen misgiving about letting him lie on my bed, but it was the only way to treat him.

When I turned around to face him, and even when I was prepared to drool, nothing prepared me for the suck-in-your-breath gorgeousness that smacked me in the face.

Rivulets of water clinging to his thick raven-black hair, only accentuated the fascinating shape of his eyes that tilted up slightly at the corners. Dom had many sculpture-worthy features. His nose, which should have been too thin,complemented his full lips and chiseled, angular face. Strong and brutally beautiful was an apt description.

For his height, Dom's perfectly muscled frame defined a man in his prime. His shoulders, chest, and biceps were a product of being an all-around athlete. I knew he frequented his family’s boxing gym and sometimes sparred in mixed martial arts.

“You’re staring,” he said. There was no teasing in his tone, but his voice took on the rough texture of gravel.

I decided I’d been on defense for too long; I was going on offense. “I am. I always wondered what you hid beneath your civilized suits.”

As he approached, I had the oddest conflicting desire of either wanting the towel wrapped around his hips to unravel or remain plastered to his skin. The edge was already drenched in blood, reminding me I had to stitch him up.

He stopped inches from me and lowered his head. “Do I get to see what you’re hiding beneath those awful coveralls?”

“If you’re a good boy,” I shot back and nodded to my bedroom. “In there. I’ve prepped my bed, but don’t get any ideas.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Dom drawled. He turned and awarded me a view of his fine ass. No flat-butt male here. With everything going on in my life, I tried to be pragmatic. I wasn’t a denier. I was an opportunist. If it were any person other than Dom, meaning not connected to the mafia, I’d be giving in to a hookup. My busy life and the people I was currently indebted to because of my brother didn’t allow for serious relationships, which was why I avoided them. But this girl had needs. But my needs shouldn’t be used as future blackmail.

When we entered the room, Dom paused when he saw the bed. I had a plastic sheet covering the mattress and a folded bedsheet on top of it.

He cast me a brief glance. “Should I be worried?”

“What? That the Russians set a trap and I’m Doctor Death?”

“Not funny,” he grumbled. He kept his eyes on me while whipping off the towel and handing it to me. I didn’t break eye contact when I accepted it. His mouth lifted at the corner before he lay on the bed in all his naked glory.