Page 31 of The Italian Reckoning (A New York Criminal Empire #3)

SARAH

H e kisses me like I’m made of glass, like I’m the most precious thing he’s ever held in his arms, and it makes my heart soar.

This is what I want.

This is what I need.

Every part of me feels like it’s made of the most fragile glass, like pouring my heart out has robbed me of all the strength I have to hold myself together.

So Rocky does it for me. He picks me up and cradles me to his chest, maintaining the softest kiss I’ve ever had in my life.

We leave behind the study and I guide him toward the bedroom, where he lays me down on the bed.

Just as he’s about to pull away, I cup his cheek with the palm of my hand.

“Don’t leave me,” I whisper, staring deep into his eyes.

I’m scared that the moment he walks away, I’ll shatter into a thousand pieces and I won’t have the strength to rebuild myself.

Not again. That monster took so much from me and I’ve spent years keeping everything at arms’ length—including real intimacy.

Now Rocky is here and beyond the mind-numbing grief, there is only one thing I want.

To feel.

Just once.

I want to feel everything.

“I’ll never leave,” Rocky whispers, crawling over me and rejoining our lips in a gentle kiss.

Everything starts and remains gentle. The soft touch of his hands against my skin as he holds me close to his hot body.

The tender way his lips massage and move against my own.

The languid roll of his body as he aligns his torso and legs with my own.

Everything is soft and slow, and it almost makes tears well back up in my eyes.

I don’t deserve to be held like this. I don’t deserve to be cared for.

Every kiss Rocky gives me tells me that actually, I do.

He kisses my jaw and leaves a trail of love bites down my neck.

When I reach under his shirt and caress his body, it’s not long until I find the two small scars from where he was shot in the back at the gala.

Scars of wounds that nearly took his life.

My fingertips linger and Rocky’s eyes meet mine, breaking the kiss in order to shed his clothing.

When he’s back over me, he kisses me deeply.

“Proof of my survival,” he says in a low voice, then his palm skims over the scars on my lower belly and I fight the urge to pull away. “Proof of yours.”

He’s right, but my disconnect from them is so powerful that when Rocky moves down my body and presses his lips to the long, thin scar below my navel, it doesn’t feel like he’s kissing me. It’s like I’m watching him kiss someone else, someone who isn’t even a part of this moment.

Until he kisses another scar.

And then another.

Every single scar that litters my body, every detail that monster left behind, is devoured by Rocky.

He kisses slowly, licks slower, and nibbles along each scar like he’s removing them and remaking them with his teeth.

Across my abdomen, the few around my ribs, even the ones on my back get what feels like hours of gentle attention when he rolls me over.

He locates and loves every single scar he finds on my body until I’m a panting, writhing mess.

And I can feel them. Every single one. The numbness that’s existed inside me for years is replaced with a pulsing, heated yearning as my skin sings from every love-nibble Rocky decorates over my skin. Then he’s kissing me deeply, our mouths dancing in a lazy, slow circle.

Then he’s between my legs and pressing inside me until we become one.

“Rocky,” I moan softly, placing one hand over his heart while my other cradles his neck.

“I’m right here,” he whispers breathlessly. “I’m always going to be right here.”

I pray he means it. In a few short months, the man I hated has suddenly become the only thing holding me together.

I was shattered, barely keeping myself in one piece, and now Rocky has me.

Every kiss, every touch and caress and stroke, it’s all slowly placing one fragile piece back in place until I’m almost whole.

Even his cock buried deep inside me brings such a sense of overwhelming love and peace that the tears tickling the corners of my eyes are of adoration and an overwhelming sense of love.

We move together as one, rocking back and forth with barely an inch of space between us.

There’s no frantic thrusting, no biting and scratching like usual.

There’s just us, intertwined and joined as one.

We share the same air in the space between our lips, share the same ripples of pleasure that move through us in a single wave.

Rocky grinds into me, I rock back, and we roll over until we’re tangled in the bedsheets and I can’t tell where I end and Rocky begins.

There’s just… us.

We come together with muted gasps and desperate, soft whimpers that sound more like our souls taking their first breaths.

My orgasm is so intense that every muscle in my body goes rigid and my mind goes quiet.

There’s nothing but the rush of heat inside me from Rocky’s cock and the curl of overwhelming pleasure through my core.

Over and over, wave after wave of ecstasy consumes us.

Rocky kisses me like I’m his only source of air, and I hold him as tightly as my arms will allow.

This… is peace.

Rocky is gone when I wake up the next morning.

The cold sheets beside me bring a pulse of anxiousness until I touch the edge of a handwritten note.

Blearily opening one eye, I read the letter Rocky left behind and then sit up as not a single word actually made it into my mind.

Iris chirrups from between my legs and stretches herself out across my lap, nuzzling in as I rub my eyes to clear them.

Sarah,

Waking up alone after last night will probably feel like an insult, or that something is wrong, but I swear to you that everything is fine. I just had to sneak back before my father noticed I was missing, and you were sleeping so soundly that waking you up felt terribly selfish.

I meant everything I said last night. I am here for you.

You are safe with me.

I’ll call when I can.

Rocky

As letters go, it’s pretty sweet and Rocky’s scrawled a handful of kisses at the bottom. Waking up to him would be better, but just the thought of his father makes my stomach churn.

Rocky knows the truth now. He knows everything.

He knows about my time with the killer, that his face is lost to my mind and that I’m the reason Belle and Kara are dead. His reassurances, while kind, did nothing to quell the guilt that sits heavily in my chest. Even Iris’s thick fur and deep purrs don’t shift that sensation.

I need coffee.

Strong coffee.

Only one place can get me exactly what I need, so after a quick shower and admiration of the marks Rocky left on my throat, I head to my local cafe where Bobby greets me with a smile.

“Usual?” he asks.

“Actually, can we try something different?”

His smile fades instantly. “What’s happened?”

“What do you mean?”

“You only want something different when something has happened.”

“That’s not true.”

“It so is.” Despite his laughter, the usual spark seems missing from Bobby when his eyes drop and linger on my throat.

Adjusting the collar of my shirt, I clear my throat and gaze up at the menu on the chalkboard behind his head. “I’m just in a good mood, that’s all. And it’s hot today. So… Can I have a mango iced frappe?”

“To go?”

“Please, I have to be at work in like twenty minutes.” Flashing Bobby a smile, I settle against the counter and for the first time in six weeks, I don’t stare out the window.

I don’t need to look and hope for a glimpse of Rocky’s bike.

I don’t need to hover over my phone in the hopes that he will text.

Right now, I’m comfortable in the fact that he cares about me, and that’s all that matters.

It’s an odd feeling, almost like relaxation but with an increase of tension around my shoulders as I contemplate how I’m going to navigate tracking down the monster from my past while avoiding my boss and Rocky’s father.

“Well?” Bobby sets the drink down in front of me with one brow raised.

“Well what? Sorry, I was miles away.”

“Because of that?” Bobby jerks his thumb toward my throat, sending a flush of shameful heat down my neck.

“Not exactly, no.” I’m about to tell him to back off when I’m reminded that he’s asked me several times over the past few weeks if I want to catch a movie—as far back as the day he asked me before I bolted out of here to confront my mystery biker man.

I never directly said no, focusing on dropping hints rather than an outright rejection.

You never fuck with the people who access your food, right?

But the love bites on my throat are a pretty clear indicator.

“Listen, Bobby?—”

“Don’t worry about it.” Bobby smiles brightly. “Drinks on the house. Consider it an apology for my attempts to cheer you up when you already had someone.”

Guilt worms its way high into my chest and I smile sadly. Best to leave it alone.

Despite Bobby saying it’s on the house, I fill up the tip jar with a handful of dollars and head off to work.

I’m feeling less guilty by the time I slip into the mask I’ve perfected in the face of all my colleagues who witnessed my very public ejection from Belle’s case.

Most have moved on, but there’s still a few glances thrown my way.

The crazy cop from Montana chasing ghosts.

Little do they know.

I bury myself in cold cases and civilian disputes for the majority of the morning until a mid-morning donut run draws me out of my office and into forced socialization with the rest of the precinct.

It’s someone’s birthday so I sign the card shoved into my hands and leave a vague message of celebration.

I’m balancing two donuts and some terrible coffee, intent on heading back to my office, when something catches my ear.

“—attempted kidnap?”

“Yeah, lucky she got away. Honestly, never seen anything like it.”

“Come on, it’s New York. Shit goes down like that all the time.”

“Yeah, but not like that. The whole thing is pretty suspicious, don’t you think, especially after that Kara…”

The conversation ends when the two detectives discussing it head out of the break room and are lost to the precinct.

No matter. My curiosity is spiked and I hurry back to my office, barely keeping all the powder on my donut.

I set them down, dust my fingers off, and tap hurriedly through the database in search of the kidnapping.

Attempted kidnapping of a young girl. Could it be…?

There it is. I click the file and my heart somersaults up into my throat.

Shit .

Attempted kidnap victim—Mary Del Prete.