Page 25

"I can't," I admit, my voice rough with honesty.

"I've tried to convince myself that this is about business, about strategy.

But the truth is simpler." I study her face, memorizing every detail.

"I can't let you go because you're already part of me.

The child you're carrying is just proof of what I already knew. "

"And what's that?" she asks, her voice barely a whisper. The fight is draining out of her, replaced by something that might be resignation or understanding. Her body has gone still in my grasp, no longer straining against my hold.

"That I love you," I say. "Not the way Emilio loved your talent. I love the woman who argues with me in empty kitchens, who refuses to be broken despite everything I've put her through." My hands move to frame her face, forcing her to meet my gaze. "I love you enough to fight a war to keep you."

Tears spill down her cheeks, but she doesn't pull away.

"Your love feels like drowning," she whispers with thick emotion.

"It's too much, too overwhelming. I don't know how to breathe inside it.

" Her hands come up to cover mine, fingers trembling against my skin.

"I'm terrified of what you're capable of, but I'm more terrified of how much I'm starting to need it. "

"Then stop fighting it," I urge, my thumbs brushing away her tears. "Stop trying to escape something that's already happened. We're bound together now, whether by choice or fate." The kitchen feels smaller, more intimate, walls responding to the intensity of our confession.

"I hate you," she says, but the words lack conviction. "I hate how you make me feel, how you've turned my life upside down." Her voice breaks completely, sobs shaking her small frame. "But I can't stop thinking about you, can't stop needing you to come back safely every time you leave."

The admission unleashes something primal in me, a possessive satisfaction that burns through my veins.

I pull her closer, crushing her against my chest, feeling how she fits perfectly against me despite the tension radiating from her body.

"Then stop pretending you don't want this," I murmur against her hair, breathing in the scent that has become as necessary as oxygen.

She looks up at me then, her face streaked with tears but her eyes blazing with something that might be surrender.

"I don't know how to want someone who terrifies me," she admits, her voice barely audible.

"I don't know how to love someone who could destroy me without trying.

" Her hands fist in my shirt, holding on despite her words of resistance.

"You don't have to know," I tell her, my voice gentle for the first time in hours. "You just have to trust me not to." My hands move to her back, holding her steady as her emotional walls crumble. "Trust me to protect you, to protect our child."

When her lips turn upward to meet mine, I cover them in a kiss that swallows her sobs.

As our lips meet, the world around us melts away.

The tension that has been building between us for days is released in a torrent of pent-up passion.

I back her up against the counter, my hands roaming her body, desperate to feel every inch of her soft skin.

Her fingers rake through my hair, pulling me closer as our kisses deepen.

Clothes are discarded haphazardly on the floor, our bodies entwining as if they were made for this moment. I pick her up, lifting her onto the granite counter, her skirt hiked up to her hips.

Rosaria's legs wrap around my waist, her heels digging into my back as I press her against the cool marble. Her nails rake down my back then around to my shirt where she begins to undo my buttons. All I can think about is how much I need her, how much I've missed the feel of her body against mine.

“Fuck, I need you,” I grunt into her neck as I continue hiking her skirt higher until her legs are bare and her panties are under my fingertips. I hook two fingers in each side of the elastic and pull, earning another gasp from her lips.

“Gentle…” she chides before biting my ear. Her teeth nip the lobe as her fingers work the buckle of my belt, and I slow my movements as her panties slip down over her calves.

“The baby,” I whisper, and she pauses just as her hand wraps around my girth. “It won’t hurt the baby?” Our eyes meet, and for the briefest of seconds, I see hesitation in her gaze, but she shakes her head, arching her neck and presenting her pulse point to me.

“Just don’t spank me too hard,” she purrs and pulls me closer. My stubble rakes along her neck as I pepper hot kisses there and hear her moan softly.

“So no choking or slamming into you so hard you can’t walk either?” My reward is a hearty chuckle as she strokes me and I grin against her shoulder.

“No choking, but you can slam into me all night as long as you make me come.”

With a growl of approval, I press her further into the counter, our bodies flush against each other as I enter her in one deep, possessive thrust. Rosaria's gasp echoes through the kitchen, her nails digging into my back as she holds on to me for balance.

I set a punishing pace, driving into her with urgency.

Her hips rise to meet mine, her legs tightening around my waist as she meets my fervor stroke for stroke.

"Salvatore," She moans my name, her eyes squeezed shut in pleasure.

A primal urge surges through me, a need to mark her as mine in the most primitive way possible.

I angle her body, one hand on her thigh, the other supporting her back as I drive even deeper inside her. The world reduces to the two of us.

Her moans grow louder, her hips moving in time with mine as we both edge closer to the precipice of orgasm.

" Cammora mia ," I growl in her ear, my accent thickened by desire.

"That's it, let go for me." My hand travels up her thigh, finding her clit as I continue to pound into her.

Her walls clench around me, tightening with building pleasure.

"Christ!" she grunts, clinging to me so that I almost can’t pull back to thrust in again.

With every thrust, Rosaria's grip on me tightens, her nails pressing into my back with enough force to leave marks I'll wear as badges of honor.

"Salvatore," she moans, the way she says my name a combination of supplication and demand.

I can't hold back any longer, my own climax barreling down on me like a freight train.

"Rosa," I growl, my voice unrecognizable even to my own ears as I feel myself release inside her, her name echoing off the kitchen walls.

She lets go, convulsing and contracting around my cock as I continue to thrust into her and fill her, and my lips find hers again, drinking in her tears and her sighs of pleasure.

I don’t know how I’m going to manage it, but somehow, I have to turn the tide of this war I’ve started with Emilio Costa.

Because once he finds out there is a child that has joined our families together, he isn’t going to be satisfied to win Rosaria back and control her again.

Things will get ugly fast, and now, there's more than just territory at stake.

My child must be protected at all costs.