Chapter 6 Six
Elena’s POV
His hand was around mine. Large, warm, utterly certain. Mine felt small and cool and trembled slightly in his grip. He didn’t comment on it. He just led me, weaving through a quieter, plush carpeted hallway away from the club’s heartbeat. I walked beside him, my mind a blank static. The brave hunter was gone, replaced by a woman hyper-aware of every point of contact: his palm against mine, the brush of his sleeve against my arm.
He stopped at a discreet, polished bronze elevator door, different from the public ones. He pressed a code into a keypad. A soft chime, the doors slid open soundlessly. A private elevator. Of course.
He guided me inside, his hand resting on the small of my back. The touch was light, but it seared through the silk. The doors closed, sealing us in a mirrored, silent box. The opulent noise of L’Ombra vanished, replaced by the hum of machinery and the sound of my own breathing, which suddenly seemed too loud.
He turned to face me. The elevator was spacious, but he made it feel small. He didn’t move aggressively, but he shifted, leaning a shoulder against the mirrored wall, his body angled toward me. He was just… closer. His presence didn’t crowd the space; it filled it, changing the very air. It became warmer, heavier with the scent cedar and something clean and sharp.
My back found the cool mirror behind me. I had nowhere to look but at him. The trembling in my hand moved inward, a flutter deep in my stomach.
“So,” he said, his voice a low rumble in the quiet. “What are you escaping from, tonight?”
The question, the same one from before, felt bigger here. More intimate. I looked into those endless dark eyes and saw no judgment, only a deep, patient curiosity. It made the truth spill out, stripped of pretense.
“A future I didn’t choose,” I whispered. It was the core of it. The simplified, brutal core.
He nodded slowly, as if I’d confirmed something. His gaze traveled over my face, my neck, the nervous clutch of my hands. “And you chose this instead?”
“Yes.” The word was braver than I felt.
“Good.” The single syllable was a seal of approval that warmed me in places it shouldn’t. “Then for tonight, that future doesn’t exist.”
He pushed off from the wall, closing the small distance between us. He didn’t touch me, not yet. He simply stood before me, looking down, his heat radiating against me. The elevator continued its smooth, silent ascent.
“You’re nervous,” he observed, not unkindly.
“I’m…” I trailed off terrifiedlost and utterly horny.
“You’re perfect,” he finished for me, his voice dropping to that whisper that vibrated in my bones.
Then his hand came up, not to my face, but to my own hand, which was gripping the small beaded clutch I’d brought. He pried it gently from my stiff fingers and let it fall soundlessly to the carpeted floor. The act felt profoundly intimate.
His fingers returned, this time to trace the line of my jaw, a feather-light touch that made my breath catch. His thumb brushed my lower lip. My eyes fluttered shut for a second, overwhelmed.
When I opened them, his face was closer. His gaze dropped to my mouth.
Every thought of plans, of safety, of rebellion, evaporated. There was only this man and the humming tension between us.
A deep, aching need pooled inside me, heavy and urgent, overriding every shred of nervousness.
I wanted his mouth on mine.
I wanted to feel that certainty against me.
I wanted to be consumed by this feeling, to let it burn away everything else.
As if he heard my silent plea, he leaned in to capture my lips in slow soul-swapping kiss.
His lips were firm, warm, moving against mine with a confident ease that melted my bones. One hand cradled the side of my face, his thumb stroking my cheek, while the other settled on my hip, pulling me gently until my body aligned with his. I felt the solid wall of his chest, the strength in his arms, and a soft, helpless sound escaped me.
I kissed him back hungrily. All my hesitation burned away in the heat of it. My hands came up, sliding over the impossibly fine wool of his jacket, feeling the powerful shoulders beneath. The world narrowed to the slick, hot slide of his mouth, the taste of him: dark and sweet like espresso.
The clean scent of him was everywhere. My fingers tangled in the hair at the nape of his neck, and he deepened the kiss, his tongue sweeping in, and I met it with my own, a surge of pure want so strong it was dizzying.
The elevator chimed.
We broke apart, both of us breathing heavily. His forehead rested against mine, his eyes were closed. I could feel his heart hammering against my chest, a wild echo of my own. His thumb was still stroking my cheek in a slow, possessive rhythm.
The doors had opened. Beyond him, I glimpsed a space all soft light and shadows, a wall of windows overlooking the sleeping city.
He didn’t move for a long moment, just held me there in the threshold, our breaths mingling. When he finally opened his eyes, the look in them was fierce, focused, and so hot it stole the air from my lungs.
“Come with me,” he said again, his voice rough now, transformed by the kiss.
And I would have followed him anywhere.
MATTEO
Her hand was small and cool in mine. It trembled, just a faint, betraying vibration. The vulnerability beneath the emerald bravado was the most intoxicating thing I’d ever tasted. She had walked into the fire, and now, holding her, I could feel the heat of her fear and her astonishing courage.
Leading her to the private elevator was like guiding a skittish, magnificent bird. She was all wide, dark eyes and thrumming energy. In the mirrored box, her nervousness was a palpable scent, jasmine and resolve. She told me she was escaping a future she didn’t choose. The pieces clicked together with perfect, beautiful irony.
Oh, little painter.
You glorious, defiant fool.
You came to my den to give yourself to a stranger to spite the monster you think awaits you.
You are rebelling against me, by using me.
The realization sent a dark, thrilling pleasure through me. Her rebellion was more perfect than I could have orchestrated. She had chosen her own cage for the night, unaware she was stepping into the keeper’s arms.
As the elevator ascended, I watched her. The way her pulse fluttered at the base of her throat. The quick rise and fall of her chest beneath that devastating green silk. She was trying so hard to be brave, to own this moment. The desire to shatter that control, to see what lay beneath, was a drumbeat in my blood.
I crowded her gently against the wall not to trap her, but to immerse her in the moment.
Her breath hitched, her eyes locked on mine, drowning in a confusion of fear and a dawning, answering hunger. I could smell it on her, that sharp, sweet scent of arousal cutting through the jasmine. It made my head swim.
When I kissed her, it was a strategic move meant to disarm, to claim. But the moment my lips touched hers, strategy evaporated.
She was on fire, her mouth was soft and shockingly responsive.
The little gasp she gave, the way her hands fisted in my jacket, then slid up to clutch at me, unraveled something tightly wound inside me.
Her kiss was not practiced or coy. It was honest, a surrender and an attack all at once, fueled by a desperate kind of lust that mirrored my own.
I felt a deep, throbbing hunger that had nothing to do with my plan and everything to do with the woman in my arms.
The kiss deepened, turned consuming. I forgot the cameras, the city below, my own name. There was only the taste of her, the feel of her slender body pressed against mine, the soft sounds she made in the back of her throat. My hand on her hip gripped her tighter, pulling her into the hard evidence of my own need. She didn’t pull away. She melted, her body arching into mine. The horny ache that had been a constant, low hum since I saw her at the bar became a demanding roar.
The elevator chimed, a rude interruption. I broke the kiss, resting my forehead against hers, fighting to regain the control I’d so effortlessly lost. Her breath was ragged against my lips, her eyes closed. She was flushed, beautifully ruined, and entirely mine in that moment.
The doors were open to my penthouse. My sanctuary. My true territory.
As I looked at her, a new strategy crystalized, born from the ashes of the old one and the fever she’d ignited. Tonight would not be about taking something from her. That was the plan of a petty man. A brutish one.
No. Tonight would be about giving.
I would give her such pleasure, such profound, shattering connection, that it would imprint on her soul. I would weave myself into the very fabric of her first real act of freedom. I would be the invisible standard by which all else was measured. Every time the old, fictional Don Valtieri touched her, she would remember the stranger in the elevator. She would remember my hands, my mouth, the way I made her feel utterly possessed and utterly free at the same time.
I would replace the memory of fear with the memory of me.
She opened her eyes, looking dazed, ravished, more beautiful than anything I’d ever owned.
You wanted one night to remember, I thought, leading her out of the elevator into the soft darkness of the suite, her hand still trustingly in mine. I will ensure you remember nothing else.