Chapter 96 The man in the painting
Dante POV
I had always been a man of simple pleasures. Violence, whiskey, women and games on a screen or a field was all I wanted. That had been the shape of my life for years, raw and uncomplicated but three months ago, something shifted. I found myself consumed by a new obsession which was Isabella.
Her name alone had become a vice and my mouth moved over her slowly, deliberately, savoring every reaction she gave me. I let myself linger, tasting her, learning her all over again like she was something rare and forbidden. I did not need to coax her body into wanting me because she was already trembling, already open, already drenched in heat that belonged only to me. That was not why I did this. I did it because I craved it and because I liked hearing the way her breathing filled the darkness of the room and because I liked how her fingers clutched at my wrists like I was the only solid thing in her world.
She arched beneath me, her body answering mine without hesitation, and I let myself take my time. I moved upward slowly, worshipping every inch of her skin like it was sacred. My mouth traced her chest, her throat, the fragile places where her pulse betrayed her. I had been inside her countless times, memorized every curve and sound she made, yet somehow she never felt familiar. Every time was new and every time was a discovery.
I held back on purpose and I denied her the kiss she wanted, the release she needed, just to feel her twist beneath me in helpless anticipation. It was a cruel game one that burned both of us. Because the longer I waited, the more it tore at my control too. I wanted her just as badly as she wanted me maybe even worse.
When I finally hovered above her, our faces inches apart, the air between us felt electric. My hands parted her thighs and I pressed against her slowly, letting her feel every second of it. My eyes locked on hers but my mind drifted somewhere else to that painting. The one she made of me and the way she had seen something in me that no one else ever had, her fingers dug into my shoulders, her breath uneven. “Dante please.”
A woman like her should never have to beg. I gave her a faint smile, low and rough. “Easy, baby.” Then I pushed forward, slow and deep, feeling her body welcome me with a tight warmth that made my jaw clench she was slick with both her own need and me, making the slide effortless, but I still felt the resistance, the way her body stretched to take all of me. I buried myself inside her and let out a quiet groan. “I missed this.”
Her hands moved into my hair, holding me there like she never wanted me to leave. “It missed you too,” she whispered, her lips brushing mine before she kissed me fully, deeply, like she was pouring herself into me.
I started moving then, steady and unrelenting, listening to the rhythm we created together. The sounds, the heat, the friction. It always felt like drowning and breathing at the same time. She clung to me, her legs wrapped tight around my waist, pulling me closer like distance itself was a threat.
Ever since she came back from Milan, it had been like this. I could not stay away from her. I would have her, lose myself in her, and still crave her again hours later like an addiction I could never satisfy no other woman had ever done that to me. If I had gone to anyone else, it would have been empty, forgettable and mechanical because no one else was Isabella.
She hated what I was hated the darkness I carried, the promise I had made to destroy her family piece by piece but her hatred never reached the core. Beneath it was something deeper, something tangled and dangerous, something neither of us dared name.
That painting proved it that she did not see a monster. She saw a man who had nothing no family and no past worth remembering. No future waiting for him just deals, blood, and the few men who stood beside me in the shadows. No love, no warmth and no one who would mourn when I was gone.
I will be alone, so damn alone and somehow she understood that. She saw the war inside me, she knew revenge would never give me peace, that every victory would still leave me standing in the same empty place and still, she stayed. Still, she touched me like I was worth something.
Why would I ever want anyone else after that?
I pushed her over the edge quickly too quickly. All that restraint had been a mistake because the second I let go, she shattered her cry broke against my mouth as her nails dragged across my skin, sharp enough to sting. Her body tightened around me, pulsing, clenching, dragging me deeper into the storm she created.
I watched her come undone, completely captivated the way her face changed the way her eyes squeezed shut before flying open again, brighter, darker, hungrier. She looked at me like I was the reason the world existed like I was both heaven and ruin completely beautiful, asolutely devastating and in that moment, as she lay beneath me, breathless and glowing, I realized something that sent a cold edge through the heat still burning in my veins because if she ever found out what I had done tonight what I was about to do next she would never look at me like that again.