Chapter 12

CHAPTER TWELVE

ALYSSA

L orenzo and Antonio are driving me up a wall. They’ve been arguing about which flowers to choose. When I asked Brynne to choose between the two they were arguing over, she said either, making the argument worse.

“That’s going to clash with her dress!” Lorenzo says again.

“Brynne hasn’t picked a dress yet,” I answer. “We’re going tomorrow. But let’s assume it’ll be white, yeah? I agree with Lorenzo; the white flowers need to go.”

Antonio fumes, his eyes flaring as he tosses the photograph of the flowers to the ground.

“You two don’t listen to shit.”

I never knew two made men would get this involved in a fucking wedding. At first, it was cute. Now, I’m annoyed, hungry, and sick of their shit.

My phone rings, and I look down and tap answer before Lorenzo calls Antonio something that doesn’t sound very kind in Italian.

“Alright!” I slap the table as hard as I can. “Let’s take a thirty-minute break. Meet back here after you’ve cooled off some. So help me, God, if you two come back here with the same attitudes, I’ll stain the white flowers with your blood and call it a fucking day!”

Lorenzo looks at Antonio, and they share a look of shock before moving out of the room.

Placing the phone to my ear, I finally say, “Hey.”

Brynne and Slate are both laughing on the other end. “I don’t think you two are funny in the slightest. Saddling me with these two goons was like a sentence for punishment. I’m wondering what I did to make you both hate me.”

Brynne takes the phone off speaker and tries to control her laugh. “I’m sorry, Lyss. I’ve never heard you so mad before, and I wish I could’ve seen their faces.”

“They both looked at me as if I was the problem. They’ve been acting like this all fucking day, I’m ready for a fucking drink.”

“Have you made progress, at least?” she asks.

I look down at all the finalized plans, sighing. “Yeah, we’ve gotten a shit ton done. Until we got on the subject of flowers.”

“I was calling you about that. I was wondering if we could get Orchids. He sent them to me once, and I’d love to have them as part of the wedding.”

“Done. I’ll tell the goof troop when they come back in.”

My phone pings, and I put Brynne on speaker to look at the text. “Dante?! How the fuck did Dante get my number?”

I narrow my eyes as I read the text.

Hey, it’s Dante. How is wedding planning going?”

Brynne’s silence is telling, and I wait for her to fess up.

“I may have given it to him, but not for nefarious reasons. He said he had a wedding planning question.”

“Wedding planning question, my ass. He’s making small talk.”

“Uh-oh, he must have some devious plan to see how your day is going. Whatever will you do?”

Her sarcasm is not appreciated, and I roll my eyes.

I swipe his message away, not answering it as I place my phone on the table and press my forehead to the cold marble.

“He kissed me,” I tell Brynne, and she lets my admission hover a bit before saying anything.

“Okay? And?”

“He hasn’t kissed anyone since Anna.”

“Holy fuck.” I hear Brynne exhale shakily. “Wait, he told you about Anna?”

“He did, and Brynne? I don’t know if I should tell you this, but I think we need to keep an eye on him. I know this is your big day, but Anna’s service was at St. Andrews.”

“Oh, God.” I hear her sniffle, and I know she’s crying. She and Dante got close these last few weeks, and I know she’s sad for him to face this. “Why would he go there and set all this up? It doesn’t make sense.”

I smile. “Because he loves you. He wants you to have the best wedding ever. I’ve looked at the pictures of St. Andrews, girl. It’s beautiful.”

“I know, so did I. I had no idea...” she trails off.

“I know you didn’t. Slate knows. It’s why he asked him last night if he was alright.”

“I caught that, too. I was going to ask him, but then after you left...”

I grin, knowing where that sentence is headed.

“I really think you should give him a chance. If not now, let him grow on you, Lyss.”

I bite my cheek. “It’s just so hard to unlearn and undo all I’ve done to become who I am. As long as I can remember, I didn’t want a man or a family, B. I wanted to do this life on my own, blowing through life like a wild tumbleweed.”

“You still can,” she counters. “Dante won’t dull your shine. I know he won’t. Shit, the last few days, you’ve been shimmering brighter. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have.”

“I know, B. It’s just... I can’t focus on him and me right now. I’m focusing on you, okay?”

“Got it. We’re still on for dress shopping tomorrow?” she asks.

“Absolutely! Are you sure you don’t want to attend the cake tasting tonight? That’s usually something for the bride and groom to do together.”

She sighs. “No. I know you’ll pick something I’ll love, and Slate and I have some merger shit to get handled.”

“Got it. No worries, I’ll get it done. Love you, B.”

“Love you, Lyss. Talk later.”

My phone pings again as I end the call—another text.

I know you read that. Are you still playing hard to get? I love a game; I’ll play along if I have to.

I can’t help the grin that plays on my lips, but as Lorenzo and Antonio come down the hall, bonding over the fact that I lost it on them, I swipe the message away.

They sit down and look at one another before Lorenzo says, “We’ve decided on a flower.”

“Doesn’t matter, Brynne wants Orchids.”

The two of them fire up again at the fact they lost their vote, and I eye my phone as I tune their new argument out, fighting with myself over whether or not I’m going to cave and text him back.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I grab it and type out a quick message.

If you love games, you’ve got the wrong girl. I’m working with two men who don’t know how to problem-solve to save their lives. How’s your day going?

Want me to kill them for you?

I don’t think violence is necessary.

Violence is always necessary.

At least I’ll get silence tonight at the cake tasting.

Going alone?

Yes. Brynne and Slate are tied up with meetings.

Send me the address; I’ll meet you there after I go home and shower.

I’ll do you one better. I’ll meet you at home with dinner. We can eat before we go, so we don’t fill up on cake.

I’m keeping my innuendo-filled comment to myself.

I appreciate it. What would you like for dinner?

You, but I’ll settle for Chinese of some sort. You choose the place.

See you at six, then.

That you will.

I try to ignore the giddy energy in my stomach as I read the messages over and over. I’m unclear what Lorenzo and Antonio are arguing over now that I realize I referred to his apartment as our home .

This is the dangerous thing about letting my guard down. Dante storms in with his troops when my defenses are down, determined to overthrow my carefully built plans.

I can’t let him.

I’m unpacking the Chinese food when I hear the door slam shut and boots sounding on the marble floors.

“I hope you’re ready to overeat because I couldn’t choose what I wanted, so I got nearly everything on the menu. We will say it’s a working dinner and charge Slate and Brynne for the food... Oh, my God, what happened to you?”

I drop the egg rolls on the counter, rushing him to check him over for wounds. He’s covered head to toe in blood, stinking of the metallic stuff.

His eyes are dark and feral, as if a beast from the depths is still creeping through them.

“I’m fine, tesoro. Thank you for the concern.”

He leans down, skimming his nose up my throat like he’d been waiting all day to do so.

“Dante,” I breathe, trying to steady my breathing and failing.

“You smell so fucking good,” he growls, and I’m afraid of the way my pussy throbs at his words. I’m scared to examine too closely how much my stomach had spun, too, if I’m honest.

“Is the other guy alright?” I ask him.

There’s so much blood soaking him that I’m confident the answer is no.

“You said you knew what I did for a living. That you understood, that look in your eyes, tesoro, says otherwise.”

I knew he took over the Enforcer position for the Ricci Family, but I think I blocked out thoughts of the blood and the killing.

“What do you keep calling me?” I ask him as he lifts and places me on the island’s edge.

“Darling,” he says, tucking hair behind my ears from my wind-whipped hair.

The nickname has done something to my insides, I ignore it. “I don’t need a nickname.”

“You do need a nickname, tesoro. Besides, you said I couldn’t call you menace.”

“Why do you need to call me anything?”

He shrugs. “To denote my ownership, I guess.”

I laugh, shoving him back. “You don’t fucking own me.”

I hop off the island and sidestep him to the fridge.

He’s on me in a flash, pressing my front into the cold metal of the appliance.

“You’re mine. Even if you don’t want to admit it yet, I’ll give you the time you need,” he whispers in my ear, and I have to fight the shiver tangling at the base of my spine.

With that, he shuffles off to his room, slamming yet another door behind him.

I stay flush with the fridge for a few more moments, wondering how I’m going to survive a night with him since he’s in such a mood.

I know he’s killed, and it seems killing makes Dante wild.

Wild Dante is a flavor I want to taste more than I want to taste fucking cake, and that could be dangerous.

When he’s out of the shower, we eat in uncomfortable silence. He is dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, which is currently making me a bit feral if I’m honest. I know he sees me gawking because I can't take my eyes off him but, thankfully, he hasn't said anything.

“We need to get going if we’re going to make the tasting,” I tell him once we’ve cleaned dinner up and he’s washing his hands.

“I’m ready when you are, darling.”

Great, now he’s taken to calling me his unnerving nickname in my language.

I grab my bag and stand beside the door as he turns off the lights, arms the alarm, and then opens the door for me to exit.

“Shit, I forgot to call the car,” I say. I’m not used to this life where you can have someone drive you around at the drop of a fucking hat.

“We won’t need a driver tonight,” Dante says, hitting the button to take us to the basement, where I know the parking garage for this building is.

“Oh, alright. Perfect, then.”

I shift on my heels, eager to see what he drives. If this man drives like he fucks, I’m in too deep and need to just go home to Florida. I’m a sucker for a man with an expensive car, and Dante Ricci already ticks too many boxes on my build-the-perfect man card, and if he checks any more of them, I’ll be checking myself into an asylum.

He leads me to a black Maserati Ghibli, opening the door for me to get in, and I nearly groan when I slide across the red leather seat, breathing in the scent of the sexy ass car as he rounds the front of it and gets inside.

The engine rumbles to life, vibrating across my skin, and I keep my eyes forward as I bite my lip to release some of the building tension between where Dante is backing the car up with one veiny arm and where I’m melting into the red, hand-stitched seat next to him.

When he drives out of the parking garage, placing his hand on my exposed thigh where my dress rode up, his black rose tattoo flexing as he squeezes, I check another box off on my fucking list in his favor.

If I don’t get away from this man, he will hire a firing squad to take down all my defenses and lead the charge himself.

Soon, I might fucking let him.

“Where to, tesoro?” he asks, gravel tone full of lust that makes my panties soak through as I pull up the cake place on my GPS.

Handing it over to him, I catch his eyes. He flashes me a grin that says he knows he’s winning me over, and I nearly fucking punch him.

Dante Ricci is the Devil in a saint’s clothing, and I want the Devil to pull this sexy ass car over and let me ride him instead. Thoughts like those will get me in trouble.

“Tesoro?”

I shake out of my lust-induced stupor and loll my head on my headrest toward Dante.

“What did you say?” I ask him.

He leans over, shoving the stick into park as he smirks. “I said we’re here, but I don’t think you care about that now, do you?”

“Of course, I care. We have to do the cake thing for Brynne,” I breathe, sounding foolish as I can’t keep my words from slurring.

“Mmm. We do. I don’t think you’ll be able to focus, however.”

His lips hover near mine, and my breathing grows slow and shallow. “Why?” I squeak.

His hand inches up my thigh, fingers brushing my panties aside. “Because of how bad you want to come right now.”

“Dante,” I all but whimper when he slips his fingers inside me.

I fist the front of his shirt in my left hand, and my right finds the door as I lift off the seat an inch and give him more room to work.

“How about I make you come for me, and then we go do the cake thing . Sound good?”

I nod frantically. He’s mocking me, but I don’t care. I can’t care.

“There’s a good girl. I love it when you’re compliant. Your sassy mouth rarely behaves,” he taunts, but I’m moaning at his praise.

“Like that, do you? You want to be my good girl?”

Another frenzied nod.

“Your nature says otherwise, unless...” he trails off, eyes locking on mine as my mouth drops open when the heel of his palm connects with my clit in just the right way.

“Unless you do it on purpose,” he finishes. There’s a question floating in his eyes, but he’s still working me out. All the while, I’m hoping he doesn’t probe any further.

“You misbehave like a dirty little slut, but you say you want to be my good girl.”

I groan so loudly that people walking by have likely heard me, even over the engine’s purr.

Dante chuckles darkly.

He’s figured out one of my kinks, and I’m floundering at his hand.

“Come for me, be my good little slut. If you make us late, I’m going to spank you in front of everyone on this street.”

My mind says he won’t, but I won’t press him.

He’s found my weak spot; I know I’m a goner.

So I listen and come violently, screaming his name and a string of curse words through the car as I feel my cum wash over his fingers.

When he slips out of me, replacing my panties over my throbbing, swollen pussy, he shoves them in my mouth.

“Clean them off.”

I do, gagging on them when he shoves too far. The entire time, our eyes are locked in a dangerous gaze.

He faces forward again, adjusting his massive cock in his jeans before he steps out of the car.

I take a few steadying breaths as he comes around and opens my door, offering me the same hand he just made me come with as help out.

He slams the car door behind me, leaning down and whispering, “Such a good girl, tesoro.”

I’m done. It’s the end of an era.

Single, loner Alyssa is changing by the second, and I have a feeling I have to get to know this version of myself. Dante will accept nothing less.