Page 5 of Dad Bod's Naughty List

My head whips to the man and I shake my head. “No, I was just… um… it seems like it’s going to snow heavily tonight.”Good save.

“Looks like it.”

Then we fall back into silence and neither of us speaks for the rest of the drive to the art gallery. The second I spot the gallery, my focus shifts from Orlando’s heavy presence to the massive building that holds some of the best artwork in the country. When I am not daydreaming about Orlando, my mind is always on this place, wondering if I’ll ever have any of my art displayed in the gallery. The place I consider home.

I plant my face to the window and gawk up at it. “Do you think we can stay out a little later than usual?”

“Arianna.”

I turn to look at him pleadingly. “Please, maybe an hour or two. No one will notice if I get home late and if they do, I’ll just tell them I was out with my friends.”

He’s caving, the way he always does when I flutter my lashes at him and blink up at him innocently every time I want to get my way. “Fine.”

I am already opening the car door the second the words are out. Orlando is beside me before I can make it to the entrance where we purchase two tickets. I’ve been here a hundred times before but walking through these doors always feels surreal. No, walking through them with Orlando by my side feels surreal.

He is the only one who knows about my passion for painting. The one thing I have kept for myself.

When I was five, I started learning to play the piano because my mother wanted to show me off to her friends and brag about how talented I was. I agreed to study economics because it's what my father wanted. The family's princess, a doll everyone gets to play with.

No one’s ever asked me what I want. I’ve never had a choice in my life and every decision from what I eat to how I think is all planned for me, but painting is mine. I started painting to relieve family pressure but found out I was actually good at it, but no one in my family cares to know this part of me.

The silent man who's always by my side knows me better than anyone in my family does. I've let him into my world and a part of me can't help but wonder when he'll let me into his.

Chapter Two

Orlando

She is in her element. Here in this hall, surrounded by paintings and sculptures that command her attention like nothing I have witnessed before.

And my eyes are on her.They are always on her.

See, that’s not how bodyguarding works. You don’t spend the entire time watching your client,wanting them. I am trained to be aware of our surroundings and it’s the same damn way I train my men to act but for the life of me, I can’t remember to do any of that around her.

Arianna Lorenzo is… forbidden.

She is that sweet juicy apple I am not allowed to touch. No matter how many short skirts she wears or how much she unbuttons her shirt to reveal her bra, I cannot touch her. Not if I want to make it to my fortieth birthday. I am a powerful and wealthy man in my own right, but I am not Constanzo Lorenzo. The mob boss would have my head if I touched his precious daughter.

My dick hasn’t gotten the memo that she’s forbidden. Christ, I’ve been hard from the moment I spotted her with her friends and my cock hasn’t gone down. It doesn’t seem like it’s going to go down any time soon.

"Oh, this one is my favorite," the girl squeals, flashing me a wide toothy grin before rushing towards a painting we've seen a billion times. Is it a duck, or a horse? Gun to my head and I would still have no fucking clue what the hell I am supposed to be looking at. "I wonder what the artist was thinking when she painted this masterpiece."

The weird painting is not a masterpiece. Aria on the other hand… is a masterpiece that is forbidden. I need to remind myself of that little fact.

“…Look at these lines. They are so neat and clear. I bet it took her ages to master it; or do you think it’s natural talent?”

“Both,” I respond, figuring she needs an answer.

“For sure,” she says with a happy sigh before moving to the next painting and complimenting the artist before doing the same for the next and the one after that. Before I know it, we’ve rounded the room and my obsessed little client has gone through all the paintings in the building, including the ones upstairs and it’s not until we’re walking back down when I realize we’ve been here for three hours.

Fuck!

It seems we were both so lost in our fascinations that I forgot to check the time. “We need to leave, Arianna.”

"Already?" she whines, fluttering her eyes at me, and goddamn it, I almost give in but I don't allow myself to be swept away by her beautiful brown eyes.

“It’s already past eight. Your father must be worried.”

Aria chews on her bottom lip, her eyes contemplative before she steps into my space. She’s so close I can smell the sweet rosy scent clinging to her skin. “You know I’m a big girl, right?”

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