Page 12 of Sin & Sapphire

“More, please, Luca,” she gasped, flexing her hips and dragging me deeper into her.

“Such a good girl,” I praised her. “Telling me what you needed, coming here to take it from me.” Each snap of my hips up into her was heaven, our desperation making each moment more precious.

“Luca,” she whined. “I’m so close.”

I tamped down my selfish instinct to tease and edge her until she cried, instead continuing my litany of sweet words in her ear, telling her how beautiful she was, how perfectly she took me, how clever she was, how fucking tight her pussy was squeezing around me.

“Please,” she begged, the word a prayer on her tongue as she clenched around me.

“Say my name, baby. Tell me who you belong to,” I growled. She wouldn’t. She never had. Ana had never been mine, and no matter how much I might wish for it to be so, she’d never tempted fate by lying to me about it.

“Please,” she pleaded again.

I hitched her tighter around my waist, then pushed her hard against the wall. She dropped her head back against the door and let me fuck her the way I wanted to, until we were both crying out our releases. My rhythm slowed as I pumped in and out of her.

Fuck.

I hadn’t used a condom.

Warm pride spread through my chest. I loved the idea of filling her with my cum, of her going to sleep with me inside her, of putting a baby in this fucking goddess of a woman so she’d never leave me.

Ana slumped against me, her fingers trailing against the back of my neck. Instead of sliding her off me, I turned and carried her to the bathroom and set her on the counter beside the sink.

“Hey there,” she said, her lips forming a smile as she watched me draw a bath.

“Hey, you,” I said, smiling back at her. Ana kicked her feet against the cabinet door under the sink as I puttered around the bathroom, filling the tub with the luxury bubble bath she liked. When it was the perfect temperature, I scooped her up in my arms and deposited her in the water, delighted at her shout of shocked laughter.

“Join me?” The uncertainty in her eyes as she looked up at me broke my goddamned heart. She had to know that I’d give her anything, do anything she asked. If only she’d ask.

“Always,” I promised and slid in behind her, enveloping her with my much larger frame. She leaned back against me and let her head loll against my shoulder as we breathed in the steam together, coming back down to earth after our frantic coupling. “How’re you doing?” I asked knowing she’d lie.

“This sucks,” she answered, shocking the hell out of me. She drew shapes in the bubbles with her long fingers. “I’m not sorry he’s dead, though.”

I kissed the top of her head, but didn’t say anything.

“I wish I—” She cut herself off, then turned so she could see my face.

When Ana cupped my face with her hands, it was all I could do to stop myself from crushing her to me, making promises I’d never be able to keep, and begging her to run away with me.

She didn’t finish her sentence, so I leaned my forehead against hers. It wasn’t fair to tell her how much I cared about her now, not when she had to walk away from me forever when we woke up.

“Stay the night?” I asked her softly. She never did—it was too dangerous—but I always asked, just in case.

“Wake me up before dawn?” she whispered, surprising me again.

“Of course.” I’d have given her the fucking moon if she’d asked. Setting my alarm was the least I could do. She always came without her phone in case there was a tracker on it.

Silently, we washed each other reverently, carefully, until our touches turned frantic and we fucked again in the bathtub, then in the shower, then on the bed, until we fell into an exhausted sleep, tangled up in one another’s arms, each of us pretending to be strong for the other.

And in the morning, she was gone.

5

ANA

The gatesto the Costa family estate swung open, and the town car that met me at the Sicilian airport drove in, the tires crackling over the pebbled drive. We wound our way through terraced vineyards until we arrived at a terracotta villa, picturesque against the hills of Sicily.

I’d only visited twice as a child, and never as an adult. My grandfather, Nonno, waited for us, standing straight in front of the double doors, even though he carried a cane for support—or to smack errant teenagers into behaving, as the case may be.

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