Page 36 of Corrupt Vows

I drop onto one knee, pop the box open, and offer her the ring inside.

“Serenity Vivaldi, will you marry me?”

I register the shock on her parents’ faces. A proposal wasn’t part of the plan. Announcing our engagement in no way required me to get down on one knee, but Serenity means more to me than I can express.

I’ll do anything for her.

Her breath hitches. She darts her attention between my eyes, not even glancing at the ring.

Alfonso Bonnetti shifts from foot to foot at the edge of my periphery. The urge to fling her over my shoulder and carry her away caveman style grips me.

Serenity’s pupils shrink and disappointment flashes in her eyes, but she lifts her lips in a tremulous smile and says yes.

I slip the ring onto her delicate finger and kiss the back of her hand before rising and enveloping her in my arms. She settles her hands on my waist and tilts her head back as I lean down.

My cock hardens the instant our lips meet, but instead of scandalizing her in front of everyone, I end the kiss before we get lost in one another.

To the sound of applause, I tuck her against my side and head toward the door.

Serenity’s happiness falters when she meets Camilla’s fake smile, but Natalie hoots and steals her attention. Affection softens her expression, and she reaches out to pat my sister’s shoulder on the way past.

Unease creeps down my spine as I meet Narciso Vivaldi’s eyes, but he turns and congratulates my father before I can dissect the reason.

Alfonso Bonnetti tries to hide his glare behind his glass. I don’t spare him a second glance as I usher Serenity through the double doors.

We’ve fulfilled our duty to our families. Now it’s time to fulfill the ache between my legs.

Because heaven knows one quick session of heavy petting won’t be enough. I need more.

I need my fiancée tangled in the sheets underneath me, gasping my name between countless orgasms.

I need Serenity Vivaldi in my bed.

Now.

Chapter 11

Serenity Vivaldi

A deafening silencefills the car as Nico weaves through the streets. I glance behind us at the empty back seat.

“Don’t you have a driver?” I ask.

“No,” he says.

When no other words seem forthcoming, I redirect the vents away from me.

“Natalie sat there last,” Nico says, as though to explain everything, before turning down the blower.

“Does her prosthetic sleeve still make her leg hot?”

His only response is to grunt. I turn and look out the window, wanting to escape the awkward silence, but I’m trapped in the car beside him.

His entire countenance changed the moment I sat in the seat.

I swallow the lump of emotion forming in my throat. I was only five years old when his mom died in a car crash, but I was inconsolable for days until my parents took me to the hospital to see him and his sister. My stomach twists as I remember Natalie’s tiny body covered in bandages with tubes coming out of her nose and mouth. Nico wasn’t much better. He’d had burns and scrapes everywhere, and a mask over his face to battle the effects of smoke inhalation.

Mamma stopped me from crawling onto the bed with him, but he’d lowered his hand and let me hold his finger for a while before he fell asleep.

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