Page 86 of Phantom Mine

He doesn’t know it, but being at the bar helps me. It gives me better access than being on a stage.

I don’t appreciate his territoriality though, not when he continued adding notches to his bedpost after we met, and definitely not when he’s about to be owned by somebody else.

“Fine.” I exhale sharply through my nostrils. “But the second you touch your fiancée, Phantom, I’m done. You and I are through.”

“I won’t.”

“You will soon, and that’s fine.” My stomach lurches in revolt, demanding that I take that lie back. “But not while you’re touching me.”

His lips twitch again. “Like I said, I’ve already got my hands full with you.”

For now.

Those words go unsaid at the end of his sentence, but I hear them anyway.

“And outside of the bedroom, you stay out of my way,” I add. “I have things to do, you understand that now. I won’t have you interfering in them.”

It’s his turn to flare his nostrils angrily.

Compartmentalization. That’s the game plan moving forward. If I keep him contained to my nights, then I can use my days to focus on the investigation atFirenzeand finally free myself from the distraction that is his presence.

“Fine,” he says.

“Fine,” I quip back, matching his tone.

Matteo throws on a pair of trousers, then stalks towards me and eventually past me out of his bedroom. Perplexed, I follow and watch him put on his shoes and grab his coat.

“Where are you going?” I ask.

He grabs his car keys from the counter. “I’m driving you home.”

“If I argue, can I get you to change your mind?”

“Nope.”

I jam the call button, cursing him out beneath my breath in my native tongue.

Matteo groans and walks into the elevator beside me. “Every time you insult me in Spanish, my dick gets hard. I think I’m starting to develop a degradation kink myself.”

“Your dick gets hard when I smile at you so that’s not exactly an earth shattering update.”

“Wrong. At this point if you genuinely smiled at me,cara, I think my dick might actually explode.”

I bite my bottom lip to stifle the inadvertent smile that tries to bloom to life at his words.

“Hey,” Matteo grumbles crossly, closing his palm around my nape. “That doesn’t mean you get to hide them from me either. What’s a little dick explosion when I’ve already taken a bullet for you tonight?”

The elevator opens just as I burst out laughing.

God, that feels good.

It’s like a gust of fresh air blows through my soul. I didn’t realize my body was perpetually tense until I feel it relax, the muscles in my shoulders loosening as the laughter works its way through me.

When’s the last time I laughed? Actuallylaughedwith abandon?

I’m halfway to the Maserati when I notice Matteo isn’t following. He’s frozen in the frame of the elevator with an almost intoxicated look on his face, one hand pressed against the doors to keep them from closing as he stares at me with an intensity that quiets the demons in my mind.

“Are you coming?” I ask.

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