Page 4 of Marked for Life

Her pulse flutters beneath my fingertips as I trace the delicate line of her throat. She's afraid—I can taste it on her skin, sweet as honeyed wine—but there's something else there too. Desire. Surrender. The inevitable recognition that she belongs to me.

"Look at me," I command, tilting her chin upward. Those hazel eyes, flecked with gold and defiance, meet mine reluctantly. "Do you understand what you are to me? Not a possession, Hannah. That's too simple. You're my oxygen. My redemption."

She tries to turn away. I don't allow it.

"You think I'm a monster," I whisper against her ear, feeling her shiver. "Perhaps I am. But monsters can worship too."

My hands map her body with reverent precision, memorizing every freckle, every scar. That delicate ankle with its childhood reminder. The soft curve where her waist meets her hip. The constellation of beauty marks across her left shoulder blade that I've counted in the darkness a hundred times while she slept.

"I've built empires," I tell her, lowering her to the silk sheets that cost more than her father's monthly salary. "I've broken men with a word. I've accumulated wealth that would makekings envious. And none of it—" my voice breaks unexpectedly "—none of it matters compared tothis. To you."

Her fingers clutch the sheets as I move lower, pressing kisses down the valley between her breasts. "Dante," she breathes, uncertainty clouding her voice.

"Let go," I growl, frustration edging my tone when I feel her tense. "Stop fighting what we both know is inevitable."

"I can't just?—"

"You can. You will." My mouth finds her center, and her protest dissolves into a gasp. I work her methodically, reading her body's responses like a book I've studied for years. When she tries to squirm away, overwhelmed, I pin her hips firmly to the mattress.

"Please," she begs, though whether she's pleading for release or reprieve, I don't care to determine.

"Surrender to me," I demand against her heated flesh. "Give me everything."

When her first climax hits, her back arches like a perfect bow, my name tearing from her throat in a scream that satisfies something primal within me. But I don't stop. I continue my relentless worship, bringing her to the edge again, watching her face contort with pleasure bordering on pain.

"Too much," she sobs, trying to push me away.

I capture her wrists in one hand, pressing them above her head. Her resistance excites me more than her surrender ever could. This delicate dance between us—her futile attempts to deny what belongs to me, my absolute certainty in claiming it—it's what makes her different from all the others.

"Nothing with you is ever too much," I tell her, my voice rough with need. "I want you mindless. Shattered. So thoroughly consumed that you forget where you end and I begin."

Her chest heaves with rapid breaths, tears glistening in the corners of those defiant eyes. Beautiful. So goddamn beautiful it makes something in my chest ache.

"I hate you," she whispers, but her body betrays her. She's wet against my fingers as I slide them inside her, watching her eyelids flutter.

"No you don’t," I reply, working her slowly, deliberately. "Your body says otherwise."

When I enter her, the sound she makes—half sob, half moan—is my undoing. I've had countless women in my bed, but none have ever felt like Hannah. None have ever made me feel this desperate, this unhinged.

"Look at me," I command again as I move within her. "I want to see you when you come apart."

Reluctantly, she opens her eyes, and for a moment—just one fleeting moment—the walls she's built against me crumble. I see everything: her fear, her desire, her confusion, and something dangerously close to understanding.

That's what terrifies me most about Hannah Brightley and what I think inspires my deep obsession with her. Not her resistance, but the moments when she sees through the monster to the man beneath. The man I've spent decades burying.

I increase my pace, driving us both toward oblivion. Her nails score my back, marking me as surely as I've marked her. When her release crashes through her, I follow immediately, my control shattered by the sight of her undoing.

After, as our breathing slows, I gather her against me. She doesn't fight this—she never does afterward, when exhaustion makes her pliant. I trace lazy patterns on her bare shoulder, feeling possessiveness surge through me.

"You'll never leave me," I murmur into her hair, not entirely certain if it's a promise or a threat. "I'd burn this city to the ground before I let you go."

She stiffens slightly in my arms. "What happens when you get tired of me?" Her voice is small, uncertain.

The question infuriates me. I roll her beneath me, pinning her with my weight, forcing her to meet my gaze.

"You still don't understand, do you?" My fingers tangle in her hair, not gently. "This isn't some passing obsession. You're carved into my soul, Hannah. The only way you leave me is in death—and even then, I'd follow you."

Fear flashes in her eyes, but beneath it, I catch something else—a flicker of dark satisfaction that she wields this power over me. She might be my captive, but in moments like these, I'm equally enslaved.

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