Page 12 of The Enforcer's Possession
When I looked back up, Dante’s gaze had been on my throat.On the movement of my swallow.His gaze lifted back to my face slowly, deliberately.
My pulse kicked up again.Fuck.
“You mentioned separate sleeping arrangements,” he said, his voice still controlled but with something underneath now.Something that made my skin prickle.
“Yes.We’d maintain separate --”
“I heard you the first time.”His fingers tightened around the bourbon glass.Just slightly.Just enough that I noticed.“I’m clarifying the terms.No physical relationship.No expectation of intimacy.A marriage in name only.”
“Exactly.”
He was quiet again.The silence stretched between us, heavy with things unspoken.I could hear my own heartbeat in my ears.
This was taking too long.He should have agreed or refused by now.The extended consideration meant he was finding problems with the proposal, poking holes in my logic, preparing to walk away.
I’d miscalculated.Fuck, I’d completely miscalculated, and now I was going to end up married to Marco anyway and this whole desperate play would have been for nothing.
Dante took a slow sip of his bourbon.Set it down with the same precision as before.When he looked at me again, something had changed in his expression.A decision made.
“I’ll agree to your terms, Caterina Lombardi.”
Relief flooded through me so fast it made me dizzy.“You will?”
“With one condition of my own.”
The relief evaporated.“What condition?”
He leaned forward, closing the distance between us.Not touching, but near enough that I could feel the heat of him, smell his cologne mixed with bourbon and something darker.His voice dropped lower, intimate in a way that made every nerve ending I had stand at attention.
“Behind closed doors, you belong to me completely.”
The words hit me like a physical blow.My breath caught.I felt my eyes widen, felt heat and ice chase each other through my veins in equal measure.
“What?”The word came out barely above a whisper.
“You want protection from your father and Marco Vitale.”His eyes held mine, and there was no mistaking the hunger in them now.No hiding it.“You want my name and my power and my reputation.Fine.You’ll have all of it.But in private, you’re mine.Not a contract.Not a business arrangement.Mine.”
“That’s not… that wasn’t…” I couldn’t seem to form a complete sentence.My brain had short-circuited somewhere between “belong to me” and the way he’d said “mine” like it was a promise and a threat combined.
“Those are my terms.”He leaned back again, giving me space I desperately needed and simultaneously missed.“You accept them or you walk away and take your chances with Marco.Your choice.”
My hands were shaking.I gripped the edge of the table to hide it.“You’re asking me to…”
“I’m not asking anything.”His voice remained maddeningly level.“I’m stating my condition.You come to my bed when I want you there.You give me access to your body, your pleasure, your submission.In exchange, I’ll give you everything you asked for.Protection.Freedom.A way out of Papa’s cage.But you don’t get to dictate all the terms, Caterina.This is a negotiation, and I’m negotiating.”
The word “submission” made something clench low in my belly.Fear.Had to be fear.Couldn’t be anything else.Definitely not the heat that was spreading through me like wildfire, making it hard to think straight.
“That’s…” I swallowed again, his gaze tracking the movement.“That’s not what I offered.”
“No.It’s what I’m demanding.”
The certainty in his voice, the complete lack of apology or hesitation, should have terrified me.Did terrify me.But underneath the terror was something else.Something I absolutely refused to acknowledge or name.
I thought about Marco.About the way he’d smiled when Papa announced our engagement, like he’d won a prize.About the girl he’d put in the hospital and the others who’d probably suffered at his hands.
I thought about Papa’s face when I’d thrown wine at my future husband, about the promise of consequences in his voice.
I thought about three months.Twelve weeks.Ninety days counting down to a wedding that would end with me trapped in a marriage where I had no power and no escape.
