I have Aria caged between my arms, her body pressed against the edge of my desk—but it’s me who feels trapped. My heart hammers against my ribs as a war rages inside me: protect her from the truth or give her what she wants and lose her forever.
Her eyes—those goddamn hazel eyes that have somehow wormed their way to pierce right into my heart—shine with unshed tears and righteous anger.
“You’re hiding something from me,” she whispers, her breath warm against my face. “Something about my family. About who killed them.”
I swallow hard, unable to look away from her accusing stare. If she only knew. If she could see the images burned into my mind—my father recounting Emilio DeLuca’s execution over celebratory brandy, voice thick with pride. How he bragged about ordering the massacre, ensuring no one survived.
Except there were. Two tiny girls, spirited away in the night.
Two girls my father is now hunting.
Nicolo’s warning echoes in my mind, as vivid as the day he said it: “If she ever learns your father ordered her parents’ slaughter, she’ll never forgive you, Marco. Blood demands blood in our world. You think she’s yours now? Just wait until she realizes she’s sleeping with the son of her family’s executioner.”
I’d scoffed then, confident in my ability to keep the past buried where it belonged. Now, with Aria’s hands pressed against my chest, trying to push me away, I realize how precarious my position truly is.
“Marco,” she demands, “answer me!”
The truth hovers on my tongue, bitter and corrosive, eating away at every shred of restraint I have left. But I can’t say it. Not yet. Maybe not ever. Because the moment those words leave my lips, she’ll be gone—ripped from me like flesh from bone. And the thought of her walking out that door, of never feeling the heat of her skin against mine, of watching her look at me not with love, but with betrayal in her eyes… it doesn’t just scare me—it destroys me.
If I’m going to lose her—and I am, God help me, I am—then I’ll have her one last time. I’ll burn this moment into my memory, into my skin, so deeply that even her hatred can’t erase it.
I’ll make her stay.
My hand moves from the desk to her face, cupping her cheek gently. Her skin feels like silk beneath my callused fingers.
“Marco,” she says again, but this time her voice holds affection.
I let my thumb trace the curve of her lower lip, feeling her sharp intake of breath. “You want truth?” I murmur, my voice dropping to a husky whisper. “Here’s one truth I can give you: I want you, Aria. Right now. More than I’ve ever wanted anything.”
Confusion flickers across her face, but she doesn’t pull away when my finger trails down from her lips to her throat, following the delicate line of her collarbone exposed by her shirt’s neckline.
“You think you can distract me?” she asks, but her voice catches as my finger continues its slow descent.
“Is it working?” I counter, watching in fascination as her pupils dilate slightly.
“No,” she says, but her body betrays her. Her breathing has quickened, and when my hand grazes the swell of her breast through her thin blouse, she can’t suppress a small gasp.
“Liar,” I whisper against her ear, letting my lips brush the sensitive skin just below it. I feel her shiver against me, her resistance beginning to crumble. “Your body knows what it wants, even if your mind is stubborn.”
“This doesn’t change anything,” she insists, even as her hands clutch and pull me closer now, rather than push. “I still want answers.”
“Not now,” I avoid answering, hating myself for it. “Not tonight.”
My mouth finds the pulse point at the base of her throat, and I feel it quicken beneath my lips. Her skin tastes faintly of salt and that jasmine perfume she’s taken to wearing. I breathe her in deeply, committing this scent to memory.
For a moment, she remains rigid against me, fighting her body’s response to my touch. Then, with a sound somewhere between frustration and surrender, her fingers tangle in my hair, and she yanks my head up to crash her lips against mine.
The kiss is violent, desperate—teeth clashing, tongues battling for dominance. I let her unleash her anger on me through this kiss, accepting the punishment in her fierce grip as she pulls me closer.
Her fury transforms to hunger with each passing second. I feel the precise moment when revenge and secrets cease to matter, when her body’s demands override everything else. She moans into my mouth, the sound vibrating through me and settling low in my gut, stoking the fire that’s been building since I first laid eyes on her.
My hands find her waist, fingers digging into the soft flesh as I lift her onto the edge of the desk. Papers scatter to the floor, including the DeLuca folder, but neither of us spares them a glance. All that matters is this—her legs wrapping around my hips, drawing me closer to her core.
“Tell me you want this,” I demand against her mouth, needing to hear the words even as her body makes its desires abundantly clear.
“You know I do,” she gasps, fingers working frantically at my shirt buttons. “God help me, I shouldn’t, but I do.”
Something primal roars to life inside me at her admission. I tear my mouth from hers, trailing kisses down her throat as my hands make quick work of her blouse, sending buttons flying across the polished wood of my desk. The pale blue lace of her bra comes into view, her hardened nipples visible through the delicate fabric.
“So fucking beautiful,” I growl, cupping her breast through the lace, watching her arch into my touch. With my free hand, I sweep the remaining items, all crashing to the floor in a symphony of destruction.
Aria gasps at the sound, her eyes widening. “Marco—”
“I don’t give a fuck about any of it,” I tell her, meaning it completely. Nothing matters except the woman in front of me, flushed and panting with desire. I lift her fully onto the desk, laying her back across the polished surface. “All I care about right now is you.”
She looks up at me, hair spread around her head like a golden halo, and in this moment, I would burn the world to ash to keep her looking at me like that—like I’m something worth wanting.
Driven by pure need, I unfasten her jeans and slowly ease them down her legs, taking her panties with them in one fluid motion. She lifts her hips to help me, then lies before me, half-naked and glorious. I remove her bra with practiced ease, and finally, she’s completely bare to my gaze.
“You’re staring,” she whispers, a hint of vulnerability creeping into her voice.
“I’m memorizing,” I correct her, my eyes drinking in every curve, every freckle, every perfect imperfection. The small birthmark on her left hip. The faint tan lines from our day by the pool last week. The way her breasts rise and fall with each quickened breath.
I lean down, pressing my lips to her stomach, feeling the muscles quiver beneath my touch. Her hands find my shoulders, nails digging in as I move lower, trailing kisses down to the apex of her thighs.
“Fuck,” she breathes, her voice thick with anticipation.
I look up at her from between her legs, maintaining eye contact as I place my hands on her inner thighs, gently pushing them farther apart. “Watch me,” I command. “I want you to see exactly what I’m doing to you.”
Her eyes lock with mine, darkened by desire to a stormy hazel. I lower my mouth to her center, my first long, slow lick drawing a shuddering moan from her lips. She tastes divine—sweet and tangy.
I take my time with her, letting my tongue tease and circle, savoring every gasp that escapes her lips. She writhes under me, hips lifting involuntarily as I find the rhythm that unravels her. When I slip a finger inside her, the tight heat pulls me in, and she cries out, arching with a need that makes my chest tighten.
“That’s it,” I murmur into her, my voice a low command wrapped in reverence. “Let me hear you. I want to feel every inch of your pleasure.”
A second finger joins the first, curling until I find that spot that draws a strangled moan from her throat. Her thighs tremble around my shoulders, and her breath comes faster, shallow and wild—as if I’ve stolen her air and replaced it with nothing but sensation.
“Marco—I’m—” she gasps, unable to form complete sentences as I increase the pace of my fingers while sucking gently on her clit.
“Come for me, Aria,” I growl against her.
Her body locks beneath my touch, every muscle pulled taut as the climax takes her—wild and unrestrained. I don’t stop. I keep pushing her higher, prolonging the pleasure until she’s gasping my name like a prayer she doesn’t know how to end, her fingers buried in my hair, holding on like she might shatter without the anchor of me.
Only when the last tremors subside do I pull away, pressing one final kiss to her inner thigh. The sight of her sprawled across my desk, flushed and panting, hair wild around her face, is the most erotic thing I’ve ever seen.
“God, look at you,” I breathe, straightening to strip off my own clothes. Her eyes follow my movements hungrily as I remove my shirt, revealing the tattoo that spans my right shoulder—the Bianchi family crest.
When I unbuckle my belt and push down my pants and boxers, her eyes widen slightly at the sight of my erection, hard and ready for her.
“Come here,” she says, reaching for me, and I can’t deny her anything in this moment.
I position myself between her legs, running the tip of my cock through her slick folds. She whimpers, hips bucking upward, seeking more contact.
“Tell me what you want,” I demand, needing to hear the words even as her body makes its desires abundantly clear.
“You,” she says without hesitation. “I want you inside me. Now.”
I sink into her in one fluid motion—
Groaning at the exquisite feel.
Her nails dig into my back. Her breath stutters. Her legs lock tighter.
“Fuck, Aria,” I pant against her neck, forcing myself to remain still until she’s ready. “You have no idea what you do to me.”
She rolls her hips experimentally, and whatever restraint I had left snaps like a dry twig. I begin to move, slowly at first, savoring each delicious drag and thrust. But the fire between us is too intense to maintain such control for long.
“Harder,” she demands, her voice nearly unrecognizable with lust.
“Tell me, Aria what do you need?” I ask, slowing my pace torturously. “Say it.”
Her eyes burn with challenge, but her voice trembles with need. “I need you to fuck me like it’s the last time. Like you’d burn the world to keep me.” She leans in, breath ragged. “Take me like you own every inch of me—like you’ll never fucking let me go.”
A growl tears from my throat as I increase the force of my thrusts, the desk creaking beneath us. “I do own you,” I say, the words harsh and possessive. “You’re mine, Aria. Mine to protect. Mine to pleasure.”
“Yes,” she moans, meeting each thrust with equal force. “Yes, yours, Marco, take me hard—like it’s the end of us.”
Something inside me shatters. Her words—raw, desperate, final—ignite the wildfire I’ve been barely containing. Not just lust now, but panic, possession, heartbreak. If this is the end, I’ll make damn sure she never forgets what it felt like to be mine. Every inch of me slams into her with a purpose that borders on vengeance, a claim carved in flesh and breath and fury.
I feel her beginning to tighten around me again, her second orgasm approaching. But I’m not done with her yet. I pull out suddenly, ignoring her cry of protest, and flip her over onto her stomach.
“Hands on the desk,” I command, pulling her hips back so she’s bent over the polished surface, ass raised invitingly. She complies immediately, spreading her legs wider as I position myself behind her.
I enter her again in this new position, the angle allowing me to go deeper than before.
“Do you want more, Aria?” I lean down and whisper in her ear. “Do you want pleasure to border pain?”
“Yes,” she whimpers. “Please…”
My hand comes down on her ass with a sharp slap that makes her yelp in surprise, then moan as the sting transforms to pleasure.
“You like that?” I ask, delivering another slap to her other cheek, watching the pale skin turn a lovely shade of pink.
“Yes,” she admits, pushing back against me. “God, yes.”
I establish a punishing rhythm, one hand gripping her hip, the other tangled in her hair, pulling just enough to arch her back at the perfect angle. The sound of skin slapping against skin fills the room, punctuated by our labored breathing and broken moans.
“Look at you,” I pant, admiring the curve of her spine, the way her body accepts mine so perfectly. “Taking my cock so well. Made for me, weren’t you, Aria? Made to be fucked by me.”
“Yes,” she cries, the word becoming a mantra as she meets each thrust. “Yes, yes, Marco, yes—”
I can feel my own release building, a tight coil of pressure at the base of my spine. But I refuse to come before she does again. I reach around, my fingers finding her clit and circling it in time with my thrusts.
“Come for me again,” I demand, my voice strained with the effort of holding back. “One more time, Aria. Let me feel you coming around my cock.”
Her entire body goes tight as a bowstring, and then she’s screaming my name, her inner walls clenching around me so intensely that stars explode behind my eyes. I drive into her once, twice more before my own orgasm tears through me like a hurricane, obliterating everything in its path.
For a moment, there is nothing but this—our bodies joined, pleasure coursing through us like electricity, binding us together in a way that transcends the physical. In this perfect instant, there are no secrets between us. Just Aria and Marco, man and woman, husband and wife.
Reality returns slowly. I become aware of the cool air on my sweat-slicked skin, the soreness in my muscles, the weight of Aria beneath me. Carefully, I pull out of her, helping her turn over so I can see her face.
Her eyes are half-closed, lips swollen from our kisses, cheeks flushed with exertion. She’s never looked more beautiful to me than in this moment of complete vulnerability.
I lean down and press a gentle kiss to her forehead, an unexpected tenderness welling up inside me. “Are you okay?” I ask, my voice rougher than intended.
She nods, a small smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “Better than okay,” she murmurs, tracing my jawline with her fingertips. “That was… intense.”
I lift her off the desk, gathering her against my chest, and carry her to the leather sofa in the corner of the office. I sink down with her in my lap, holding her close—not ready to let go, not yet. Because I know the second this moment ends, reality will come crashing in like a blade to the throat.
But on the floor beside us, the DeLuca folder lies open, papers half-spilled across the rug like a wound waiting to bleed. Neither of us says a word, but we both know—this isn’t over. Not even close.
Yet despite all the odds, I pray I’m enough for her to stay.
Even as I hold her, I feel the clock ticking. Every breath she takes beside me is a moment I’ve borrowed from a truth that wants to tear us apart.
