I grasped his cheek to draw his gaze to mine, giddy with love at the thought of this dominant, powerful man trusting our love enough to hand over his precious control to me.
‘I think perhaps you should be my sex slave for the rest of the night,’ I teased, my heart light with joy.
Especially when he frowned but said, ‘Consider it done.’
Several mind-blowing orgasms later, during which he had already forgotten his promise not to dominate, he told me again he had given me his heart…and begged me to forgive him.
As I lay draped over him in the moonlight, his arms around me, the afterglow shimmering through my body, both of us naked and exhausted, I listened to the lap of the water while the sweat dried on my skin.
And I knew, whatever happened next in the dangerous world in which I now lived, I would never want to be anywhere else, because my heart would always be safe with him.
Epilogue
Mia
Two months later
‘Don’t you everfeel guilty, Mia?’
I shifted round on the lounger to find Evie staring at me wide-eyed. This was her second visit to Isla Donna since I had come to live on Vito’s island… Vito had made a huge fuss over her, and she’d loved being here, I knew that. He’d also spoilt us both rotten this week with another trip to Milan on the jet, to purchase a wardrobe for both Evie and me this time as a belated Christmas present.
I ran my open palms over my now enormous belly. It was late January already, but we’d had a rare chance to use the pool today vecause of an unseasonably warm spell.
My new wardrobe had been designer maternity clothes—which I had tried to explain to Vito weren’t necessary, because the baby was due in less than a month. But I’d eventually given in to the trip because I had known Evie would adore it, especially after having to spend her first Christmas alone in London, and I’d also known that Vito was still a little unsure of my love for him. Apparently allowing him to buy me and my sister a load of unnecessary clothes helped put his mind at rest, so who was I or Evie to complain?
‘Guilty about what?’ I asked, concerned that Evie was finally going to ask questions about Vito’s businesses. I had never questioned him about what he did for a living. It was part of our unspoken agreement. An agreement I’d signed up to by loving him. And the rewards had been, well…incredible. Not in monetary things, not really. As much as I had come to love living on Isla Donna, it was him I wanted, not his wealth. It was that feeling he gave me of being cherished and adored, the knowledge that he would do anything to protect me and the baby.
Vito was still an unreconstructed alpha male, which meant he still insisted on bossing me around every chance he got. And while his dominance worked in bed—because it was seriously hot—whenever he got too bossy out of it, I now knew I simply had to stand up to him. And he could be reasoned with. Because he loved me and wanted me to be happy. And when he pressed and I pushed back, it also usually led to lots of hot makeup sex. So there was that…
Although in the past couple of weeks, as I had become increasingly enormous, he had become much more tender in bed and out of it. The look of awe in his eyes as he stroked my belly at night after we’d made love, or in the mornings when the baby was usually super active, had only added to the deep sense of belonging I felt in his arms.
He was the one who had surprised me a week ago with a visit from Evie. I’d only discovered this morning that he had brought her here because he was concerned the baby might arrive early, and he had wanted me to have her support during the birth. His thoughtfulness had surprised me, not because he didn’t constantly show his compassionate side to me, but because I knew he was still struggling with the problem of how to deal with Dante, and the island had been in lockdown as a result.
But as I steeled myself to deal with any difficult questions from Evie, her face lit up with what could only be described as excitement.
‘Guilty that we’re living like queens,’ Evie said, her voice hushed but animated. ‘While Vito has his brother locked up in a dungeon here…?’
I manoeuvred myself up so I was sitting on the lounger and snuggled into the warm swimming robe I’d brought down to the pool, a chill running through my body. ‘How do you know about Dante, Evie?’ I asked, not liking the sparkle in her eyes. Evie had always loved drama, so it didn’t surprise me that she’d romanticise this situation. But Vito would be unhappy that she even knew about Dante being here. No one was supposed to know of his whereabouts.
‘I was on my morning run yesterday on the other side of the island, Mia, and I saw him. Lorenzo was with him, and some of the other men. Did you know they’ve been beating him?’
I knew that Vito had ordered the beatings to stop, I would have to tell him that may not have happened. But that wasn’t the point, as far as Evie was concerned.
‘Don’t go there again, Evie. You’re not supposed to be on that side of the island.’ Something my inquisitive little sister had been warned about before. ‘How did you know who he was?’ I asked. If someone had leaked the information, Vito would be furious.
‘Oh, come on, Mia, it’s obvious if you look at him. They’re so alike. He’s even more handsome than Vito.’
I’d never seen Dante. Vito had insisted I did not need to know what was going on in the negotiations with the Malvinis, and I’d respected that. He’d promised me he wouldn’t kill his brother, and I knew he wouldn’t break that promise, so that was enough for me. It wasn’t my business what happened to his brother while he was held prisoner here.
But the dreamy look in Evie’s eyes was totally my business.
I grasped Evie’s hand and held on to it. ‘Listen to me, Evie. Dante may be handsome, but he is incredibly dangerous. He has a grudge against Vito and the Rocco Syndicate. It was him and his mob who shot at us on our first night together. Don’t go near him again. Do you understand?’
Evie nodded, her face pale. ‘It was him?’ She looked horrified. ‘Hewas the one who tried to kill you both?’
‘Yes, he was,’ I said, even though I knew it wasn’t entirely true.
Vito had assured me Dante hadn’t actually been attempting to kill us that night. He had become convinced in the arguments he’d had with Dante while he was captive here, that the nighttime raid on the estate in Naples, the night we’d made our baby, had been a show of strength, a warning that had gone wrong. But I decided it was better to let Evie believe the worst.
