Page 20 of The Mobster’s Cowgirl

I smile, something tender and terrifying unfolding in my chest. “Yeah. It was.”

I pull the covers over us, settling her against my side. She yawns, her body going limp with exhaustion, and I know she’ll be asleep in minutes.

“Dario?” she murmurs, already half-gone.

“Yeah, tesoro?”

“Goodnight.”

I tighten my arms around her, pressing my lips to her hair. “Goodnight, Katya.”

As she drifts off, I stare at the ceiling, my heart still racing, my body still humming with the aftershocks of the most intense release of my life. I came inside her. Bare. No protection. And the thought of her carrying my child doesn’t terrify me the way it should.

Instead, it fills me with a possessive satisfaction so deep it borders on madness. Katya Petrov is mine now. In every way that matters. And I will burn the world down before I let anyone take her from me.

Chapter Five

Katya

I wake up alone.

For a few seconds, I don’t know where I am. And then the warmth of Dario’s sheets beneath me and the faint scent of his cologne on the pillow beside me remind me that sometime during the night, he must have gotten out of bed without waking me.

I turn onto my back and stare at the ceiling, listening to the quiet of the house, and I can’t decide whether I’m relieved or disappointed that he’s gone. That should probably scare me more than it does. Because two months ago, the idea of sleeping in a man’s bed would have been enough to send me running in the opposite direction.

And now I have somehow become accustomed to falling asleep with Dario’s arms wrapped around me. Worse, I sleep better that way. I don’t know what he has done to me. Actually, that’s a lie. I know exactly what he’s done. He’s gotten under my skin.

When Dario is at the estate, I stay in the main house with him. And when he has to go into the city during the week, he somehow manages to find his way back here no matter how late it is. Sometimes I hear him come through the door after midnight.

And before I can even pretend to be asleep, he’s already sliding into bed beside me and pulling me against his chest. I once asked him why he bothers coming back when he has an apartment in the city. His answer was simple.

“I like having you in my bed.”

As if that explained everything. Maybe it does.

I slip out of bed before he returns this morning and make my way downstairs wearing one of his shirts. It’s too big on me, the sleeves falling past my wrists and the hem brushing my thighs, but I like wearing his clothes more than I should.

There is something comforting about being wrapped in something that smells like him. I pour coffee into two mugs and stand at the kitchen island, lost in thought, when two strong arms suddenly slide around my waist.