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“It’s all up to you, Ciro. You can do whatever you want.”
9
Grace
Ciro stares down at me,
blinking in the dim light.
I can’t quite read his expression, and my heart thuds in nervous anticipation as I grip the metal bars of the headboard tightly.
Honestly, I don’t know if this was the right call, the right move. Maybe I’ve totally misinterpreted things, and Ciro really doesn’t want to be with me—not because he thinks he can’t or doesn’t trust himself, but because he’s just not that interested.
Or maybe he is interested, but this is asking too much, pushing him too far.
I don’t fucking know, and as the seconds tick by and he doesn’t move, I start to get more and more worried.
But I meant what I said. I want him. Not just his body, but his mind and his heart. I made this offer willingly, and the least I can do is make sure he knows I mean it—and that there’s no time limit on it, no qualifiers or conditions.
He can do whatever he likes.
He can touch me.
He can leave the room.
No matter what he decides, I won’t stop him. I want him to see that he can be trusted to make those decisions, trusted to be in control.
So I keep my hold on the cool metal, and I wait.
Finally, Ciro moves. He sits down on the bed next to me, the mattress shifting beneath his weight. One large, inked hand reaches out and grazes lightly over the curve of my hip, trailing down the outside of my thigh.
I shiver, and I know he feels it. But other than that slight tremor, I don’t move.
“I’m not afraid,” I whisper quietly.
Maybe if I were smarter, I would be. Maybe I should cling to the memory of the way his hands felt around my throat, reminding myself constantly what Ciro is capable of. But that person? The one who attacked me so viciously? It wasn’t Ciro. It’s not who I’m looking at now. The man I’m looking at now would do anything to protect me—including fight against his own instincts, keeping himself at arm’s length when that’s not what either of us really wants.
Ciro swallows as he absorbs my words. His fingertips change direction, retracing their path and traveling up my thigh again.
It’s just a light touch, barely even sexual at all, but it makes my pussy clench as sparks fly through my body.
He shifts his weight on the bed, turning to face me more fully, and this time, it’s his whole palm that glides over my body, mapping the contours of my hip and stomach. He keeps doing that, trailing his hand over my hips, my thighs, my ribs. He has to lean over to reach more of me from where he sits, and when he gets frustrated with that, he kneels on the bed beside me, both hands starting to touch me.
He slides them up my stomach, dragging my tank top up with them, and when he reaches the undersides of my breasts, my breath catches. My toes curl, and I work hard to keep my hips from shifting as molten need gathers inside me, making my clit throb.
More. Please, more. Take what you want, Ciro.
Slowly, agonizingly slowly, he slides his hands up and under the bunched fabric of my tank top. His large palms glide over my breasts, and he makes a small noise in his throat when he feels how stiff and hard my nipples are. His thumbs explore them, circling and brushing over them, and the look in his eyes as he gazes down at my chest makes a strange surge of emotion fill me.
He looks fucking awed. Like he can’t believe I’m real.
I want to tell him that I am. That this is—this thing that sparks between us. But I don’t say anything, just watch him intently as he continues to explore me. He spends so long on my breasts that I think I’m close to coming just from his intense focus on my nipples. It’s getting harder and harder to control my breath, and every deep inhale I take shoves more of my breasts into his greedy palms.
Finally, he drags his hands out from beneath the fabric of my tank top. For a moment, he rests them on my ribcage, holding me as he stares down at me. Then something shifts in his expression, and he grabs the hem of my shirt and pulls it up. I arch my back a little, trying to help him a bit without moving more than necessary, since I promised I wouldn’t. He gets the tank top over my head and leaves the fabric draped around my forearms as his gaze travels back down to my bare chest.
This time, the noise he makes is almost a groan, and I bite my lower lip.
Jesus, this is so much harder than I thought it would be.
