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She sighs. “I’m guessing we both have skeletons in our closets and must accept that.”
She appears worried and I say huskily, “What’s bothering you?”
“It’s nothing.” She lowers her eyes, and I grip her face tightly in my hand and force her to look at me. “I disagree. Tell me, you mustn’t keep any secrets from me—ever.”
For some reason, her eyes fill with tears and as they spill down her face, I lean in and lick them away, causing her to gasp and stutter, “I’m not sorry for begging you to make love to me but I can’t shake the feeling that I’m not the person you see when you look at me.”
Her words anger me far more than she probably intended them to, and I fist her hair, my grip tight and painful, causing her eyes to glitter with startled tears caused by pain.
“You think I see your sister?” I growl, hurt that she could even contemplate I would look at her sister the way I look at her.
Her slight nod sends me into a blind rage, and I hiss, “I hate that fucking bitch. But you, Flora…” I break off and relax my hold, pulling her fiercely toward me and cupping my hand protectively around the back of her head, tugging her against my chest as if comforting a broken woman.
“You mean everything to me, and until you feel the same, I’m the big bad wolf in your life who will never let you go.”
I hate knowing that thought even entered her pretty little head and as she relaxes against me, I hope I’ve done enough to push it off the metaphorical cliff.
Love Diana? Not fucking likely.
As we lie entwined on my silken sheets, it strikes me that I’ve never had this. When I fucked women, they left soon after. There were no hugs, cuddles, or whispered words of affection. When I fucked Diana, it was usually a hurried affair against a wall or in a wooded area against a tree. There was none of this. It was just a dirty affair that probably only stood for one thing in Diana’s mind. Control.
Rather than think about that woman, I say roughly, “Come. We need to shower. Gretchen has prepared food for us. We must eat.”
Flora looks up in surprise and laughs. “I kind of forgot about food, but now you mention it.”
She brushes her hair from her face and grins and just like that, a powerful emotion nearly knocks me senseless. Is this what love is like? Is this what I yearned for as a kid and heard of but never saw first-hand? More than anything, it pains me to step outside this bed because it will destroy the intimacy of the moment. Burst the bubble we have created and wrapped around us while we pretend that everything in our life is normal.
Feeling slightly bemused, I lead Flora to the shower, by holding her hand and gently pulling her after me and as we cling together under the raining jets, I hold her so tightly it even worries me. How has she become so necessary in my life so quickly? Is it because of her sister? Was she not far off the mark?
Part of me shoots that down in flames, yet there’s also a part of me that knows why I fell in love so quickly with Diana. She was the woman I couldn’t have. The one person who seemed to get me. To soothe rather than slay, and she was so good at that. She made me believe I was the most important person in her life, and I would have done anything to catch that feeling and keep it.
When I discovered she was doing the same to my brothers and yet chose to marry my father, we stepped back and saw through the light she blinded us with. We saw our enemy and I don’t consider her anything but that now.
My thoughts turn to Flora and her needs. Since coming to Vegas and taking over my father’s business interests, I have been the focus of attention for every well-meaning business in town. Subsequently, I am gifted many items in the hope of a favor or two and the designer outfits that hang in my his and hers closets are the result of that.
I’ve never had a need for the women’s clothes before and yet for some reason I don’t like the idea of Flora wearing them. I want to mark her and drench her with my scent in a primal instinct to claim what’s mine. Those gifts belong to a past that has no business in my future, so I wrap my robe around her and tie it tightly, saying gruffly. “We’ll arrange some clothes. You’re moving in.”
“Excuse me.” She blinks in astonishment and seeing her pretty face flushed with the steam from the shower and the aftermath of sex, makes my heart physically ache.
“You heard me.” My voice is gruff and scratchy because I won’t allow her to leave, go anywhere away from me and what I want us to be, and she had better get with the program because my perfect life will be provided by this woman.
“I have an apartment. I have clothes. I have a life.” Her voice raises indignantly, and I growl. “Had, Flora. You had all those things and look where it got you. You have been used all your life and allowed it to happen.”
“You fucking bastard.” Her hand slaps me hard around the face before I know what’s happening, and her eyes flash as she screams. “Iallowedit to happen! Allowed it! You know shit, Dom. You know nothing about my life, about how I begged to be set free, tried several times and have the scars to prove it.”
“What scars?” I hiss, leaning closer, my earlier mood punched hard against the darkened walls of my room.
“This scar!” she screams and raises her hair, turning slightly and revealing a long-jagged scar to the side of her neck. She opens her robe and lifts her leg and points to one running inside her thigh, stopping short of her pussy.
“This one too. The one Mario gave me when I tried to escape one day. The one on my neck was when I tried again, and he strangled me before slicing a chunk of my skin.” I stare at her in shock as she shouts, “Then there are the bruises, the bites, the scratches and the blood that has long since dried. The hair that was cut off and my head shaved. The nights I spent chained to his bed while he raped me on repeat. The nights I was locked in a cupboard while Diana and Mario fucked in the same room. The times the men they sold me to beat me to within an inch of my life and the drugs they fed me to keep me willing. You know nothing about how hard I tried to escape, and you know what, you don’t deserve to, so fuck you, Domenico Ortega. You’re exactly like them in keeping me your prisoner.”
The rage blinds me as I lash out and grabbing her throat, I hold her hard against the wall and roar, “I amnothinglike them. I fucking love you, Flora Corlietti, and the only reason you’re here is so I can protect you and keep you safe.”
As soon as the words leave my mouth, she stares at me in shock, and I can’t believe I actually voiced them out loud. Hearing her speak of the horrors she’s endured sent me into a violent rage that once again she bore the brunt of. Picturing those men defiling this beauty and Mario and Diana allowing it to happen makes me into one big fucking murdering bastard. What Diana did to me is nothing to what she did to her own blood, and I’m the bastard who just added to her pain.
With a roar, I pull Flora toward me and crush my lips to hers in a blind desire to wipe those words from existence. It hurts too much to picture her life and yet despite everything, she came out on the right side. As she kisses me back with a hunger that settles my heart, I vow to make it my life’s work to make hers a happy one. To wash away the sins of her past and set us both free.
Panting for breath and flushed from emotion, we spring apart and just stare. Her alabaster skin is flushed, and her eyes sparkle and to my surprise she whispers, “You said you love me.”
