Page 36 of Captive in His Castle
Of course he’d known it would be good – that understatement again – between them, but he’d never known it would transcend every single sexual experience of his life. Hell, it transcendedeveryexperience of his life.
Feeling Callie melt for him… He’d thought that would be the pinnacle, but it had been only the beginning.
Not only was she as sexy as sin, but her curves made her perfect cuddle material, which was strange as Dante would never in a million years have described himself as a cuddler.
It was only when she shuddered and swallowed that his brilliant mood dimmed a notch. “Are you okay?”
Instead of answering, she elbowed him sharply and pulled out of his hold to curl into a ball on the edge of the bed.
“Callie?”
“Just go, okay?” she choked. “I don’t want you here.”
Was shecrying?
“What’s wrong?”
“How can you ask that? You’re what’s wrong, so please, fuck off.”
Had he heard her swear before? Definitely when he’d carried her kicking and screaming onto the helicopter, but he couldn’t remember her swearing since even though, being honest with himself, he’d given her plenty of reasons to.
In the silence that followed, a heaviness settled in his chest, driving out the last of his excellent mood. For the first time since he’d left university with his determination to bring the Castello back into the Coscarelli family, Dante found himself uncertain what to do. Usually, when a woman told him to fuck off – and admittedly, that had never happened in the bedroom, had only occurred when he’d ended a relationship – then he took that advice and went whistling out with a smile on his face and without looking back.
If he walked out of this room as Callie wanted him to do, there would be no smile or whistle.
“Did I hurt you?” he asked uncertainly, him, a man who never experienced uncertainty. Nothing had suggested that he’d inadvertently hurt her during their lovemaking – the opposite, in fact – but if he had, then he needed to know.
She didn’t answer.
“Did I hurt you?” he repeated.
“For God’s sake, Dante, why can’t you just leave me alone to lick my wounds in peace?” she cried despairingly.
“So I did hurt you?”
Holding the sheets tightly to her chest, she wrenched herself upright and twisted to face him. “Yes, you’ve hurt me,” she said, rubbing furiously at her leaking eyes. “Every minute I’ve been forced to spend in your company has hurt me, and then you dothatto me.”
Sickness gripped his guts in a vice. “I’m sorry. I swear, I thought you enjoyed it.”
“And that’s my whole bloody problem! I didn’t want to feel any of that, and I don’t want to feel what I’m feeling right now, not about anyone, but especially not about you. Why does it have to beyou?”
At his bewildered expression, Callie experienced an urge to kick him that was so strong that she laughed through her tears at the absurdity of it all.
“See? You haven’t got a clue what I’m talking about, do you, because to you, I’m just a convenient way to pass the time while you’re stuck here making sure I don’t escape.”
He levered himself up onto his elbows with the expression of a man who believed himself good enough to race cars for a living being told he needed to retake his driving test. “You think that was just a bit of convenient fun? What the hell gave you that idea?”
“Oh, I don’t know… I’m here, I’m female, and I have a pulse.”
“Either you have terribly low self-esteem or you think I’ma sex-mad desperado who lets his cock do his thinking. I have never denied wanting you, Callie. You’ve got a body that would make a grown man weep, but I wanted you because you turn me onandyou intrigue me. It’s not just your body I want, it’s your mind, because since you’ve been under this roof, I can’t get you out ofmymind.”
“Don’tsaythat,” she wailed. “You kidnapped me! You’re holding me here against my will, and now it feels like you’ve made love to me when all I wanted you to do was screw me and then go away. I didn’t want it to feel like that, and I don’t want to be on this bed with you feeling like this, so please, for the love of god, go away and leave me alone.”
Chapter Ten
Callie had never seen Dante look so serious, not even after she’d told him of Georgia’s pregnancy.
After what felt like a whole era had passed, he lifted himself upright and gently ran a finger down her cheekbone. “What’s so bad about what you’re feeling for me?”
