Page 34 of Rosetti Family New York
She shrugs. “Does it matter?”
It matters more than anything. I’m beside her in an instant. “You want a new house? You got it. Bigger diamonds? They’re yours. Anything you want, I’ll get for you,” I say, the words rough and desperate.
She tilts her head up to look at me, her eyes sharp and bright. “But you won’t let me go.”
I pause a moment. “Anything but that.”
“Because I’m yours.”
She doesn’t know how right she is, not until I kiss her. Hard and sudden, like I’m trying to prove something. She tenses against me, then melts, her arms going soft and loose around my neck. I pull her in, crush her body against mine. Her blouse is silk, delicate, but I don’t care. I can feel the heat of her, the lines of her figure, the warmth of her breath against my mouth.
If she’s my weakness, then I don’t want strength.
Her hands find my hair, her fingers a slow mess. Her touch lights me up. I want more, and I want it now. I want it to hurt.
She pulls back, just enough to look at me. Her cheeks are flushed, her lips parted. I know what that look means. I’ve seen it before. I want to see it again, and again, and again.
But she stops me before I do. “Don’t think I didn’t notice,” she says, the slightest curve to her mouth.
“Notice what?”
She drops one hand, and I follow its path. She lets it hover between us, hovers long enough for my eyes to follow it. All the way to the front of my pants, where I’m already hard. Fucking aching for her.
“What you want,” she says, “and how fast you want it.”
That look is still in her eyes. Bold, teasing. Hungry as hell. Like she owns this moment and me with it. Like she knows she doesn’t need anything but a glance to make me burn.
My whole body is on fire. She’s playing me, and we both know it. I thought it would piss me off. Maybe even scare me. But all I want to do is kiss her again, fuck her against this fountain, make her feel what I do.
It’s almost like she hears my thoughts, feels the pulse of them. Her mouth finds mine again, and it’s electricity. More than that.It’s everything we’re too stubborn to admit. She bites my lower lip and it’s a shock. The good kind, the kind that gets under your skin and won’t leave you alone.
This is what it means to be desperate for her.
To be owned.
I push her back until she hits the fountain’s edge. She gasps, a sharp sound I want to hear on repeat. I don’t wait for her to catch her breath. I pick her up and set her on the ledge.
The water is loud, rushing around us. I almost say something stupid, something that would put too much out in the open, but she stops me.
Not with words.
With the way her legs wrap around me. The way she presses her whole body to mine, leans in close and breathes the only thing I need to hear.
“You want to fuck me, Leonardo?” Her voice is a dare. “Then do it.”
She thinks she’s still in control, even now. And maybe she's right, because I’m just as much hers as she is mine.
17
Eleanor
Leonardo plucks me off the fountain and shoves me against a tree, and then his mouth is on mine, fierce and demanding. It happens so fast I can’t breathe. So fast I can’t think. His hands tangle in my hair, rough and urgent, and my entire body feels like a live wire. I’ve never been kissed like this. He tastes like smoke and heat, and it me dizzy, and for the first time, I want to lose control.
He presses against me, wild and reckless. His hands slide down to my waist, pulling me closer, like he wants to be under my skin. I gasp against his lips, and he groans. My entire body screams for more of him. It’s raw and explosive and out of control.
“I’m not letting you get away, princess,” he says, biting my lip. I dig my nails into his arms, but he doesn’t stop. He can’t stop. And I don’t want him to.
“Do you want more?” he breathes, voice rough in my ear.
