Page 64 of Dagger in the Sea

Turo’s attention was captivated by something at the edge of the dance floor. He was perfectly still, his gaze intense, a predator tracking, keeping watch. My insides dipped at the sight. God, what was wrong with me? He could crack an egg into a bowl and I’d probably get turned on.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

“Hmm. Not sure. Luca’s arguing with someone. And that someone doesn’t seem to belong here, by the looks of him.”

“Do you need to go over there?”

“No.” His gaze returned to me, and softened and my pulse raced, my lady parts thrummed. “I’m busy,” he said, just above a whisper.

“Hmm, yes you are.”

The mass of partiers danced and jumped to Kaspar’s booming electronic beat, hands in the air, reveling in something primal and wild. I moved to the throbbing rhythm, dancing with friends. I drank the pink champagne. The moon beamed through the passing wisps of gray blue clouds, and delivered its silvery, shimmery approval over us. And Turo watched, and watched me.

I climbed up a stone step to where he stood leaning next to a wooden pillar. My hands slid up his firm chest. A sharp exhalation escaped him at my touch, and I blinked at the sound. Did he want me as much as I wanted him? Did my touch make him reel with desire as his did to me?

“I want to fuck you,”he’d said. Abrupt. Brutal. A jolt.

And I want him to.

I pressed my lips to his, and his mouth immediately opened to mine. His arms wrapped around me and pulled me up the last step, behind the thick layers of sheer white drapery at the edge of the restaurant.

Lost in each other’s heat, a heat that pounded out a rhythm of its own over my flesh, binding us together like a magnetic force of nature, his tongue slid against mine, no longer teasing but demanding, deepening the kiss. Our bodies pressed together, my every nerve ending tingled and erupted with thrilling possibility, with a tidal wave of raw desire. He pulled back suddenly and stared at me, his eyes piercing mine.

“Turo,” I breathed. A plea of need, a plea of mercy.

“Indulging again?” his voice rasped; a dark query. Was he annoyed with me? Here I was throwing myself at him, and for all he knew I was with Alessio.

My fingers dug into his hair. “Kiss me, dammit.”

He kissed me, he punished me. He delivered me.

We twisted in each other’s arms. The gauzy white curtain fabric caught on the crystals of my dress and wrapped around us, binding us.

The two of us, wrapped in our own web of moonlight.

19

Turo

I toremy mouth from Adri’s delicious tongue.

Someone was in the back of the empty restaurant. I gripped her shoulders, tracking the shift in movement in the shadows beyond where we stood.

Adri’s choppy, ragged breaths matched my own. Her wild eyes gleamed in the flickering light of the tall, flaming tiki torches around the porch.

The thin, dark haired man I’d noticed Luca arguing with earlier clocked us, turned, heading for the bathrooms. Was he a dealer? Did Luca know him? He’d seemed out of place at this party with the glitterati, and it wasn’t just his ill-fitting suit—he’d been observing, not partying, slinking through the crowd, making small talk here and there, searching for an opportunity.

Luca stopped on the stairs, his eyes on us.Speak of the devil.

“I—I’m sorry,” Adri sputtered. “Damn.” Her fingers worked to untangle the wispy curtain that had wrapped around us. It wasn’t working.

“I’m not sorry, baby,” I said, my thumb rubbing a corner of her mouth. “But Luca is watching us, and I don’t think that’s a good thing, do you?”

She bit her lip, and I ripped the curtain away from us. Exposed to the night air again, to the world.

Luca tossed his cigarette and headed off in the direction of the men’s room. His bodyguard draped himself over a railing at the other end of the porch steps from us talking up a blonde in a bikini.

Raising Adri’s chin, I brushed her lips with mine—I just had to—and she let out a perfect little cry.Fuck me.“I want you to go to Gennaro’s table.”

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