Page 35 of Consigliere’s Revenge

The blood races through my veins at an unprecedented speed and doesn’t stop the whole way through the airport. Even when we’re alone and seated in the Larussio Gulfstream and ready to take off, my heart continues to race.

I swallow hard as his cousins join us. The look of their unveiled suspicion and those dark soulless eyes penetrate me as they board and pass by before going to the security area behind the cockpit.

Lorenzo sits in the leather recliner next to mine and folds one leg across another as he waits for my reply. He seems at ease, as though nothing has changed and that he didn’t just track me down and haul me back to his jet when that seems impossible to me.

“How?” It’s the only word I can manage as the anger, fear, and undeniable attraction to the dark-hearted beast all mingle as one.

He takes my hand and strokes the inside of my palm. A gesture that should be calming, but instead ignites desire and increased apprehension all at the same time. “The question we should be answering is why? Why would you risk everything you’ve worked for, toss it all away, fly halfway across the country when you should know that I will always find you?”

I swallow through the fear and lump that has formed in the back of my throat as I contemplate my fate. “I wrote everything that you asked me to write.”

“But you didn’t stop there, did you, Isabella? The story you saved?” He turns my hand over. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have read it, but it was simply too tempting not to read your words, get an in-depth understanding of the hurt you’ve suffered at the hands of men like your father and others.”

“And you,” I say quietly. “Don’t forget yourself in this, Lorenzo. Maybe I didn’t mean anything to you, but that wasn’t the case for me. I let my heart become involved.”

Lorenzo nods. “I read the email, Isabella.”

“And yet, instead of respecting my need for space, you fly after me and force me to go back with you?”

His eyebrows raise. “I don’t recall really forcing you to do anything, Isabella. Surely the lady does protest too much. And you think that you were alone in this involvement of the heart? That telling you that you were mine were empty words, as if I say them every day?”

I shrug. “Words from a smooth-talking man. It’s probably why my mother stayed with my father through years and years of his infidelities. I’m not like my mother, or at least I don’t intend to be. One day a man will love me more than any passing fancy he may have. He’ll cherish me for his own and not toss me away on a cheap fuck in a sex club.”

I look out the window as we take off, the lights of the vast city twinkling in the distance until we’re far over Lake Michigan and on our way back to the desert.

The silence in the cabin stretches between us. Perhaps I shouldn’t have laid my cards out on the table. Maybe it was better if he never knew how much I cared, but I thought I’d be far away from him after he read it.

“It’s clear that you’ve made up your mind about me, Isabella. So let’s not waste precious time squabbling about the past. There is a story that needs to be written, and I want you to write it.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow.”

“As if I have a choice?”

“In this, you probably do not. Write the story, and then we’ll talk about severing the agreement.”

“The agreement you forced me into by breaking into my home?” I ask.

“I recall you inviting me in.”

I roll my eyes. “As if I had a choice?”

His eyes level me with the intensity of their gaze. “There’s a very comfortable bed beyond that door. I suggest you take the opportunity to get some rest and write a few cathartic paragraphs. Perhaps it will help you control your tongue.”

My cheeks heat with anger. Maybe because I don’t even mean enough to him for him to make up a lie about his time in the lower level. He’s worse than my dad. At least he tried to spare my mother’s feelings every chance that he could.

I turn to him. “Or what? Do you plan to cut out my tongue? Is that just another myth in the legends of the Larussios, or does that have a little ring of truth in it to discover too?”

His eyes flash, and he points to the door. “Rest, Isabella, before you find yourself wearing those sparkly high heels and that little wisp of a dress pulled up over your ass while you lay across my lap waiting for the spanking that you so very much deserve.”

Chapter25

Lorenzo

Isabella’s eyesflash bright blue as she stands, but there’s no way to conceal the pointy nipples straining against the long-sleeve shirt that’s molded to her frame. “Getting spanked? That’s not likely to happen today, tomorrow, or ever, by you,” she huffs, walking into the master bedroom at the back of the plane and closing the door with a firm click.

The fact that this woman can bring out every emotion possible in me should tell me everything I need to know. But still the word love is almost impossible to comprehend. Not for a man who strategizes everything, plans out every step of his intentions, and then layers them in with backup steps to ensure if things go south that myself and the family still have a way forward.

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