I let out a scoff at that. I have a duty and yet no agency.
I’m a member of one of the most powerful families in New York, and yet I’m utterly powerless.
I rise from my bed, knowing my pity party only brings misery.
I need to push my schoolgirl dreams away. I need to act my part. Be smart but not opinionated.
Be beautiful, but not too sexy.
Be the dutiful Dante daughter everyone expects.
But inside, where no one can see, I'm already dead.
8
CRISTIAN
I pace outside the Dante mansion, unable to enter yet unwilling to leave. I wrestle with what happened between Valentina and me in that car.
Fuck. I can’t shake the look on her face when I stopped her.
The hurt in those gray eyes, the humiliation.
I did that to her.
I pushed her away when every cell in my body screamed to pull her closer.
Alessandro trusts me to protect his sister, not to put my hands on her.
Not to slide my fingers beneath her dress and into that hot, wet pussy. Not to watch her come apart beneath my touch.
God, she was beautiful when she came.
The way her head fell back, lips parted, those little gasps.
I've been with women before, but nothing prepared me for Valentina surrendering to pleasure.
I rake my fingers through my hair.
I've spent my life in service to this family.
My father served Lorenzo Dante before me, and his father before him. Loyalty isn't just my duty.
It's my inheritance, my identity.
But when Valentina touched me, I wasn't a soldier.
I was just a man wanting a woman who wanted me back.
The memory of her lingers everywhere.
Her taste on my tongue.
The sound of my name on her lips.
The softness of her against my hardness.
She deserves gentleness.