The solid heat of him is everywhere now. His chest against mine. His body holding me up because mine has stopped being able to.His mouth against my throat, my collarbone, the place where my shirt won't let him go any lower without permission he knows I won't give him in words. So he stops there. He doesn't cross. He doesn't have to.
Because his hand is enough.
Because his mouth is enough.
Because the tightening in my body is happening on its own, my legs around his waist, my hands fisted in his hair, my face pressed against the side of his neck so I don't have to look at him when I fall apart, and I don't know how long I can take this. I just know it's too much, this scorching ache, this need that's almost like an obsession, a craving that's unlike any other—
And when his teeth graze the spot where my pulse lives—
I cry out as something explodes inside of me, my body shuddering as my world turns upside-down.
I'm not sure how long it lasts.
All I know is that when I open my eyes in a daze, I'm still pressed against his neck. My legs are still around his waist. My hands are still in his hair. And worst of all, I'm still trembling against him in a way I haven't trembled in eighteen years.
No no no no no no no no.
Reality starts setting in, and I can’t...I can’t believe that just happened.
That Iletit happen even after...
No no no no no no.
I wish I could strike this out like all the other things that don’t have to go on record.
I wish I could make this unhappen.
But I can’t.
Fingers are cupping my chin...
Because he won’t let me.
Forcing my gaze to collide with his...
"You. Are. Mine."
And at that moment, I can no longer pretend Nate Simons ever existed.
"Don't make me punish others to prove my point."
I have to accept that this is the real him.
Nicolo Sestini.
A stranger.
A mistake.
A threat.
Chapter Four
EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO
The AUSA across the table has been sliding photographs at me for the last two hours, and I've named what I can name.
A signet ring on a finger that's no longer attached to anything. A wristwatch I gave one of my father's lieutenants for his fortieth birthday last March, the one with the engraving on the back that I told the jeweler to make in his wife's handwriting. A tattoo I've seen across someone's shoulder blade in the steam room at the club. By the fourth box of photographs the AUSA has stopped asking me to identify bypersonand started asking me to identify bything.