Complete Corruption (Corruption #1-3) (89 page)

He nodded. I hugged him. He was a good kid, whip smart and acing every single class at Harvard-Westlake. He was a genius under pressure. Valentina said he was more like his father than her, but his sense of humor belonged to his mother. At least he didn’t need half a glass of wine to bring it out.

Behind me, a car door slammed. And another as he was let out of the back of the limo.

I didn’t think I could turn around, because once I did, the waiting was officially over. My life would begin and preparation would become action. I stood with our families on the porch, waiting.

“Capo,” he said.

His voice. Music. An opera in two syllables.

I turned and nearly died, my gasp was so strong.

He was… Antonio.

Everything I remembered and imagined, but in three dimensions. In a white shirt and grey jacket, his thumb hooked on the shoulder strap of his bag, his face shaven, his brown hair falling into a parenthesis on his forehead. When he smiled, the sky opened and God himself showed his favor.

“You lost weight.” My bottom lip trembled so hard I could barely get the last word out.

“The second worst part was the food.”

I didn’t say anything. I was too overwhelmed. I took in every detail. His ebony lashes. His lips, drawn across his face in a grin. I was supposed to ask him the worst part, but the breeze shifted and I was swept away in the scent of campfires and quiet pine forests.

“I missed you,” I said. God, would I ever again get a word out without crying? I didn’t know how to catalog the relief, the joy, and the feeling of utter liberation, because I’d been in prison with him.

He dropped his bag and engulfed me in his arms.

“I missed you I missed you…” I kept repeating, because I hadn’t uttered it in a year and a half and it needed saying.

I felt a hand on my shoulder, and a pair of arms around my legs. I felt the breath and tears of our families as they gathered around us, shielding us with their bodies. I rested my cheek on his shoulder. This was my heaven, with him.

He rocked back and forth, holding me as if I were the last woman in the world. I hadn’t been held like that since before the fall. I’d been broken in so many places, I was afraid to embrace anyone, but with Antonio, I wasn’t scared to be held. I’d forgotten how safe he made me feel, how loved, how trusted. He could hold me and nothing inside me would break. I was fine.

Better than fine. I was whole.

theresa

he food was gone. The dishes were put away. The children were bathed and kissed. A few stragglers stayed up for late night TV.

All was dark.

Except the bathroom. It was white, and the light was on. I’d loved its brightness. I’d designed it so I could see everything, but now I wanted the light dimmed. Or off. Or warmer. I leaned into the mirror. I’d just gotten out of the shower. Hair stuck to my forehead, and droplets hung under my eyes. I hadn’t given myself a good look-see in a long time, and tonight, the first night of Antonio’s return, was probably way too late.

I was nervous.

The side of the bed I kept for him was about to be filled, but so much had changed in the meantime, I didn’t know if it made sense anymore. I didn’t know what he’d been through, done, experienced while he was away. He hadn’t spoken about it during dinner or the card game after. He seemed reserved. Standoffish, even. I knew he loved me. I knew from the way he put his hand over mine at dinner and the way he looked at me.

“Hello,” he said, leaning against the doorframe.

I jumped. “You scared me.”

He crossed his arms, and the way he looked at me made me close the neck of my robe tight. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right.”

I tried to get past him, but he didn’t budge. His cheeks were darkened with late-day growth, and his eyelids drooped a little with exhaustion. He was still the most beautiful man I’d ever seen.

“Do you like our room?” I asked.

“I like the room.”

“You can pick a different one, but this one had the nicest patio onto the orchard.”

“Theresa. I—”

“I’m sorry, it’s just…” I had constructed a hundred ways to talk to him when he hadn’t been in front of me. He pressed his hand to my cheek, and without thinking or intending it, I leaned into him, letting his palm cup me.

“Do you want to wait?” he asked. “I won’t force you.”

“No, I… this… what happened? I’m not the same. I’m ninety percent. Ninety five, actually but not the same.”

I’d forgotten how powerful he was in a room. How the energy surrounding him seemed to squeeze out everything else.

“You aren’t the same. I could have told you that.”

“I just—” I stopped myself. This was stupid. “Oh, fuck it.” I stepped into the bedroom and faced him.

“I want to kiss you,” he said. “I haven’t thought about anything but kissing you for a year and a half. If you don’t want to do anything else until you get used to me again, I accept that. But I’m kissing you before I go to sleep.”

“I want you to kiss me. You have no idea how badly I want that kiss, but first I have to show you.” I opened the robe. It was the hardest thing I’d ever did, not because I thought there was something wrong with me, but because I didn’t know how he’d react.

The scar drew his eyes first, but then they drifted all over me, the way they had that first day, and the second, and the time I swore I felt him touching me.

“I see,” he said, touching the scar on my abdomen. “Does it hurt?”

“Itches sometimes. But also, my left shoulder. I told you in the letters, but see, I can’t really do this anymore.” I shifted my shoulder back as far as it would go. Not very far. It had taken the brunt of the fall.

“You need me to be gentle,” he said.

My anxiety fell away and was replaced by irrational joy. He knew it was just as simple as that. I only needed him to know that I felt fragile, even if I wasn’t.

“I do.”

He pushed the robe off my shoulders. It fell at my feet like a snowdrift. I was naked, and he was there. Right there. My body was on fire for him.

“I want my kiss,” he breathed into my cheek, his lips grazing me.

“Come and get it.” I barely made a sound saying it, then I thought he hadn’t heard me, because he didn’t do it.

“Do you know why I haven’t kissed you all day?” he asked.

“No.”

“If I kissed you, I was going to take you. And I didn’t want a rush job in a closet.”

“If you can take me like this, you can take me.”

His lips were so soft on mine, his mouth so supple, his tongue gentle and sweet. He was slow, savoring every turn and twist of our mouths together. His hands landed on my cheeks and traveled down my neck, over my breasts. I groaned as a shudder went through me.

“I want you like this.” He leaned forward, guiding me onto the bed until I was on my back and he was on all fours over me. “And like this.” He kissed my chin and moved down to my breasts. “And this.” He put his lips on my scar. “Just like this.” He kissed my navel and below it. “God, I missed you.”

He parted my legs so tenderly yet so firmly that I knew he was still in charge, even if he wasn’t rough or demanding. He kissed between my legs, flicking his tongue over me. I hadn’t been touched in so long that my back arched, and I knew if he flicked it again—

“Stop,” I gasped. “Wait.”

He looked up from below, his hand on my knee. “Why?”

“I want to see you. I thought about your first night home all the time. And I always imagined looking at you.”

He pecked the inside of my thigh and stood at the foot of the bed. His eyes grazed over me. I thought I’d feel more self-conscious about my scar and my little crookedness. I thought I’d have to apologize for being imperfect and overcome my physical inadequacy in his sight. But I didn’t feel the need for that at all. I felt warm and loved, whole and perfect before him.

He unbuttoned his shirt.

“Was it terrible in prison?” I asked.

“It wasn’t too bad. Boring mostly. And lonely.” He undid the cuffs, shrugged the shirt off, and tossed it over a chair.

“Is it true about the showers?”

He laughed.

“I’m serious!”

“You want to know if I took a bitch in the showers?”

Then I laughed. Of course he’d never imagined anyone would top him. Santa Claus would land on the roof first.

He got out of his pants and crawled over me. His erection pressed on my thigh, and I felt two completely separate longings. One for a deep, slow connection, and the other to be torn apart until I couldn’t speak.

“Well?” I said, running my hand over his chest. “I’d forgive you as long as he was ugly.”

“They’re all ugly. It’s in the food or something.”

“Except you.”

“I wasn’t really there. I was always here with you.” He ran his lips over mine. It wasn’t a kiss but a wakening of skin.

“Capo,” I said.

“Yes, Capo?” He kissed my cheek softly.

How did I go so long without feeling his breath in my ear? It was the most exciting and distracting thing ever.

I put my hands on his jaw and pushed his face to the front of mine so we were nose to nose. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“That you went to prison for me. I wouldn’t have let you, but you did. And I’m grateful to you and mad at myself at the same time.”

“I would do it again.”

“I hope you don’t have to. I want to give the whole thing away. I’ve set it up so it runs itself. Just let it go. I think I can divide it up nicely,” I said.

“
Come vuoi tu
.”

“We can talk about it.”

“No talking. Just do it.”

I hitched myself and wrapped my legs around him. “
Come vuoi tu.”

He laughed softly. “Your accent, my God.”

“No more talking.” I rotated my hips, getting myself against his length.

He shifted, getting the head of his dick against me. He pushed forward, and I pushed against him. I’d forgotten about his size, and I laughed.

“What?” he asked.

“I love you. Now, fuck me already.”

He smiled, pulled my legs apart, and got on his knees. He entered me in three short bursts, each one making me gasp with pain then pleasure. Then pleasure again. And well, it was all good after that.

That night he came home, he bent over me, pressing our bodies together. I looked in his face while we made love so slowly, it was almost torture. I memorized the lines and curves of him all over again. I touched his cheeks and ran my fingers through his hair. And even when I closed my eyes because I couldn’t take the rising tide of my orgasm anymore, I kept his face in my hands and let the scent of burned pine and sweet olive blossoms meld and linger until they became a unique harmony of their own, never to be separated again.

***

I put my head on his chest and listened to him breathe.

“It’s a good room,” he said.

“It’s ours. Just ours. Let me show you the best part.”

I rolled away and opened the French doors onto the orchard. The breeze caressed his hair, flicking the ends. I sat on his side of the bed, stroking his forehead. A scar so straight it looked as if it had been drawn with a ruler shot across his temple and past his hairline. I drew my finger along it. No hair grew along its length, even past his ear, where it tapered and disappeared.

“Thank you for waiting for me,” he said.

“Tomorrow, I’ll show you your orchard. We can walk the rows.”

“How’s business?”

“Breaking even.”

“Good. Very good.” He rolled onto his side, draping his arm over my thighs. The moonlight fell on his cheek, and the mating calls of crickets filled the air. “I’m so tired. I didn’t realize until now.”

“Go to sleep, Antonio. I’m here. You can sleep now.”

The last word had barely left my lips before his eyes closed and his breathing turned even and slow. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him sleep without a care as to how he woke up. I curled up behind him, putting my lips to the back of his neck, and I thanked God for him, for our life, for the love between us that hadn’t died even when we almost did.

I was sure we would pay for our sins in either this life or the next. But maybe there was a little in us that could be saved. In this little room with a half-empty closet and a full bed, maybe salvation would come in the form of love.

Fin.

----------------

I stuck another book in after the acknowledgements! To skip to it
CLICK HERE!

Antonio and Theresa appear at the end of
Forbidden
, a dark, erotic journey through the eyes of Fiona Drazen.

Everything about Fiona is forbidden.
She’s a party girl with dark desires.
She’s beautiful, irresponsible, irresistible.
She’s my patient.
I’m her therapist.
I’m past past wanting her. Past possessing her. Past bedding her or protecting her.
I’m willing to be self-destructive, negligent, brave, audacious, and stronger than I ever believed possible.
She’s blunt force trauma to the heart.
And she calls another man Master.

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