Shadow Rider (45 page)

She smiled up at him. “I would hit you over the head and knock sense into you if you dared to be too harsh with our children.”

She was smiling at him, but there was truth in her eyes, honesty in her voice and steel in her spine. He had no doubts that she meant what she said.

“Let's go to bed,” he said, turning her toward the bedroom. He wanted to lie down and just hold her. “That was a surprise. Eloisa has never talked about her feelings. Not once. She's never showed emotion, not even when Ettore died.” His death was too close. Far too close. He felt as if the walls were pressing in on him.

“What she said about Ricco. The training. What was that?”

He stripped, tossing his clothes aside and then stretching out on top of the sheets, hands behind his head as he watched her take her clothes off. When she reached for one of the many sexy camisoles he'd bought her, he shook his head. “Not tonight, Francesca. I don't want anything between us. Not even something that gives me great pleasure in taking off. Just come to bed.”

She was beautiful. More than beautiful. Her body was lush and inviting, just the way she was. “You give all of us hope. Did you know that? Do you have any idea how important you are to my brothers and sister? Not because you're going to give me babies, but because you represent something beautiful
and amazing. None of us believed we'd ever have the chance to love someone. Or that we'd be loved.”

Francesca stretched out beside him, her body turned toward his, one arm slung around his waist, her head on his shoulder, one leg thrown over his thighs. She did that a lot, he realized. Turned her body toward him. She never protested when he locked her to his side, or at night when he draped himself all over her. She just snuggled closer to him.

“You need to explain all this to me, Stefano,” she urged. Her fingers moved over his chest, tracing his heavy muscles. “I need to know. I want to understand.”

He shifted just enough that he could wrap an arm around her. The lights were off, but he could see her easily through the bank of uncovered windows that were one wall of his room. Up so many floors, there was no one to see in, yet he could look down on the city with all the lights. He loved his city. He loved his neighborhood. More than anything he loved his family.

“I've told you some of it. We go back hundreds of years. The Ferraro family always had riders born into it. Men and women capable of connecting with shadows and entering them, like a tube, an expressway. When we're inside the shadow, no one can see us. In the old days, our ancestors took on the task of protecting family and friends and then, eventually others in our neighborhood.”

She nodded and turned her head just slightly to press a kiss into his chest. He'd told her this before, but he needed to start somewhere comfortable. She was patient with him, but then he knew she would be—just like she would be patient with their children.

“When the Ferraros refused to join the Saldi family or reveal to them just how they were able to protect so many, the head of the Saldi family issued orders to wipe them out. Every man, woman and child. Only the riders escaped. A few cousins off on a holiday. Those remaining alive went into hiding. Because the shadow riders were able to get away, the family began to rebuild in secret.”

Her finger traced his ribs. “I know where you get your tenacity.”

He captured her hands and brought her fingertips to his mouth, his teeth scraping seductively along the pads. “They spent years building an empire. Branches of riders were established in major cities throughout the world. Every rider had to be familiar with languages and geography so they're sent to each city to train while teens. The other family members began legitimate businesses. Solid ones that would bring prosperity to the family. Banks, hotels, casinos, nightclubs. Each business was carefully built up before another was added.”

“All of them are capable of handling any money a shadow rider would get for his services that aren't so legit,” she murmured. “Like the rescue of a seventeen-year-old girl.”

“No money for that job. Some jobs are bartered for favors. Others small things. Taking on work that involves executing someone”—he deliberately used the expression to see her reaction—“requires a great deal of money unless, as in the case of a brutalized child, the petitioner can't afford it, isn't a criminal and the need is justified.”

“That's why you have such a process. The greeters, and then the investigators.”

“Yes.” He bit down again on her finger, wanting to kiss her, warmth spreading through him because she didn't even flinch when he used the word
executing
. “We have to be certain before we take a job. There can be no mistakes. Both sides are investigated, the petitioner as well as the target and the incident itself. We protect the family at all costs. We make certain our own riders don't take down anyone who can draw attention to us in our own city. We don't do our own personal work. Nothing close to us. We use the paparazzi for alibis. Because we play so publicly, few people ever consider that we would do anything that they can't see.”

“And you're careful.” She made it a statement.

“And we're careful,” he confirmed. He was silent a moment before continuing, his fingers delving into the silk of
her hair. “It's difficult to find others outside the family with the ability to ride the shadows. There just aren't that many. Men have a little longer to find someone they truly want than a woman, because in the end, we serve the family and that means producing riders. Riders keep us safe. If the Saldis or anyone else ever try to wipe us out again, retaliation would be swift and brutal. They know that. They don't know how we do it, but they know we can get to them.”

He had to make her understand. “The riders are important to the family, Francesca. Our training, training the children, it is necessary for us to continue. It's difficult but very rewarding. But . . .” He trailed off.

“Tell me.”

He could because it was Francesca. His woman. She seemed to understand everything he needed or wanted. “I will train our children and they'll go to other trusted trainers, but Francesca, if this life isn't for them, I don't want them not to have a choice. I don't want arranged, loveless marriages for them. I'll teach you to shadow ride because I want you safe, but I never want you to do the work or see the violence. I don't want it touching you. I need you to understand that. It isn't because I don't want to share power with you. It's because . . .”

She rolled over, sprawling over his body, her hands framing his face. “You don't have to explain. I know you want me home, to balance out the training. There's nothing wrong with that.”

“I want to come home to clean. To something wonderful and warm. To love. I want that for my children. I need that.”

“I know you do,” she murmured, and pressed a kiss into his throat.

“You have to know there are consequences to being with me, Francesca. I wasn't exaggerating when I warned you what kind of man I am. I expect to lead. I expect you to follow. I'll give you everything I can. I want you happy. But I need you safe. That's something in me I can't change. There will be a lot of demands. That you let me know where
you are every minute. That has nothing to do with trust, and everything to do with my issue to know you're safe.”

“I know that about you, Stefano.”

He took a breath. He had to let her know everything. He had to know if she could live with the real consequences of being married to a shadow rider. “That's nowhere near the worst.” He took a breath. Framed her face to look into her eyes. “The truth is, Francesca, once we're married and our shadows are completely merged, if things didn't work out and we divorced, the shadows would tear apart and there isn't any repairing them. I would lose my ability to ride the shadows. That's what my mother was talking about tonight. You would lose all memory of me, our life and even our children together. You wouldn't remember anything to do with shadow riding. You wouldn't suffer, because you'd have no memory of it, but you would lose your children. That's why it's important to know for certain before we're married, that this life is for you.”

He felt her sudden stillness. The swift inhale. She started to roll off of him, her first retreat. He didn't allow it, his arms locking her to him. “Don't,
bambina
, don't leave me. Just listen. Hear the truth in my voice. I love you with everything in me. There will never be a time that I won't. I'm incapable of cheating on you. I'm too loyal, and I know you have that in you as well. We'll work things out. I know I'm difficult, but I swear, with every breath in my body, Francesca, I'll work at our marriage.”

“It's a huge price, Stefano, if something goes wrong.”

“I know that. I know what you're risking. It seems I have less to lose, but it isn't so. I would be half a man without you, and I wouldn't know who I was without the ability to ride. Marry me, be my wife. Be my partner. Take the risk with me. I need you in a way I've never needed anything or anyone.” He was giving himself up to her. He'd never felt more vulnerable. Never felt more terrified. “Every fucking word I said to you is the truth.”

She brushed her mouth across his. Looked into his eyes,
searching for something. She must have found it because she nodded. It was slow in coming, but in the end, she did nod her acceptance. “Yes. The answer is still yes.”

*   *   *

S
tefano woke Francesca three hours after he fell asleep and he made love to her. Gently. As gently as possible for him. He made certain she was gasping and ready before he took her, driving her up again and again, giving her three orgasms before he emptied himself in her. He fell back asleep to the sound of her taking a bath. The woman loved the fucking bathtub.

S
tefano woke with the dawn creeping into the bedroom and urgent need clawing at his belly. His cock was hard and thick, desperate to be inside Francesca's warm, wet channel. Francesca's long hair moved in a sensual slide over his thighs and belly, so much silk, building a wild urgency as her mouth moved between his legs. Up his thighs, spreading kisses and little bites right up to his aching balls. She licked his sac and his cock jerked hard. Her fingers found him, rolling and caressing his tight balls even as her tongue slowly bathed them in warmth. She made little moaning sounds that added to the dark fantasy.

“Dolce cuore.”
It was all he could manage when she licked up his shaft. Greedy. Hungry. He reached down to bunch silk into his fist. Her mouth slid over the wide, flared head of his cock and she engulfed him. Completely. Taking him deep. Unexpectedly. The inside of her mouth was wet and slick, hotter than hell. “Fucking paradise.” He groaned. Tugged at her hair to raise her head. He wanted to see her eyes. He loved holding her gaze while she went down on him.

“Gotta look at me,
bambina
. I have to see your eyes.” He loved how she was ravenous for him in the same way he always felt insatiable for her. How her eyes conveyed her excitement and her love of what she was doing. He needed that almost as much as he needed her mouth on him. Her hair, moving over his thighs and belly, made him ultrasensitive so that every nerve ending in his body leapt to life. Fire
danced over his skin, adding to the sensations her mouth and hands created.

He waited for the impact, holding his breath. When it came, when she lifted her lashes and her eyes met his, his heart contracted in his chest and deep inside, where no one could see, she shattered him. That look. So full of love. So full of lust. For him. The man. Not the name. Not the money. Not for any other reason. Just for him. His fists tightened in her hair. He wanted to jerk her up to him, but she chose that moment to take him in her mouth.

Watching him watch her, she parted her lips and slowly, inch by inch, took him deep. It was the hottest thing he'd ever seen. She kept her gaze on his, letting the hunger burn in her eyes as she hollowed her cheeks and sucked hard, her tongue lashing him with strokes that felt like white lightning.

Her mouth felt like a fist of scorching velvet wrapped around his cock. Hot. Tight. Wet. Perfect. He knew what paradise was, right there in his woman's mouth. She slid her mouth up his shaft and then engulfed him again in a tight, wet hold that rocked him.

“Fuck.”
It burst out of him. Crude. But still. He couldn't think with his blood thundering in his ears and roaring through his shaft. Her hands were doing wicked, sinful things to his balls while her mouth did them to his cock. He gripped her hair harder and began to tug. “You gotta stop,
bella
. Right. The fuck. Now.” Because if she didn't, he was going to pour everything he had in him right down her throat, and he didn't want this to end.

Francesca showed no signs of stopping. Her mouth tightened even more, the suction stronger than ever, sending heat waves storming through him. Desire tightened his thigh muscles, drew up his balls and danced in his belly. He held her head in place with her hair, his fists on either side of her head, guiding her now, his hips thrusting into that hot, wet tunnel.

Stefano stared down into her eyes, sinking there, letting her take him, the fire consuming him. He thrust deep and held himself there, locked in that paradise, her mouth closing
around him like a vise. He didn't pull back until he saw the first hint of panic in her eyes. He let her take a breath and he thrust again and couldn't believe when her tongue lashed him with the lightning streaks, she suckled hard and once again took him deep, all the while her gaze clinging to his.

His breath caught in his throat. Not only was she giving him fucking paradise, but she looked at him with adoration, as if he was the only man in her world. He held himself there a beat or two longer, watching her take it, seeing the trust in her eyes. With a crude oath, he withdrew, transferred his hold to under her arms and yanked her up.

“Get on your knees—face the headboard,” he commanded.

Already he was up on his knees, his cock in his fist, using rough strokes to keep that fire hot and burning. It wasn't that difficult when she rolled onto her belly and crawled up the bed toward the headboard. She looked the epitome of sensuous, her beautiful ass in the air for him, her head bending toward the mattress.

“Reach behind you with your hands.”

She did so, turning her head to peek at him through the mass of hair tumbling on the sheets. He caught up his belt and used it to secure her hands behind her back. “I love the way you look right now. That's not too tight?”

“No.” Excitement or trepidation made her voice tremble; he wasn't certain which, but she pushed back her hips in invitation.

He waited a few moments, jacking his cock while he watched her in silence, allowing anticipation to build. He loved that his woman gave him this—gave him everything he asked for and more. Her breathing turned ragged and he slid his palm up the inside of her thighs and then opened her wider with his knees. She shivered. He reached between her legs and found her wet and hot. He knew she would be. She'd enjoyed going down on him. Lusted after him.

She gave a low moan when his palm swiped over her slick entrance, but she didn't move. She just waited. Giving herself to him. He slapped her ass hard, a sharp sting and then
rubbed the red spot soothingly. He bent and pressed a kiss right in the middle of his palm print. His tongue found her entrance and he licked up, all the way, a long stroke of heat searing her.

Francesca cried out, and he repeated the entire sequence on her left cheek. He spent time there, building the heat in her, using his hands, his tongue, varying the rhythm and strength, making certain to soothe her and keep her honey spilling into his mouth, onto his tongue, down her thighs so he could lick them clean.

She sobbed his name over and over, her breath hitching on every moan or cry he elicited from her. He took his time, enjoying building that heat in her body. His cock pulsed and throbbed with every single smack and caress to her beautiful rounded ass. He couldn't resist taking a bite out of her, his teeth finding the center of his palm print on her right cheek and then stroking over his mark with his tongue.

She exploded, screaming his name, her entire body shuddering. He drove into her, using her hips like handles, dragging her back into him so he could slam deep and hard, feeling the viselike grip of her body as she clamped down on him, stroking and strangling him with her inner muscles as she convulsed around his cock.

He didn't make love to her as he often did. He fucked her. Hard. Deep. Rough. He reached down and caught her hair, dragging her head up and back while he jackhammered into her, pistoning hard. All the while fire streaked through him, raced up his spine and boiled like a fury in his balls. It was exquisite. Fucking perfection. Her body responded to his rough treatment with another strong quake, rippling with shocks, gripping and teasing his cock as he drove into her over and over.

He dragged her up farther, using her hair, so he could see her breasts swaying through each hard jolt of her body. He wished he had two cocks so he could be in her mouth at the same time as he fucked her sweet, scorching hot tunnel. He didn't let up for a minute, a kind of sexual fury riding
him hard. He drove into her again and again, nearly lifting her up off her knees with each stroke.

“You want more?”

She nodded.

“Harder? Rougher?”

She nodded again. Cried out when he complied.

“You're going to give it to me again, Francesca.” He made it a command. “Come for me right now.”

She did the moment he told her to, her body already his, exploding around him, clamping down hard so the friction was nearly unbearable. He rode through it, his teeth clenched, the fire building and building until he thought it was impossible to get any hotter. “Again,” he demanded, not stopping. Not letting up. Driving as deep as possible, as fast and hard as possible.

“I can't,” she gasped.

“You will.” He made it a demand once again, knowing she'd comply.
“Now.”

He felt his balls tighten to the point of pain. The fire rushed down his spine to his hips and buttocks, up his toes and calves, into his thighs. The two fires came together, crowning in his cock as her body suddenly gripped him hard. Her sheath was scorching hot, burning him with a fiery strangling clasp. She screamed as her body milked his, and her orgasm tore through her and his through him in a vicious, brutal climax that rocked both of them. His seed jetted deep, filling her, pouring into her, triggering more aftershocks nearly as brutal as the original orgasm.

He loosened his hold in her hair, locked his arm around her waist and both of them collapsed onto the mattress. He breathed deeply, trying to recover, floating in a kind of bliss, his heart pumping wildly and his cock still jerking deep inside of her. “Give me a minute,” he managed to rasp out. “I'll get your hands free.”

He couldn't move for the longest time, a fine sheen of sweat covering his body and dampening his hair. He felt great. Better than great. After a few minutes he slipped from
her body, the sensation sending another heat wave coursing through his veins.

“You still with me,
bella
?” He pressed a kiss into her back. She hadn't moved, hadn't made a sound, not since that ragged scream that tore through her along with the fury of her orgasm.

She nodded her head, but didn't speak. He gathered her hair and twisted it, getting it off her back so he could sweep his palm down the curve of her spine and over her buttocks. He liked seeing his marks there. He pressed kisses all along her spine, down to the small of her back and then over both cheeks of her bottom. Undoing the belt buckle, he freed her wrists and rubbed at them gently, inspecting them for marks before rolling onto his back, taking her with him.

Francesca lay up against his side, curled into him, one hand on his belly, fingers splayed wide. “I don't think I can move.”

“Me either,” he admitted.

“I'm glad you're home.”

“I noticed. You can wake me up anytime,” he added.

“You've really never done the tying the hands with any other woman?”

“Nope. I wouldn't share my fantasies with any woman who wasn't mine. They don't belong to another woman, only you.”

She turned even more toward him. Her breast slid along his rib cage, sending a curl of heat spiraling through him. “And if you never found the right woman?”

“Then my fantasies would go to the grave with me.”

“I'm glad you found me. I like everything you do to me.”

“Tonight,” he stated, “I'm going to fuck you with a vibrator while you suck me off. If I don't, I'll be waking up every night with that particular fantasy. I'll use handcuffs this time. Ones that are padded so there are no bruises. When I was fucking you, all I could think about for a few minutes there was how I wished I had two dicks instead of just one.”

“I don't think I could handle two. As for your intentions for tonight, I don't have any objections,” she said, licking
along his rib cage. “Not that I mind you waking up every night with a fantasy. I'm more than happy to oblige you in all things. And I don't mind the handcuffs, but don't think I'm not well aware my ass is bruised, so don't sound so self-righteous.”

He laughed and flicked her nipple with his tongue. “I want my mark on you. Not some object's mark.” His hand found her bottom and he caressed her with his palm. “Are you sore?”

“A little.”

“Good.” There was a wealth of satisfaction in his voice he didn't try to hide. “I want you thinking of me every time you sit down today.”

“I think you're imprinted so deep inside me, Stefano, I'm going to feel you there for weeks.”

He used his arm to sweep her in closer to him so he could lean over her and look into her eyes. “You tell me if I ever get too rough or if our play gets too much for you.”

“I will. You weren't too rough. I loved it. My body loved it. Couldn't you tell?”

“That was why I kept going. But you stop me if you don't like anything I'm doing to you.”

“I will. I promise.” She pressed a kiss to his throat. “I need a shower. So do you. And food. This time, I might even order us up something.”

“I'll carry you if you can't walk,” he offered.

“We're going to shower together?”

“Yes. I'm a conservationist. Conserving water is high on my priority list.”

“I'll just bet it is. If you shower with me, we'll never get to breakfast,” she pointed out.

“You will. You started something earlier that I want you to finish.”

She laughed, her eyes sparkling. “I'm all for that. Carry me.”

He was all for it, too. She took him right back to paradise with the hot water pouring down on him, her eyes clinging to his as he took her mouth. He thought himself well sated
after riding her so ferociously, but the moment she began to suckle him, he was lost again. Hard and thick and needy again. This time she finished what she'd started.

*   *   *

T
hey ordered up breakfast and ate it in the room Stefano liked to call his “sunroom.” It was all glass on one side, the sliding doors opening onto a balcony that was wide and long. The walls jutted outward on both sides to help with wind and there was a small table and two comfortable chairs where they took their food and ate. He had sex on the brain, because he'd decided he'd have her out on the balcony and inside the sunroom, pressed up against the glass.

She sipped at her coffee and teased him about being an exhibitionist. He just sent her a grin and began to run through his morning reports while she opened the tablet he'd bought for her and read the local news. He liked sitting beside her, reading together, sipping coffee and being locked away from the rest of the world. He reached out and caught her hand, bringing her knuckles to his mouth.