Italian Stallions (27 page)

Vince’s hands curled into fists as he struggled to control his rage. Every male instinct he had ordered him to go in there, rip Theresa out of Mark’s hold and pound him into the floor. But a cautionary override reminded him that if he wasn’t careful, he could end up getting Theresa hurt, even killed.

“Come on,” Mark said, half dragging Theresa toward the door. “Let’s get this over with.”

They were coming toward the door. Vince pressed himself back against the house, waiting for an opening. Mark pushed Theresa out the door so hard she stumbled. As she fell, she pulled Mark partway down with her.

Vince seized the opportunity, clipping Mark with a hard punch to the temple. Stunned by the pain, Mark dropped his grip on Theresa and staggered back. He hadn’t let go of the knife, and wheeled around clumsily to face his attacker, trying to shake off the pain that had to be ringing through his head.

“Vince, be careful,” Theresa cried when Mark rushed at him, swinging his knife hand in a wild arc.

Vince was on the balls of his feet, hands loose, ready for him. It had been years since he’d been in a fight, but he’d spent enough time scrapping with the neighborhood toughs as a teen and now it all came back. And it helped that Mark still hadn’t regained his equilibrium as he rushed at his target.

As Mark slashed viciously toward Vince’s abdomen, Vince caught his wrist in an iron-hard grip. He squeezed, grinding the wrist bones together until Mark’s hand opened spasmodically, sending the knife clattering to the stone pavers. Vince landed his other fist in Mark’s face with a satisfying crunch, and Vince felt a savage satisfaction as blood spurted from the gory mess that used to be Mark’s nose.

But Vince didn’t stop there, landing blow after blow on the smaller man’s body. He felt something tugging at his arm, but he didn’t stop. He used Mark like a punching bag, exorcising the frustration and rage that had been dogging him.

“Vince, stop, you’re going to kill him!” Theresa’s voice, her grip on his arm, finally penetrated his consciousness.

He whipped around, fist raised. “Give me one fucking reason why I shouldn’t!”

She jerked her hands away and flung her arm up in front of her face as though to ward off a blow. “Just don’t!”

All the rage in his body drained out of him at her frantic plea. He let Mark slump to the ground as he turned to Theresa, feeling sick to his stomach at the way she flinched when he settled his hands over her shoulders. “Theresa, I’m not going to hurt you.”

“I know,” she said shakily, shaking her head as though to clear it. “I’m sorry. It’s just reflex.”

Anger kindled to life again. “Because of him.” He slanted a scathing look at where Mark was moaning, semi-conscious.

She nodded, refusing to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. Sorry about all of this.”

She folded her arms around herself and started to turn away.

“Stop apologizing!” He grabbed her by the shoulders so she couldn’t get away. “Just tell me what’s going on here.”

Her shoulders slumped. “He’s trying to blackmail me.”

“Blackmail you? How?”

In a hurried rush, she told Vince the story of her job dancing at the club, Mark’s debts, and the slutty photos.

She didn’t dare look at him until she was finished, not wanting to see his face, know what he thought of her until the last possible moment. When she finally met his eyes, she saw that they were dark and flinty with suppressed rage. His full, sensual mouth was drawn into a tight line. It was exactly as she feared.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

The simple question threw her for such a loop, she couldn’t find the words to answer.

He barreled through her stunned silence. “Why should I care if you danced naked—”

“I wasn’t completely naked.”

“Whatever. You could have just told me the minute this asshole started harassing you. You should have told me, Theresa,” he said, his voice getting louder. “You should have trusted me enough to tell me.”

“This was my mess,” she said, her jaw tilting at a stubborn angle. “I didn’t want to drag anyone else in.”

“I could have helped you—”

“I didn’t think you’d understand,” she broke in impatiently. “I mean, I see how you live, the circles you run in. What was I supposed to say? Oh, by the way, my drugged-up, gambling addict ex-boyfriend is in town, threatening to send half-naked pictures of me to everyone I’ve ever known? How could I expect you to be okay with that?”

“Theresa, I didn’t start out rich. If you’d bothered to ask, you’d know that me criticizing you for what you said you did would be beyond hypocritical.”

She raised a skeptical eyebrow, taking in his tailored shirt and slacks, his five-hundred-dollar shoes, his twenty-thousand dollar watch. Okay, so his shirt and pants were bloodstained, and the hand attached to the watch was bruised from pounding on Mark’s face, but still.

He met her look with a glare. “Let’s just say my family’s connected, Theresa.”

“How connected?” she said.

“Connected enough that I’ve been audited by the IRS every year since I made my first million. And I guarantee that the FBI has a file on me. You hear that, asshole?” he said over Theresa’s head to where Mark still lay in a pile. “You come near her again, I’ll make sure you end up in a wood chipper somewhere, you got that?”

Mark made a feeble groan of acknowledgment.

He gave her a long, measured look. The same look her father used to give her when she had done poorly on a test. A look that said he wasn’t merely angry, he was deeply, deeply disappointed. “You remember I told you once, there was nothing you could tell me that would make me turn away from you?”

She nodded, and a tiny seed of hope took root inside her. Maybe now that the truth was out, they could put this all behind them and start fresh.

“You should have believed me, Theresa.”

That little seed of hope withered and died as he shook his head and turned away without another word. He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and she heard him call the police.

By the time the cops had come and gone and taken Mark away in the back of a squad car, Theresa felt like she’d been hit by a truck. Her neck ached and her throat stung where Mark had cut her, but the full body ache came from the emotional blow she’d been dealt.

She’d lost Vince. She knew it. And along with that knowledge was the brutal realization that if only she’d told him the truth in the first place, she could have avoided this whole ugly mess.

He’d left her to follow the cops out and speak briefly with the detective. Now she stood alone amidst her packed boxes, wanting nothing more than to crawl into bed. Preferably with Vince.

But since that wasn’t in the cards, the only option was to go along with her original plan for the day and get the hell out of here. By time the squad cars left and Vince walked up the driveway, she was loading up her last box.

He stood, thumbs hooked into the pockets of his pants. His wide shoulders were stiff and his jaw was tight with rage. His eyes were flat, grim, like he didn’t want to look at her. “You got somewhere to go tonight?”

Please let me stay here. Please love me enough to give me another chance.
But she stayed silent. Theresa Bellessi never begged. “Gia’s.” The name was all she could force past the softball sized knot in her throat.

He nodded, and she closed the trunk of the car and climbed into the driver’s seat. She had nearly closed the door when he called out to her. “Yes?” she said, as embarrassingly hopeful as a death row inmate waiting for a pardon.

“I need your key back.”

Her heart fell like an anvil, crashing through her insides to land somewhere around her feet. “Right.” She dug through her purse, wondering when it had expanded to the size of the Grand Canyon as she raked through its contents. Having her vision blurred by tears did nothing to help. Finally she found the damn keyring and pried the key off with shaky fingers and passed it to Vince, praying she could get out of there before dissolving into tears again.

One fat droplet squeezed past her eyelashes and rolled down the side of her nose, landing with a plop on Vince’s outstretched hand. She slammed the door shut and barely made it out of the driveway before she completely fell apart.

V
ince stood outside of Ciao Bella, feeling more insecure than he could ever remember. It wasn’t a sensation he was familiar with, and not one he enjoyed. And the fact that it was a woman who had him twisted in knots didn’t make it any easier to take.

It had been a little over a week since he’d watched Theresa drive away. Coldly taken her key back and sent her away without so much as a “have a nice life.” Nine days later, he was hovering outside Ciao Bella, having come to the realization that pushing her away was maybe the biggest mistake of his life.

Actually, it had only taken him about a day and a half to figure it out, but by then he’d been on a plane to Singapore and hadn’t been able to do anything about it.

If he was completely honest with himself, he wasn’t sure there was anything he could do about it now. Not after the way he’d treated her. He cringed every time he thought about the things he’d said, the way he’d acted. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her face, white and strained, mouth pulled tight as she struggled not to cry. His heart, which he hadn’t ever given much thought to before, throbbed like a big bruise inside him.

Needless to say, he hadn’t slept much in the past week and a half, and he knew better than to blame it on jet lag.

Now Vince lurked outside the restaurant, as he had for the past half hour, watching the last of the customers trickle out. He’d come directly from the airport, had the car service drop him off here and sent the driver home with his bag. He didn’t want to waste any more time getting to Theresa.

So why was he standing out here like an idiot, watching her clear off and wipe down her tables and count her tips? For a guy who had a reputation for having brass balls and not taking no for an answer, he sure as hell was acting like a pussy.

“Loitering is illegal, you know.”

Vince jumped. He hadn’t see Gia come out the door, he’d been so focused on the sight of Theresa through the restaurant’s window. “How is she doing?”

Gia looked at him like he was an idiot, which he supposed he was. “She’s doing fine, considering in the past two weeks her father called her a whore, her ex-boyfriend blackmailed and attacked her, and you dumped her like last night’s fish special.” she said tartly.

His face burned despite the cold of the late fall night. “I fucked up,” he said simply, voicing aloud the thought that had been playing on an endless loop since he’d last seen Theresa. “I never should have let her go.”

Gia’s expression softened by a degree. “Tell me something I don’t know. The question is, what are you going to do about it?”

“Throw myself at her feet and beg for forgiveness?”

“Sounds like a good start.” She grabbed his arm, pulled him over to the door and held it open. Before he stepped through she caught his arm, “I have to warn you, though. If you hurt her again—”

“I know, you’ll send someone after me with a pair of cement boots.”

Gia drew herself up to her full five-feet-two inches, looking mildly affronted. “To hell with that. I’ll take care of you myself.” She ushered him in before her, and as he stepped over the threshold, she called, “Theresa, there’s someone here to see you,” before she scooted past him to the back of the restaurant.

Theresa looked up expectantly, her hand freezing in the act of reaching for a cocktail glass. Her big eyes were sad and strained, her normally warm olive complexion looking sallow. But she was still so beautiful he felt like he’d been punched.

“Hey Vince,” she said, wiping her hands on the short apron around her waist.

His tongue was thick, sticking to the roof of his mouth as he scrambled for something diplomatic, apologetic and highly romantic to say. His brain came up blank, save for one phrase flashing relentlessly like a neon sign.

“I love you,” he blurted out.

Theresa met his blunt declaration with stunned silence. Every molecule in his body froze as he waited for her reply. She just stood there, staring at him like he was speaking Martian, her lips parted in confusion.

“I’m sorry,” he tried again, rushing forward and stopping only inches from her. He grabbed her hand, laced her icy fingers through his. She didn’t pull away, which he took as a sign of encouragement, even though she was still looking at him like she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to kiss him or hit him. “I’m sorry,” he repeated, “I shouldn’t have said those things—I didn’t mean them. I made a huge mistake—”

“Wait,” she interrupted, halting his flood of inept apologies. “Can you go back? What you said before?” Her hand was gripping his, her fingers shakily clinging to his as wary hope poured through her big dark eyes.

“I love you,” he said, bringing her hand to his lips, closing his eyes as the scent of her skin hit his bloodstream like a heavy narcotic.

Then, just like that she was in his arms, tilting her face up for his kiss.

“I love you too,” she said, cupping his face in her hands.

Relief blew through him with such force it made his legs shake. “So you forgive me for being such an idiot?”

She laughed softly and kissed him hard. “Depends on what’s in it for me.”

“Everything,” he said, lifting her by the waist to pull her closer. “Anything. Name it.”

“Just you,” she said, her face buried against his shoulder. “I just want you.”

Theresa clutched at Vince’s shoulders and buried her lips against his throat, absorbing his taste, his scent, not entirely convinced this wasn’t an elaborate hallucination brought on by her recent lack of sleep. A distant part of her brain admonished her to resist, to play a little harder to get. He had dumped her. Without even trying to understand why she wasn’t willing to blindly trust him with the truth about Mark and her past.

She let the thoughts percolate, tried to get angry. But then he said, “I love you” in the way that sent ripples of pleasure and need through her. And then, “I missed you so much.” He pulled back and looked at her, his face marked with tired lines as he looked at her, passion in his beautiful dark eyes.

Okay. Some women might accuse her of being a weak-willed pushover, but she didn’t see much point in fighting when he was giving her everything she’d ever wanted.

Her lips parted under his, opening for his tongue, eager for the wet slide, the hot taste of him. Her nipples puckered tightly against the satin of her bra and moist heat pulsed between her thighs. God, she had missed this, missed him. The feel of his big hands on her body, holding her flush against him, the thick rise of his cock pressing insistently against her.

A loud, deliberate throat-clearing broke through her lustful haze. She and Vince pulled apart and turned hazy eyes on Gia, who stood at the other end of the bar.

“Since everyone is gone,” Gia said pointedly, “I’ll leave you here to close up, Theresa. Try not to break any health department codes,” she said and turned to leave through the back door of the restaurant.

Theresa broke away long enough to lock the front door and turn down the lights. Vince came up behind her, sliding his hands up her rib cage until his fingers teased the undersides of her breasts. “I just need to close out the cash register,” she said a little breathlessly. “Then we can go.”

“I don’t think I can wait that long,” he said, landing a hot, sucking kiss on the side of her neck.

Her gaze darted nervously out to the front window. It was late, and the foot traffic outside was scarce, but still.

“No one can see us,” he said, as though reading her thoughts. His hands came up to cover her breasts, kneading her through the heavy cotton of her blouse. She could feel his cock rearing up against the small of her back. “And I can’t walk home in this condition.”

Frankly, she wasn’t sure she’d make it either, what with the way all the blood in her body was pooling between her legs as the desire she’d suppressed for the past week and a half erupted in a rush of achy need. His hand slid down inside the front of her pants, over the silky fabric of her panties. She felt as well as heard his groan of pleasure when he found her wet.

“Turn around,” he said, urgency lending an edge to his voice as his fingers fumbled with her buttons. He pulled the front open, the heat of his gaze rising another fifty degrees as he stared at her creamy flesh cupped in satin and lace. “So beautiful,” he said, pulling his attention from her breasts to her face. “You are so beautiful to me, Theresa, and I love you so much.”

Tears burned in her eyes at his words, at the way he looked at her, the way he touched her. He sat her on one of the tall bar stools and leaned her back against the bar as he kissed his way down her body. His lips pulled at her breasts, his tongue flicking her nipples into almost painful hardness. He slipped off her shoes and pulled her pants down her legs, turning his face to press a passionate, almost reverent kiss against the smooth skin of her inner thigh.

Any reservations she might have had about being seen from the street vanished at the first flick of his tongue. His palms pressed her legs apart, spreading her wide. His thumbs slid against her slick folds, parting her pussy lips to meet his kiss. He kissed her not with mere hunger, but with relish. Like she was the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted, like he wanted to lick her, kiss her,
pleasure
her, until she dissolved into a molten puddle. She braced herself against the bar with one hand and ran her fingers through his thick, dark hair with the other, reveling in the feel of his mouth against her, the slick texture of his hair sliding through her fingers, in the knowledge that he was
hers.
And she was his.

“Come inside me,” she whispered, tugging his hair, urging him up. She shuddered as he gave her a last, lingering lick before coming off his knees to stand between her legs. She yanked his shirt from his waistband and they both struggled to pull it up over his head. She unzipped his pants and shoved his boxers down, and his heavy erection sprang into her waiting palm. “You have no idea how much I missed you,” she breathed as she ran her hand up over his thick shaft.

“I can’t believe I almost gave you up,” he said. “I can’t believe how lucky I am that you forgave me.” His shaky voice echoed her own sense of happy incredulity.

“I can’t believe we don’t have a condom handy,” she laughed.

He pulled one from his shirt pocket. “Always prepared.”

“Get it on.” She watched as he did.

“I love you,” he said as his hips surged forward, parting her, stretching her for his thick invasion.

She came in a sudden rush, the combination of his words and the sensation of his cock surging inside her enough to shove her right over the edge. “I love you too,” she moaned, wrapping her legs around him and pulling him deeper as her pussy rippled and contracted around him. Pleasure seared through her in a burst of heat and light as she pulled him close, her hands digging into the long muscles of his back as his hips pumped between her legs.

She’d never felt anything like this before, love and sex and pleasure, all the sweeter because she’d nearly lost it all.

He was right behind her, surging and thrusting between her thighs, pumping hard and fast. He came in thick, hot spurts, his hot skin blooming with sweat under her palms. “I’m never letting you go,” he whispered against her neck, kissing his way up her throat. “Just so you know.”

“Sounds good to me,” she said, trying to keep herself from sliding off the bar stool and onto the floor.

They took care of getting it together, pulled their clothes back on, their progress impeded by frequent kissing and touching.

“At this rate we’re never going to get home,” he chuckled as her hand skimmed down the front of his pants. He caught it in his hand and drew it up to his lips. “No more of that. I’ve been dreaming of having you in my bed all week.”

Home. In his bed. She loved the way that sounded.

She collected her tips and went behind the bar to grab her purse. When she came back around, Vince was surveying the restaurant with a calculating expression. “So you think Gia will let us have our reception here?”

That drew her up short. “As in wedding reception?”

“Yeah.”

“Aren’t you supposed to ask me first?” she said, feeling a goofy grin stretch across her face.

He grinned back. “I’ll ask. But just so we’re clear, we’re definitely getting married.”

Theresa didn’t argue. And later that night, when he slipped a two-carat emerald-cut diamond on her finger, it took her less than a nanosecond to say yes.