For Angelo (Full-Length Standalone Italian Billionaire Romance) (26 page)

“Angelo?” Lane pushed herself up, sensing the sudden change in his mood, and she asked, “What’s wrong?”
 

His eyes bored through hers. “What do you think?”

Oh no.
Her heart slammed hard against her chest, and her stomach became queasy with fear. They were going to talk about it now then. She had hoped that he would just let things lie, but she realized that she was being silly.

Angelo was a planner, not a pantster.

Of course he’d want to talk about things, even when they were hurtful.

She took a deep breath, telling herself she was going to be an adult about this.

Fuck.
He saw the look on her face, and his chest clenched. He heard himself say, “You should stay here longer.”

She snapped her mouth shut, deciding that the less said, the better. If he wanted her to stay longer, who she was to argue?

“You’re not going to ask why?”

She shook her head.

And it became clear to him. “You didn’t want to leave?”

Not looking at him, she mumbled, “Do you want me to?”

Ah.

He could hurt her now
, he thought. He could afford to keep his pride, to remain behind his walls, and not let her know that he had been terrified she would want to leave.

He could do that, but he didn’t.

“No.” He held her gaze with his. “Never.”

Because he might be a sadist…but he was only interested in pain that gave her pleasure. Pain that would make her cry did not interest him, repelled him even.

Angelo’s words left her dazed, and she didn’t even realize she was crying until he bent close and wiped her tears away.
 

Oh.

She watched him bring his finger to her lips, and he murmured, “I love the taste of your tears.”

Lane cried and laughed, and when he placed her on his lap, she wrapped her arms around his neck and cried on his chest.

“Poor baby.”

She laughed and cried harder because Angelo didn’t sound convincing at all. Instead, he sounded like he was relishing her tears, and he probably did.

“I should make you cry again tomorrow.”

“Sadist.” But her arms tightened around his neck as she spoke.

“Exactly.” He smiled against her hair. “That is what I’ll always be, just as…” His mouth moved to her ear. “Who you are now is who you will always be.”

Oooh.

She looked up. “A masochist?”

He shook his head, confusing her, and cupping her chin, he brought her mouth to his, saying, “You disappoint me. Surely you know by now—” He kissed her hard. “What you’ll always be is
mine.
”

Her toes curled hard.

“My masochist. My Lane.”

It was the most unbearably sweet thing he had said, and she couldn’t help it. She just had to say it.

“Angelo, I lo—”

His hand cupped over her mouth. “No.” She tried speaking against his palm, and he pressed just the slightest bit harder so she would know that he was against it. “I mean it.
”
She didn’t try to say anything, but he heard her anyway.
 

The pain that flickered in her eyes told him everything he didn’t want to know.

Slowly, he lowered his hand.

But this time, she didn’t even try to speak.

He drew his breath unevenly. “How about a bargain?”

She looked at him warily. “Like you’re allowing me to love you by 40%? That kind of bargain?”

He stared at her blankly. “How did you even come up with that kind of thought?”

She colored.

“Never mind, and no, that’s not what I meant.”

A part of him believed he was crazy for what he was about to suggest while another part of him believed it was the best idea he had ever come up.

But then he saw the way Lane’s eyes were gradually darkening, and he remembered that day when she had fainted.

He remembered seeing her looking at him like she deserved to be thrown away.

It was the same way she was looking at him now.

“Would you,” he said roughly, “be my girlfriend?” He might never be able to give her the words, but he could give her the next best thing, the only thing he could offer.
 

Lane was staring wide-eyed at him, and his tension increased. When he saw her shove her hands in her pockets, he said tautly, “Lane?”
 

“Could you say that again,” she whispered, “so I can be sure that I’m not hallucinating?”

Chapter Sixteen

Would you be my girlfriend?

Would you be my girlfriend?

Would you be my girlfriend?

Would you be my girlfriend?

The alarm gradually penetrated Angelo’s sleep.
 

Would you be my girlfriend?

Then he realized what he was listening to, and with a snarl, he woke up and turned off Lane’s phone with a muttered chain of Italian expletives.

Behind him, Lane burst into peals of laughter.

In the next moment, he had her trapped under him, and he glared down at her.
 

“Good morning,” she said sweetly. One of her newer discoveries about Angelo was that he was
not
a morning person, and it was yet another secret she kept zealously close to her heart.

Angelo didn’t smile back. Even now, he couldn’t believe that he hadn’t realized she had recorded his question that night.
Dio,
what an idiot he had been. And now, he was paying the price for his stupidity, with Lane using his words as an alarm to force him awake every morning.

“I can still kill you for that, you know.”

Swallowing back a nervous giggle, she clasped his face with both hands, saying cajolingly, “But it’s for your own good. Now, you wake up more quickly and—”

Not wanting to listen to her admittedly reasonable explanation, he kissed her to shut her up, and a second later he was kissing her just because he wanted to. Another moment, and he was kissing her because he needed to.

And just as it was in the past, the moments that followed were a wild frenzy, their clothes strewn across the room—

Angelo rolled to his back, and Lane automatically straddled him.

Their eyes met.

Clutching his muscular arms, she slowly lowered herself to his cock, her body trembling with every inch that entered her.

His biceps bulged under her fingers as her pussy took in the entire length of his cock, and she whimpered at the feel of it, thinking that no matter how many times they did it each day – and there were days when she would even lose count of her orgasms – this would never get old.

Never.

Angelo started moving, slowly and leisurely at first, just to drive both of them wild with anticipation. He tried to make it last as long as he could, but with her every whimper pushing him further to the edge, his loss of control became inevitable.

“Oh, Angelo,
please
.” Her body molded against him, her breasts falling on his face.

And that was it.

His mouth clamped onto one nipple, one hand clutched her other breast, and then his other hand was squeezing her bottom, telling her to let go.

With a keening cry, she started riding him, her movements untutored but passionate. She bounced on his cock as he sucked on her nipple, and when he heard her pant faster and harder, his balls tightened at the realization that she was close.
 

Releasing her breast, he fisted her hair, pulled her down, and hissed against her lips, “Ride me hard, and make me come.”

His mouth covered hers just as she cried out, and then she was doing what he commanded, riding him hard until he was stiffening under her and she was shaking—

He came with a harsh gasp, and the moment she felt his cum shoot inside her, she screamed his name, grinding her pussy on his cock as she reached her own orgasm.

After, both the shower and breakfast were an unhurried affair, but all throughout he also had to scowl at Lane to keep her from saying ‘I told you so.’ Yes, it was true that because of her blasted alarm they now had more time to spare in the morning, but he absolutely disliked hearing the truth, and that was that.

He drove her to school before heading to work, and the car ride was mostly spent in companionable silence, with Angelo’s mind already occupied with his plans for the day while Lane was again content just to be in his presence.
 

When they reached CU, she immediately tried making a break of it—

“Not so fast.” An arm snaked around her waist to pull her back to her seat, and she reluctantly let go of the door handle. This wasn’t ever a battle she won, but it didn’t mean she should stop trying.

As Angelo cupped her chin and made her face him, she mumbled, “You’re so unfair. You can at least choose to drive a car with tinted windows.”

“What you must think of me.” His soft voice was filled with disappointment. “It’s for your sake that I’m driving this. All the cars that I have with tinted windows are over five million dollars.”

She winced at the amount.

“This one I’m driving is just three point five. This is more preferable, si?”

She said doubtfully, “I guess.”

“Now,” he purred, “let me give you a goodbye kiss like the perfect boyfriend that I am.”

Oh no.

But there was no escaping him.

His mouth closed over hers, his lips nibbling hers, his mouth sucking on her lower lip before his tongue finally slipped inside her mouth. He kissed her so long and passionately that in the end, she could only hold on to him as she surrendered to his claim.

Angelo forced himself to raise his head, knowing that if he continued for another second, Lane would end up late for her class. He surveyed her face with deep satisfaction, taking note of her kiss-swollen lips and the way her eyes were still clouded with need.

Good,
he thought. No one would be able to forget she already belonged to someone else upon seeing her.

When she only continued to look at him, he asked wickedly, “Are you trying to tempt me into another kiss? Because I will gladly—”

His words made her flush, and recovering her senses, she stammered, “No, thank you.”

Her too-polite response made him grin.

She reddened even more. “Sadist!”

“I try my best to be one for you, my Lane.”

She bit back a sigh. Oh, why did she even bother verbally sparring with him? Picking her purse up from the floor, she said, “I have to go.”

He nodded, murmuring, “If you need anything, you know where to find Fico and Umberto.”

“T-thanks.” Even though it had been almost a month since she had become his girlfriend, Lane still hadn’t gotten completely used to the idea of having people at her beck and call.

“No panicking today?” His knuckles grazed her cheek as he spoke.

“No panicking,” she promised, her heart tripping over itself at the tenderness in his gaze.

She stepped out of the car, and when she looked back at Angelo, every trace of her sweetly possessive lover was gone. In place was the coolly composed billionaire, and she fought back a smile at the way Angelo nodded at her oh so politely before driving away.

No one would have thought that this was the same Angelo who woke up with the cutest bed hair and liked to eat her pussy in the shower.

No one.

She hugged the knowledge to herself.

Then she turned around and found practically the entire university staring at her, most of them women, throwing daggers at Lane with their envious gazes.