Shane: A Mafia Love Story: Dark Erotic Romance (10 page)

She frowned. “But why?”

He ignored that question. “This is a different kind of submission for you, Mia. I want you to fight your own urge to resist. Accept some gentleness.” His lips were lighter than a butterfly’s wings as he brushed a kiss against her nose. “Realize you deserve it, that you have a right to be pampered and pleasured by your partner.”

Her eyes widened. Was his amateur psychoanalysis somewhat on-target? Did she fight because that was all she had ever known, or did she subconsciously feel like sex had to be a battleground, and that she deserved nothing more?

Intellectually, Mia knew Aldo had used her in sordid ways that she’d had no control over, and she was a victim. Sometimes, on a visceral level, she still couldn’t help feeling like a dirty slut for letting him, even though she had fought.

If she fought Shane, she would get what she wanted without having to accept any responsibility for the decision. Giving in to his request not to fight was so much harder, because it was making a conscious decision to have sex with him and enjoy it, regardless of how fucked up things were between them.

He pressed a sweet kiss to her lips. “Can you do that, Mia?”

She trembled as he slipped a strap down her shoulder, his mouth moving to the curve of her shoulder to follow its path down her arm. He repeated the motion with the other side, increasing her trembling. “I don’t know.”

“Let’s find out.” The gown pooled to her waist, and Shane pushed her back against the pillows so he could straddle her.

Mia closed her eyes when he took one nipple into his mouth with deliberate care. His gentle sucking sent bolts of pleasure throughout her body, centering on her core. She was so wet between her legs that she would have been embarrassed if she hadn’t been so focused on his mouth and hands.

Those hands were stroking her skin carefully, as though determined to seek out and learn all her secrets. The satin and lace confection she’d worn slid down her body with minimal assistance from her, and she couldn’t help a small smile at his appreciative hum when he discovered she wore no panties.

Shane parted her thighs, but didn’t touch her pussy. She arched her hips in invitation before muttering a small grunt as he got to his feet instead. Mia watched as Shane slipped off the robe. She had seen him naked before, but had always been so preoccupied with resisting that she hadn’t taken time to really study his body.

A few scattered tattoos adorned skin stretched taut over muscles she had felt firsthand. Muscles she had strained against before being forced to submit. That thought made her clench her thighs.

He shook his head. “Open your legs, honey. Let me see that pretty pussy.”

Inexplicably shy, considering the things she had done with him, Mia slowly let her legs fall open again. As he turned to put the robe on a chair, his back diverted her attention. She gasped at the sight of the jagged scar running parallel to his spine. Other marks marred his flesh, but that was the most prominent. It hovered on her tongue to ask him about it, but she called back the impulse when he turned to look at her, his expression making it clear the subject was out-of-bounds.

“Come here.” He crooked his finger.

It wasn’t as difficult to obey him as she’d expected. Mia got off the bed and walked to him, insanely aware of their nakedness. Part of her wanted to draw out this intense seduction, while another part of her wanted to beg him to fuck her right then. She knew her body would offer no resistance to his possession, and her mind was falling in line with that idea.

To her surprise, Shane put his arm around her waist and led her to the bathroom. As they got closer to the shower, she tensed up, remembering their first time. “What are you doing?”

“Giving you a better memory.” He paused to turn on the water, fiddling with the panel of buttons until the light was a dim pink, and the steamy haze smelled of vanilla.

“That’s an impressive shower control system.” Her stomach clenched with nerves as she hovered at the entrance. Shane stepped into the marble stall, holding out his hand. She didn’t know if he would accept her refusal if she turned away, but she enjoyed having the illusion of choice.

Hesitantly, she took his hand and allowed him to take her into the space that had been the scene of their first violent encounter. Mia shivered despite the warm water cascading down on them with the intensity of a gentle rain instead of deluge like last time.

“I forgot something.” Shane paused in the process of closing the glass door. “Will you wait here for a moment?”

Feeling lost, both by his gentle manner and the turn of events, she nodded. Hugging her arms around herself, she drifted to the built-in bench as she waited for Shane to return. Whatever he’d gone to fetch must have been in the other room, because he was back quickly.

Her eyes widened when he sat on the floor between her legs. The silver gleam of a razor clued her in to what he’d gone to get, and while she didn’t really think he would cut her, she couldn’t stop herself from tensing as he lifted one of her legs to put on his thigh.

She couldn’t speak as he reached for a can of shave gel and applied a generous coating to the leg on his lap. It was unnerving and sensual to have him shave first one leg, and then the other. He moved with confident strokes, and she found herself asking a question she hadn’t intended to utter. “You’re good at this. Do you shave women often?”

“Once or twice.” He didn’t move his gaze from the path of the razor. “Jealous?” he taunted in a joking tone.

“Yes.” She’d meant to respond in a teasing fashion, but the word rang with sincerity. Somehow, she forced herself not to look away as he looked up, his green eyes wide with surprise. With a shrug, she said, “I’m fucked up.”

There was hint of cockiness in his grin as he resumed shaving her. “I lied.”

“What?”

He chuckled. “I’ve never shaved a woman before.”

“Oh.” Without a witty response, she leaned back against the cushioned wall of the bench and watched him finish shaving her in silence.

When he’d reached the top of her second thigh, she started to sit up.

“Uh uh.” Shane placed her feet methodically on either side of the bench, splaying her wide for his inspection. “I like your neat little thatch of curls, but I’m dying to see and taste you hairless.”

Mia’s stomach spasmed as he arranged her a bit more, and it took every ounce of courage not to flinch or try to move away when he put a dollop of gel on his palm and started smoothing it over her slit. There was something so personal about this act that it left her feeling raw and exposed.

Shane seemed to pay special attention to covering her mound with gel. He was methodical as he stroked it down the inside of her outer lips, pausing to swirl his finger around her throbbing clit.

Mia whimpered and arched her hips, eyes wide when he swatted her between the legs very gently. The light impact made her inner muscles clench with desire.

“No moving. I don’t want to cut you.”

She watched his nimble fingers wield the razor. Even his swollen knuckles seemed to offer no deterrent as he shaved her with the careful attention to detail a master painter might use when applying paint to a canvas.

Her body hummed with arousal as the sharp blade slid over her skin, made slicker by her own juices. Turned on beyond known limits, Mia cupped her own breasts and started massaging her nipples. She could have sobbed with relief when he put away the razor and rinsed her newly bared flesh by redirecting one of the shower nozzles.

A loud moan escaped her as the water hit against the bundle of nerves beneath her clit, almost making her climax. She glared at him when he diverted the water. “Bastard.”

Shane chuckled. “Sorry, baby, but that orgasm belongs to me, not the showerhead. I want you to fuck my face, to spill your juices in my mouth as you come.”

“Oh.”

He grinned. “Just oh?”

Mia shrugged. “What can I say to that, besides get to it?”

Looking delighted, Shane grasped her thighs and pulled her ass to the edge of the bench. He folded her legs back and pushed them wide, leaving her completely open to him. Mia had no fear in that vulnerable position. Her only thought was of feeling his wicked tongue on her heated folds so she could come.

Shane prolonged the torture by kissing her inner thigh, starting halfway up and working toward her center. Mia’s nerves were strung taut by the time he neared her pussy, and she sobbed when he skipped over the swollen flesh to kiss his way down her other thigh. “You’re such a sadistic bastard.”

“I know.” He lifted his head slightly. “You playing with your nipples makes me so hot, Mia. It really makes me want to dive in and eat you up.”

Responding to his challenge and subtle demand for incentive, she started pinching her nipples. In her fevered lust, she had continued cradling her breasts, but had forgotten about stimulating her nipples as she’d focused on impending oral pleasure. Now, she pulled gently on each tight bud, feeling a corresponding pulse between her thighs with each tug.

“I’m inspired.” He bent his head, his tongue teasing her puffy lips for a second.

Mia gasped at the sensation, which was so much more intense without the barrier of pubic hair. Abandoning her nipples, she leaned forward to grasp his head with her hands, digging her fingers into his hair as she forced him closer to her.

He laughed a scant second before his mouth devoured her. The combination of his breath and the first taste of his tongue sent her over the edge. She whimpered and tensed as a climax spread through her. It had happened so quickly, and was so intense, that she couldn’t think about anything except the tongue lapping patiently between her folds as she arched against his face.

Shane eased the pressure of his tongue as she convulsed, until she stopped bucking against him. Mia reached out to grasp the bar behind her, holding on with both hands when he ramped up his speed again as her climax crested and started to wane. In no time, he’d teased her back to the edge before withdrawing.

She endured that cycle three times before she was screaming his name from a combination of need and exasperation. When Shane finally pulled her off the bench to ride him, she parted her legs and helped guide him to her opening. “Fuck me, Shane.”

“Oh, yeah.” He surged inside her, his hands digging into her hips as he pushed in as deeply as he could.

Mia pressed down, wanting every bit of him. Shane’s cock felt larger than it ever had, and she didn’t know if that was from the new position, her lack of pubic hair, or because he was so turned on. She had never been so wild for someone before and wondered if it was the same for the man underneath her.

He rotated his hips as he thrust into her, rubbing along all her responsive spots and bringing Mia to the edge of another orgasm with just a few strokes. This time, he didn’t deny her release as he surged inside her, pressing against her g-spot.

Mia came with a keening cry, and the intensity of the orgasm made her shake. In her release, she was vaguely aware of Shane pulling out and turning her over. It was only when he had her on all fours, as he’d done the first night, that pleasure faded and panic crept in. She tried to push him off her, and tears splashed down her cheeks.

“Shush, Mia.” He kissed her shoulder blade. “Let me make love to you this way. I don’t want you to remember that ugly encounter. Remember this instead.”

His voice was so gentle, his hold supportive rather than restrictive, that Mia’s panic subsided. With a few deep breaths, she managed to gather her scattered wits and didn’t try to escape when his hand slipped between her thighs.

This time, rather than holding her apart for his rough possession, Shane stroked and teased her folds, his fingers rubbing lightly under her clitoris in a way that made her arch backward. That seemed to be what he waited for, because a second later, his cock pushed against her sheath.

“Take me, Mia.” His breath was a gentle breeze against her ear when he whispered the request.

Just a little uncertainly, she eased backward, opening her thighs and relaxing her inner muscles. His cockhead slipped into her, and she relaxed the rest of the way against him. A millisecond later, Shane was all the way inside her, moving slowly before his pace increased.

He fucked her like he had the first night, but with an undercurrent of gentleness and a focus on her pleasure. Mia was shocked to find her body responding so quickly, and was soon clenching around him as she came again. Shane groaned her name as he surged inside her, filling her completely as his erection twitched. Hot spurts of his release entered her. It was an animalistic position, and she couldn’t deny she felt claimed like a bitch as he came inside her.

Surprisingly, it left her feeling content and replete, rather than shamed or debased. He had succeeded in supplanting the memories of that first horrific shower encounter with something much better and far more memorable.

He saw to the task of cleaning them both and drying her off, apparently realizing his combination of gentle and possessive lovemaking had left her a languorous mess. Mia couldn’t summon the energy to do much more than shuffle her feet as he led her to the bed and tucked her in. When he started to stand, she surprised both of them by reaching out for him. “Stay.”

He frowned, as though debating something with himself, before sighing in a way that suggested surrender. A second later, Shane joined her on the bed, pulling the blankets over both of them. Mia snuggled against him, feeling no guilt for enjoying the embrace and the sex that had preceded it. His lips against her forehead was the last thing she remembered before slipping into a deep sleep.

***

Mia woke sometime shortly after dawn to the delicious sensation of half-under, half-against her lover. Rather than panic at being pinned under a solid male form, pleasure spread through her.

Plastered against his back and partially under his side, she let her gaze wander freely over the scars on his back, squinting just a bit to see them with the faint morning light. She recognized three holes in separate spots around his back that had to be from bullets. Two were near each other and roughly the same size, making her think they might have been from the same incident.

The third was lower down, near the base of his spine, and larger. It was the kind of wound that should have left him paralyzed, but must have missed any vital parts.

Next to that old wound was the start of the knife mark that blazed a ragged line up his back, alongside his spine. It was old and puckered, more white than pink. The mark had probably faded as much as it ever would and was likely very old. How had he survived that?

Unable to suppress the impulse, Mia reached out and touched the scar, slowly trailing her finger up the line to where it ended a short way below his shoulder blade. Halfway through, she felt him stiffen as he woke, but he didn’t move away or tell her to stop. Emboldened, she slid out from under him and turned more toward his back. He jumped when she brushed her lips against the scar. Small tremors shook his frame as she moved her mouth along the line, pausing to kiss every few inches.

When she had run out of scar, Mia moved higher, kissing the back of his neck before angling her head slightly to bring her mouth close to his ear. “Tell me about it?” she invited, holding her breath as she waited to see if he would allow the intrusion. Sharing ugly secrets was even more baring than sharing their bodies.

After a second, he turned over and pulled her against him. She couldn’t see his face with her cheek pressed against his hard chest, but maybe he preferred it that way.

“My father did it.” He sounded aloof, as though discussing baseball statistics or telling her about something that had happened to someone else.

She winced. “Dear god, why?”

His shrug made her shift a bit, bringing her closer to him. “I honestly don’t remember now. I know it had something to do with me being afraid to try or do something. I remember him taunting me about being a coward and saying he was going to check to see if I was spineless. The pain…” Trailing off, he let silence stretch for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, tentatively putting her hand on his stomach as a show of comfort.

“The pain was pretty fucking unbearable. I remember that, but the rest of the details are a blur.”

“How old were you?”

“Twelve.” His hand draped over the one on her stomach to clench around her fingers. “My neighbor saved me, since my mom was too fucking terrified to intercede.” Shane’s chest rumbled with an unexpected laugh. “Cormac whacked him over the head with his own half-empty bottle of Jack. The dumb son-of-a-bitch had no memory of any of it and assumed he’d just passed out.”

“Did the police come?”

He snorted. “Not in that neighborhood, and not with a mean bastard like Manus O’Mara. No one wanted to cross the crazy fucker.”

“Except your neighbor?” She tilted her head to look up at him.

He nodded. “Cormac always had balls.”

The tone of affection underlying his words caught her attention. “You’re still friends?”

“Yeah, you could say that.” He laughed. “Cormac is my boss’s third-in-command.”

“What are you?” Sexy, crazy, and frustrating were words that came to mind, though she didn’t utter them.

“A captain. I have a crew, and I have authority, but there are those above me.” Suddenly, he pulled her on top of him, his hands on either side of her head. “Bosses who won’t be pleased if Aldo Peretti starts a war.”

She bit her lip. “Maybe you should send me away.” Her heart leapt with hope, though the darker side of her protested the idea.

Shane’s eyes narrowed. “I thought about it, but I can’t.”

Mia frowned. “Why not?”

He rolled his eyes. “You know why not. I’d rather paint a target on my ass with all three families and the feds than give you up.”

The intensity in his gaze made her shiver, and she searched her mind for something to distract him. “What do you do for your bosses?”

“Whatever they tell me.”

“Do they…what if they tell you to get rid of me?”

Shane’s hands tightened around her head, making her wince slightly. “They can fuck off. It would kill me to break with Cormac after what he did for my family, but I would for you.”

“I know he saved you when you were a kid, but didn’t he also drag you into this lifestyle?” That didn’t sound like a true friend to her.

His expression closed slightly. “Cormac didn’t drag me anywhere, honey. I leapt in eagerly, ready to repay the debt I owed.”

She scowled. “They expected you to pay for him saving your life as a child?”

He shook his head slowly. “No, I felt obligated to repay them when they helped me hide the fact that I had killed the bastard who’d spawned me.”

She gasped, fear racing through her. It was so much worse than she’d thought. If he could kill his own father, he’d have no trouble eliminating anyone who got in his way. What kind of ruthless monster killed his…

Remembering that ugly scar on his back, she could understand why he’d want revenge, and her fear faded. “Why didn’t you just leave or tell someone?”

His gaze shuttered, and his voice turned cold. “Judging me, baby girl? Shocked that I killed my father?” Shane sneered. “I’m proud of it. That bastard deserved to die, and if I hadn’t killed him, he would have killed my mother and my sister.”

“Oh.” She had clenched her hand in his, but now forced her fingers to relax. “How old were you?”

“Fifteen. Siobhan was six and had always been fragile. She missed a lot of school from being sick, and since my useless fuck of a father never kept a job for longer than few days, there was no money for a doctor. He wouldn’t take charity, so she suffered. We all suffered from his choices, but she used to cry sometimes from the pain, because it was so bad.”

“What was wrong with her?”

“Rheumatoid arthritis, juvenile onset, but we didn’t know it at the time. I guess she’d started crying one afternoon, and it interfered with his drinking time. He attacked my little sister to shut her up. Mom tried to stop him and was knocked out. When I came home from school, he was beating my baby sister with a belt, though she was unconscious.”

She hugged him instinctively. “What did you do?”

“I stabbed him through the back of the neck with a steak knife.” His laugh held a sharp edge. “It was some freebie set my mom had gotten at a grocery store with coupons, and it did not want to go in. I had to try a few times.”

The shadows in his expression stilled her breath, but she couldn’t say it was from fear. He was mesmerizing in his darkness, and she couldn’t find fault with his actions in light of the circumstances. After a brief consideration, she decided she would probably happily rid the world of her own father, and she certainly would if she had the chance to get rid of Aldo. “So Cormac saved you?”

“I saved myself and my family, baby, but he helped me hide the body. The world just assumed that drunken fucker had finally shambled off into obscurity, and the neighborhood breathed a sigh of relief.” He smiled, loosening his hands around her head to brush her cheek gently. “My sister and mother breathed a helluva lot easier, and life improved when I started working with Cormac.”

“In the mafia.” She couldn’t hide her disdain. “Your improved life came at the expense of others.” At his careless shrug, she asked, “Did you have to kill other people?” He nodded, making her teeth set on edge from frustration at his deliberate obscurity. “Okay, how many?”

“I’m not answering that.”

She arched a brow. “Why? Do you think I’m wearing a wire?”

He chuckled. “The only thing you’re wearing is me, baby.”

Mia rolled her eyes. “So tell me.”

Shane shook his head. “No. You don’t need to know.”

“Do you even know?”

He rolled his eyes. “Of course I know, Mia. I mark it down on the wall with the blood of my victims. You wanna see the shrine?”

The implausible urge to giggle rose inside her, and she had to bite her tongue. “Seriously, have you killed so many people you can’t keep track?”

He sighed, sounding annoyed. “I know exactly how many I’ve killed. I know the reasons why, and I have no stain on my conscience for ending those fuckers. Happy now?”

She slumped a bit. “I guess.” Tilting her head, she asked, “Ballpark? More than five? Less than one hundred?”

He snorted. “How about this? I’ve killed more people than the number of times we’ve fucked, but a lot less than the number of times I plan to fuck you.”

His words were twisted and wrong, but she couldn’t pretend they didn’t make her body stir with desire. When he tugged her head down for a long kiss, she didn’t protest or fight. Mia didn’t even have the compulsion to resist as he worked her into a frenzied state and fucked her to satiation within fifteen minutes.

Afterward, they lay side by side on their backs, breathing heavily. Her stomach growled, making her giggle. “I’m starving.”

“Let me order food.” He fumbled around for his robe, retrieving his cell phone from the pocket.

Seeing him do so was a stark reminder of her prisoner status, but she swallowed the angry words that rose and suppressed the urge to complain that she didn’t even have a way to communicate. It would serve no purpose, because she hadn’t earned his trust yet, and the idea of arguing with him again when they had a tentative truce didn’t appeal.

When he’d stopped speaking with whichever of the kitchen staff he’d called, he surprised her by drawing her against him to cuddle. They didn’t speak, and she didn’t have the urge to break the silence.

Instead, her thoughts turned to the miserable childhood he must have endured. At least she had been mostly ignored by her father and raised by kind, if distant, nannies. Her nightmare hadn’t begun in earnest until she was thirteen, but he’d been a victim all through his childhood. Was it an adequate explanation for how he’d ended up so selfish and driven, without the limits of moral decency that bound most people? That was too simplistic, but she was certain it at least partially explained why he could be so cruel.

“Where is your sister?” she asked a few minutes later. “And your mother?”

“My mother lives in Florida with my second stepfather, who is a nice old guy. She’ll probably outlive him like she has her last two husbands.”

She frowned. “Did you do something to her second husband?”

Shane groaned. “Do you think I’m responsible for the death of everyone, babe? No, I had nothing to do with Jake croaking. I never even met him, since they were only married a short time.”

Treading lightly, to avoid further offense, she asked, “And your sister?”

“Siobhan is a ballerina in the city.”

She licked her lips, searching for a delicate way to phrase the question. “Does she know what you do?”

He hesitated. “Vague bits, but nothing concrete. I keep her separate from this life, Mia.”

She didn’t know whether to be touched by his protectiveness toward his sister, or annoyed at the way he had dragged her kicking and screaming into the seedy underbelly of his lifestyle when she had escaped it long ago. Or had she? Had Aldo ever really let her go, or had he been biding his time for some reason known only to him? Would he have taken her in the future without warning?

Imagining his goons coming for her, and what would have waited for her at Aldo’s hands, made her shudder. Perhaps in some fucked up way, Shane had saved her from a far worse fate.

A tap on the door had her pulling the covers up to her chin. It opened a second later, and she groaned at the sight of Selena carrying a heavy tray. The older woman glared at her before giving Shane a polite smile. “Good morning, sir. Your breakfast, as requested.”

With what appeared to be perfect servitude, Selena set down the tray and lifted the salvers to reveal two plates of food. She poured two cups of coffee into silver cups, handing first one to Shane before turning to her with the other.

Mia knew what was going to happen before the cup started to tip, but she had nowhere to go. The hot coffee splashed down on her shoulder and seeped through the blanket in a flash, making her hiss with pain.