“I hate that you have to see me this way,” he says, a tear in his eye.
“It’s not your fault. You’re sick. It happens,” I assure him.
“You are so kind,” he says, staring at me. “I saw you in a dream, you know. While I was out. You were kind then, too.”
“A dream?” I repeat.
“Yes. I dreamed that you came to see me. You told me that you wanted to forgive me,” he adds. “A kindness I could never expect from you.”
“That wasn’t a dream,” I tell him, my heart thumping. “I really did come to see you.”
“How wonderful,” he murmurs, smiling.
“Dad, a lot has happened while you were sleeping,” I begin nervously. Sal steps forward from behind the curtain, and my father’s eyes go wide. He looks between us, confused.
“Who is this young man?” he asks. I squeeze his hand reassuringly.
I brace myself, knowing that this next conversation is going to be a little rough. I have to tell him about Sal. And even worse, I have to tell him about Blake. But I just have to trust that my father can handle it. So I decide to just jump right in.
“I know this may not be the best time, but there’s a lot I need to tell you.”
Epilogue
The morning light that filters in through the church has never looked prettier. It lights up all the guests who sit in the pews, each one of them looking up at me and Eva at the altar.
I’m wearing a tuxedo that’s blacker than black. There’s a light touch of Italian cologne on me, my face is cleanly shaven, and I have a fresh haircut that made Eva’s eyes light up as she watched my scruffy black hair fall away.
As for Eva, there’s not an angel in heaven who could match up to her.
Her dress is whiter than the snow outside, hugging her form down to the hips and flaring out like an elegant swirl of clouds at her feet, and her hair hangs over one shoulder like a swirling golden gilding.
It’s the same girl I saved what feels like a lifetime ago, even though it’s only been so little time. She’s same girl who fell into my arms, the same girl who stood by me through more than I could have asked of anyone, much less someone with so much pain behind her. Her eyes have been watery since we saw each other on the aisle.
Her father walked by her side the whole way, healthy and beaming with joy at being allowed to have such an honor.
It’s our wedding day, and I’m about to exchange vows with the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.
“Eva, my love,” I say and the words are hardly out of my mouth before tears start running down her cheeks. “We met in one of the darkest times in my life and yours. I don’t know what we did to deserve the chance to find each other. But when we did, Eva, we stepped out of darkness. And I never want to leave that light with you.”
“Sal…” she starts, but she gets choked up before she can keep going. As she does, laughing at herself as she wipes a tear from her eye, I can’t help but smile and feel my own eyes getting wetter.
There are sounds of sympathetic “Awws” from the audience of friends and family—mostly Eva’s, but there are more than a few of my old friends watching us, and the room couldn’t be fuller of warmth.
“Sal,” she tries again, regaining her composure, “before I met you, I didn’t know what it meant to be vulnerable. You showed me how good that can be, both for me and for the people around me. I’ve grown because of you in ways I didn’t know possible, and the walls I spent so much time building up are gone now. It feels better than I could have possibly dreamed. I love you, Salvatore, and I want to build something new with you for the rest of my life.”
My heart is so swollen and overflowing at Eva’s words that I can barely hear whatever it is the priest is saying. A tear rolls down my face, the first tear I can remember in a long, long time. In the background, I hear the words “You may now kiss the bride,” and the words are hardly out of the priest’s mouth before I seize Eva by the waist and pick her up.
Our lips press together with the applause of the audience, and I feel like fire is welling up in me. Her tears patter on my face as she holds my cheeks with her soft hands.
Soon after, we’re rushing out the church to the cheers all around us, and down the steps of the church is the limousine, waiting and ready exactly as I arranged it.
Most of the people shouting good wishes and applauding for us are Eva’s family, or rather, the family of her father.
As soon as I proposed to Eva, her father insisted on the most lavish, beautiful wedding that Eva could have possibly wanted. And so, we found ourselves at a beautiful church in a “rustic” town upstate, on a day where fresh snow was covering the landscape in a blanket of beautiful, pristine white.
Kirk Brighton has a lot of making up to do for his daughter and everything she and her mother went through over their lives, but the wedding has been at least one solid step in the right direction.
Another step in the right direction is the protection his family’s connections and power are able to give me to keep me hidden from the mafia. Those ties are long since cut, and while I’ll still be watching my back for a long time for Eva’s sake, the bulk of my worries are behind me. Fucking with Kirk Brighton’s new son-in-law is a dangerous prospect, even for the mafia.
But from here on out, the honeymoon is on me, and I have a trip to Spain planned that Eva will never forget.
I help her into the limo, both of us grinning stupidly and piling in, waving to the crowds before the doors shut. With the partition to the driver’s seat already closed, we’re left in privacy at last, looking at each other with such passionate love that it makes me dizzy.
Alone together at last, just the way this all started.
“Did that just happen?” Eva asks, fluttering her eyes at me, and I can’t help but laugh with her, taking her by the waist and bringing her in to pepper her face and her neck with kisses.
“Nobody ever remembers a thing about being up at the altar,” I say. “That’s what I hear, anyway. All I could focus on was you.”
Her eyes get lidded, and she puts her arms around my shoulders, letting out a contented sigh. “This still doesn’t feel real. All this is... it’s more than a dream come true.”
“Well, I have a few things that will make it feel more real, maybe,” I say, cocking a smile.
She blushes, looking away for a moment and biting her lip before she says, “I think I do too, but you go first.”
“When we were packing up your place,” I say, thinking back to Eva’s very modest living arrangements, “I noticed a few... things.”
“Things?” she asks, cocking her head to the side.
“Mm, things that were missing.”
She stares at me, trying to figure out what I mean.
“I’ve spoken with a few contacts of mine, and one of them has a sister who happens to be a cat breeder.”
Eva’s eyes start to get wider, her smile growing into a grin, but I hold her hands before she starts bouncing up and down excitedly.
“... and there may just be a litter of Ragdoll kittens that’s going to be born right around the time we get back from Spain.”
“Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!” she gushes, kissing me excitedly all over, and I can’t hold back my laughter for a few moments before I can get her to settle down.
“The second is something special,” I say, and I reach into the compartment of the bar across from us in the limo. I take out a bottle of wine that looks jet-black, and the label is quite old. “I pulled a favor from an old friend of mine to get a bottle of wine straight from Sicily—one of the oldest vineyards in the country,” I add with a smile. “Just for our wedding night.”
She looks surprised, but there’s something she isn’t telling me on her lips—I know her well enough to be able to tell, easily. I furrow my eyebrows. “What’s the matter?”
“I mean, it’s fantastic!” she says nervously, “it’s just that... we might want to save that for the anniversary.”
/> I’m even more confused now. “Why?”
She holds back a smile. “I... won’t be drinking alcohol for a little while.”
I stare at her in complete confusion, but then it hits me, and it’s my eyes’ turn to widen. “Eva, do you mean…?”
“Sal, I’m pregnant,” she says, her face positively glowing.
My heart races, and I feel as dizzy with happiness as I did the moment I picked her up at the altar a few moments ago. I seize her and kiss her deeply, then look her in the eye with a broad, sloppy grin on my face.
“Eva, this is wonderful!” I say, “We’re going to be parents!” This kind of joy isn’t like me, but seeing my wife there—my wife!—and knowing that we’re going to bring a new life into the world fills me with something new and beautiful.
And the very next moment, I press Eva back against the seat with a deep, long kiss, letting my tongue delve into her as I grope her breast through her unbelievably expensive wedding dress.
She gasps at first, then moans into the kiss, putting her hand over mine and sighing in delight at the feeling.
I pull her on top of me and pull her in close. The limo is large and spacious, and she has plenty of room to get positioned the way she wants. She starts pushing her hips into me, a soft moan with each little thrust as we kiss each other sloppily.
My hands touch every part of her they can get their hands on. They squeeze her ass, run up and down the bare back exposed by her dress, grip her hair and tilt her head back just enough to ravage her neck with kisses.
I press my lips to the nape of her neck and just hold them there for a few long, beautiful moments as I hug her to me.
The next moment, I pull her shoes off and hitch her dress up. She gasps and looks down at me in alarm. “Right here? Are you sure?”
“When am I not?” I growl, and with one hand I pull her neck down to me so I can silence her lips with a kiss. The other hand works up her legs to her underwear. I tug at it at first, but I soon lose patience.
“After everything you’ve been through,” I say in a low, husky tone, “you deserve nothing but the best, Eva. And for the rest of your life, I’m going to make that happen.”
I unbutton my pants, and I let my cock spring forth from my tuxedo, feeling it touch the warmth of Eva’s pussy. I grind her against me slowly at first. She’s wet, but I want her wetter. It takes almost no time at all for me to start feeling her slickness on my cock.
“We’re going to ruin our clothes,” she says with a laugh as I keep going, able to hold her up easily with arms like tree trunks.
“Nobody has to know,” I say with a dark chuckle. “I won’t tell if you don’t.” I lean in and whisper into her ear, “But I can’t promise I’ll be gentle.”
Her whole body shivers, and when I feel her wet enough for me, I slide her onto my cock, right there in the limo.
I hold my bride in both hands and thrust up into her in a steady rhythm, but both of us are almost delirious with pounding hearts and racing blood.
Eva grips the seat behind me for support as I use her, feeling her tight, smooth pussy, groaning as my whole body comes alive at that life-giving touch.
I’ve loved Eva for longer than I’ve admitted to myself, but being in touch with her in the most literal way brings me into a state that’s unlike any other. Suits and formal outfits always feel tight and uncomfortable on me, but with Eva wrapped around my cock, I feel truly free.
She presses her lips into me as I fuck her, feeling her warmth running down my cock and wetting my balls while each hard pounding up into her makes them touch her lower lips.
The thought that I got her pregnant makes me solid as a rock, and the emotions coursing through both of us make it all the sweeter when I start to feel my bride tighten and get closer and closer to the edge.
She starts to cry out when her orgasm hits, but I grab her and silence her with a kiss, feeling her beautiful moan in my chest while I let myself spill over into orgasm.
My cock throbs as I shoot hot seed into her, the first time as husband and wife, barely a few minutes after being declared official.
My cock is still unloading into her wet, needy pussy when I bring her close and whisper into her ear, “How does it feel, Mrs. Angelo?”
She gasps as a sudden shiver of delight runs up her back at the sound of the name, and she collapses onto me while our orgasms subside together.
After blissful moments of stillness together with nothing but our breathing and heartbeats to listen to, she pushes herself up on my shoulders and looks at me with those eyes I feel blessed to be able to look into forever, and those soft lips smile.
“It feels like forever.”
Also by the Author
Romantic Suspense:
Alexis Abbott’s Bound to the Bad Boy Series:
Book 1: Bound for Life
Book 2: Bound to the Mafia
Book 3: Bound in Love
Alexis Abbott’s Hitmen Series:
Owned by the Hitman
Sold to the Hitman
Saved by the Hitman
Captive of the Hitman
Stolen from the Hitman
Hostage of the Hitman
Taken by the Hitman
The Hitman’s Masquerade (Short Story)
Other:
Criminal
Ruthless
Innocence For Sale: Jane
Redeeming Viktor
Rock Hard Bodyguard
Romance:
Falling for her Boss (Novella)
Most Wanted: Lilly (Novella)
Erotic Thriller:
The Dangerous Men Series:
The Narrow Path
Strayed from the Path
Path to Ruin
About the Author
Alexis Abbott is a Wall Street Journal & USA Today bestselling author who writes about bad boys protecting their girls! Pick up her books today and find yourself transported with super steamy sex, gritty suspense, and lots of romance.
She also writes as Alex Abbott for her erotic thrillers and contemporary romance.
She lives in beautiful St. John's, NL, Canada with her amazing husband.
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Abducted: A Mafia Hitman Romance Page 18