****
Dante was having a hard time opening up about his past with Amara. His broken family was mostly something he kept to himself unless he brought it up to Griffin, but his best friend already knew about all of his secrets, so that didn’t matter to him.
How could he still want anything to do with a family that had washed their hands of him so many years ago? He owned two successful businesses, and had a circle of good friends that he wouldn’t trade anything in the world for.
Lastly, he had Amara who was fast becoming a very important part of his life. She was drawing out feelings that he had purposely kept hidden from a lot of people who knew and loved him.
Truthfully, she was a pleasurable change he hadn’t been expecting the night of the storm. He wouldn’t trade that night for anything because it brought the woman next to him into his life.
“Dante, are you okay?” Her soft voice asked, drawing him away from his inner thoughts.
He lowered his eyes and found Amara’s steady gaze watching him with such concern. He couldn’t recall any other woman looking at him with such compassion or understanding before.
“I’m fine, sweetheart,’ he answered.
“If you don’t want to tell me about your family, you don’t have to do it. I completely understand if it’s too painful.”
Dante gathered Amara close to his body loving how good she felt against his side. Recalling his past used to put a heavy ache in his chest, but now he could think about it with only a dull numbness surfacing here and there. “I’ve four younger brothers. My brother closest to my age is Morgan. He’s thirty-eight and a doctor. I used to call him Shadow because everywhere I went growing up he was right there behind me.
“Rowan is next and he turned thirty-four last month. He’s a little more distant than Morgan and preferred spending time to himself than rough-housing with the rest of us. He owns a huge ranch outside of Harper and breeds race horses. A few of them have even won the Kentucky Derby.
“Now, Lucas was a debater and he loved telling everyone how right he was about everything. Last year, he became the youngest partner in his law firm at thirty-two. Tanner is thirty years old. He’s the baby of the family and a rancher, but he mostly deals in livestock. I guess he’s a mixture of all of us.”
“How do you know so much about your brothers? Have all of you kept in contact with each other? What about your parents, are they still alive?” Amara asked firing off question after question.
Rubbing his hand up and down his face, Dante continued thinking about the past he was beginning to accept, but only as he had gotten older. Acceptance from his family wasn’t his top priority anymore.
“When I opened Inked, I wanted to share the news of my first business with my family. So, I went back home hoping to mend some broken fences, but I shouldn’t have left town. My parents weren’t happy to see me in the least. They thought I was still the disrespectful son who hated their rules. So, instead of staying there and fighting with them, I went looking for my brothers.”
“How did that go?” Amara asked.
“We tried having lunch, but Rowan and Morgan both held resentment towards me for not coming back after them when I got old enough, but after I got out of Juvenile Hall I was only seventeen years old.
“I would have been on the streets myself if Griffin hadn’t befriended me the second week I was in juvie. He literally begged his parents to take me in since I didn’t have anywhere else to go. So, I stayed with them until I got accepted to college and moved away.”
“Did you try telling your brothers this?”
“Yes, I did, but too much time had passed and their anger still ran too deep for me to break through. I would love to have a relationship with them, but I don’t see it ever happening.”
Snuggling closer, Amara kissed the side of his jaw. “I don’t see how they can be so unfeeling. Didn’t they know what you had gone through with your parents?”
“A part of me can’t blame them. I was the oldest. I knew how unreasonable my parents were and probably still are. I should have gone and gotten them after I got settled. Somehow, I could have taken care of them. It was my fault they got left in that house.
“My dad probably came down so hard on Morgan and Rowan after I left since Lucas and Tanner was too young. My mother got pregnant with me a year after graduating high school and they were forced to get married. I think they always harbored resentment towards me that I would never be able to overcome.”
“Stop it. Right now,” Amara told him, touching the side of his face. “Nothing your parents did to you or your brothers growing up had anything to do with you. Kids are going to be kids most of the time and breaking the rules will happen. Why your parents decided to sever all ties with you is their fault because they missed out watching you become such a wonderful, caring and funny man.”
A warm feeling spread through Dante’s body at Amara’s sweet assessment of him and she was right. It was his family’s fault for not wanting to see the man he had grown into over the years. He couldn’t waste the rest of his life waiting for them to see what they were missing. He had to live and learn from his past mistakes.
Wasting his time on his brother’s or parent’s acceptance was over. He knew his brothers were doing great thanks to the updates from Griffin’s parents who still lived in Harper, Texas. But he couldn’t continue to let them hold him back from finding happiness. He wanted to feel, fall in love and genuinely be pleased with the man who he had become through hard work and determination on his part without any help from anyone else.
Lowering his head, Dante kissed Amara surprising her. “I’m done talking about my family,” he said. “I would rather be doing something a lot more exciting with my time especially when you’re around.”
“Care to tell me what it is?” she asked, touching his chest.
“How about I show you instead?” Dante suggested before flipping her over and covering her soft, body with his. He allowed the thoughts of his family to leave his head, tossing them back into his past where they belonged locked away.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Slowly, Dante opened his eyes to the smell of bacon frying. The sound of rain pounding against the roof woke him up out of a restful sleep, something he had missed out on for the past several months.
Turning his head to the side, he smiled at the imprint left in the pillow by Amara’s head. Last night turned out to be fucking earth-shattering for him. All of those nights he’d imagined how it would feel to finally have her wrapped in his arms, were blown away the minute his cock slipped inside of her tight pussy.
He almost came right then and there when he found out she was a virgin. He always vowed to stay away from virgins, but the thought of Amara giving herself to another man made him see red. No other guy was going to touch his woman. Never, if he had anything to do about it.
Wait! Whoa!
Should he be thinking of her as his after only one night of good sex? He paused for only a second to think about it. Hell Yes! He could still hear Amara screaming his name over and over as he introduced her body to her first orgasm. It would be a sound and memory that he would remember for the rest of his life.
Thank God he decided to give his employees an extra day off. He didn’t have to worry about getting out of bed and opening up the bar. The best part was Amara was here with him and he could spend the day exploring that beautiful body of hers some more.
Running his hand down his chest, Dante slipped it underneath the covers wrapping his fingers around his morning erection. Today would be the first time in a very long time since meeting Amara that he wouldn’t be the one taking care of this problem.
Just the thought of her hand wrapped around his cock made it twitch. He couldn’t wait until she got back in here so they could make love again. Sometimes he believed morning sex was better than anything else in the world.
“Good, you’re awake. I fixed breakfast.”
Turning his head, he looked at Amara standin
g in the open bedroom doorway looking sexy as a pin-up rocking his shirt from last night.
“How did you find everything? I missed waking up finding you next to me in the bed,” he complained as Amara came towards him carrying two plates piled with food.
“I got hungry and decided to cook us some breakfast. I’m surprised I was able to find everything that I wanted.”
Dante looked at the delicious plates of blueberry pancakes with bacon, but all thoughts of food left his head when Amara bent over and his shirt opened giving him a peek at her beautiful breasts. He wanted to sample something, but it wasn’t anything on those plates in front of him. He had another hunger to feed that was driving him up the wall.
“Why don’t you leave those plates right there and come here instead?” he suggested in a low voice patting the side of the bed.
A cute smile pulled at the corner of Amara’s mouth as she took a step closer to him. “I’m not sure if I should,” she said, eyeing his erection poking at the sheet. “I’m beginning to think that you might want more than a good morning kiss.”
“How could I not with the way you look this morning?” Dante admitted, reaching for Amara. He wrapped his finger around her slim wrist and tugged her right to the side of the bed. “Don’t you want to cuddle with me on this rainy day? I swear I‘ll make it worth your while.”
“Sure, if all you wanted to do was cuddle. However, Mr. Braden; I believe you have other ideas running through that gorgeous head of yours.”
His heart skipped a beat at Amara’s compliment. He was used to getting praise about his looks from other females, but it was different coming from the lips of the woman he was getting deeper feelings for.
He wasn’t admitting he was falling in love with her or anything because it was way too soon for that kind of commitment after only a few dates. But, somehow she had come out of nowhere and wrapped her hand around a tiny part of his heart. She inspired him to do even more with his life because of the struggle she had with hers over the past several months.
“Baby, I can’t lie. I do want to do more than cuddle with you.” Grabbing her by the waist, he lifted Amara over his body making her straddle his hips. He moaned low in his throat as her pussy settled inches from his throbbing cock.
Taking the tips of his fingers, he ran them up the side of her thighs slowly taking the edge of his shirt further up her beautiful body. The more skin he exposed the sexier Amara became to him.
The rain danced across the windows luring them into their own personal cocoon of seduction—a place Dante wasn’t about to leave for anything. This is where he wanted to be more than anything in the world. Amara’s personality took away all of the loneliness that crept up on him anytime he saw his friends with their families.
He continued easing the cotton fabric over her skin until it rested above her cute belly button almost underneath her full, perky breasts. All he had left was a few more inches and her stunning figure would be in complete viewing pleasure for his eyes to feast on.
“Lift, your arms, darling,” he ordered in a low, demanding voice.
“No,” Amara answered, shaking her head causing her hair to brush over her shoulders. “I can’t be buck naked in front of you.”
“Why not?” he questioned brushing the tips of his fingers over her exposed skin. “You let me see all of you last night right here in this very bed.”
“It was night time, not early in the morning,” she answered.
Like that would make any difference to him at all. If Amara thought he was only going to make love to her at night then she was out of her adorable mind. The best sex happened early in the morning and it was way past time he proved it to her.
“Let me take this stupid shirt off you and I can show you how making love right now is just as good as, or even better than, at night.”
Dante watched with pleasure as a faintly eager look flashed in Amara’s bedroom brown eyes before it died away. He had her! Now, all he had to do was reel her in with a little tug here and there.
“If you show me yours, I’ll show you mine,” he said with a straight face. He hoped she didn’t laugh at his silly pick-up line trying to get her naked again with him.
Amara tried to suppress a giggle, but it ended up spilling out of her mouth and filling up the room. “God, I haven’t heard that since I was in middle school.”
“Are you comparing me to a stupid teenage boy in middle school who doesn’t know the first thing about making love?” he questioned.
Well, he would show her how much of a grown ass man he was. Picking Amara up, he placed her directly over his cock brushing her pussy back and forth over his erection, the thin sheet the only barrier between their bodies.
“Does this feel like something a comic book reading boy might have waiting for you?” he demanded.
“No, it doesn’t,” Amara moaned, locking eyes with him. “I shouldn’t have compared you to a teenager. Last night proved to me how much of a man and good lover you are in every sense of the word.”
He desired to prove even more that he was better than good when it came to being between the sheets with her. He wanted to show her that he could make a difference in her life. She needed to know how much she could count on him for anything she wanted.
“I wanted to show you even more than that, but I’ll let this be the first step into getting what I want the most,” Dante admitted before easing his shirt the rest of the way off Amara’s body and tossing it on the floor.
The sight of her last night was stunning, but this morning she was truly breathtaking. Easing his hands up her sides, he cupped her full breasts in his hands slowly teasing her already swollen nipples with the pad of his thumbs. She gasped as she squirmed against his erection.
Dante swallowed down a growl as he tried to keep his mind on the task at hand instead of ripping the only barrier away that kept him from sliding his cock into her tight, welcoming body.
Sliding his hand behind her head, he inched Amara’s head towards his for a kiss and just as her mouth was mere inches away, his cell phone went off on the nightstand next to them. Ignoring it, he brushed his mouth against her loving the sweet taste of her lips, but instead of stopping his phone kept running.
Placing her hands on his chest, Amara leaned her body from his and he cursed whoever was on the other end of that damn phone. “You should get that. It could be really something important,” she said.
“Nothing is more important than me being right here with you. Whoever it is can call me back in about an hour or even later for all I care,” Dante complained, reaching for Amara again but she brushed off his touch.
She shook her head. “No...answer it.”
“Fuck!” Dante cursed as he reached for the phone and snapped it open. “What in the hell is it and it better be important.”
“Hell...Good morning to you too,” Griffin snapped in his ear. “What is your damn problem? I called to ask for your help, but if you’re too busy forget about it. I’ll take care of Inked myself.”
Instantly, Dante felt bad for his attitude towards Griffin. He shouldn’t have been so short towards him, but he hadn’t wanted to be interrupted either especially with Amara here with him this morning looking hotter than any woman should.
He watched as she got off the bed and got redressed in his shirt. Even she knew their morning was over now. Smiling at him, she picked up the cold plates of food and left the bedroom giving him some privacy to talk and see what Griffin wanted from him.
“Sorry man. I apologized for my attitude but I was a little busy when you called,” Dante admitted.
“With what or should I maybe say with whom...” Griffin teased, his easy going personality already back.
Going into detail about any woman he dated wasn’t something he did and he wasn’t about to start with Amara...not with everything still so new between them. He still wanted to have her to himself for a little while longer.
“Hmmm... I’ll tell you later,” he finally answered. “
Why did you call?”
“I need a huge favor. I need for you to do some tattoos for me today. Caleb overdid it at a party last night and can’t make it in this morning. I can’t do them because I have to interview a girl for the floor manager’s job. So, can you spare a few hours and come in to do them?”
Anger rippled along Dante’s spine as he sat up in the bed tossing the sheet off him. He swallowed a few times so he wouldn’t lose his temper with Griffin because he wasn’t the person he was pissed off at right now...Caleb was.
“Are you kidding me?”
“No, I wish that I was,” Griffin sighed, “but I’m not. Caleb’s at home sleeping off a hangover. I love the guy like he was family, but he only has one more time to mess up and I’m going to put him on probation for six weeks without pay until he gets his shit together.”
“I would do exactly the same thing,” Dante said. “Caleb promised me when I gave him part ownership in the shop that he would stop partying. I swear I don’t think he’s ever going to realize how good he has it. Instead of acting so reckless, he should be trying to build up his client list because he’s one hell of a tattoo artist.”
“I agree,” Griffin said, “but at least he had enough sense to call me instead of coming in and working on a client in his condition. Does this mean I can count on you to come in today? I know the club is closed and you took an extra day off, nevertheless, I really do need you man.”
Getting out of the bed, Dante walked over to his closet and grabbed something to wear. “Give me about forty minutes and I’ll be there. I need to get dressed and do something else before I come in today.”
“I hope this something else involves a woman. It’s about time you go out of that cave you’ve placed yourself in. So, when do I get to meet her or do I already know this chick?”
Hearing a noise behind him, Dante turned around watching as Amara walked back into the room. He knew he would only have a little longer with her before her would have to introduce her to the group. Still, he wasn’t quite ready to bring anyone into their world just yet. It was still too amazing being just the two of them.
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