MATTEO (Dance with the Devil 1)

by Carole Mortimer

  Yes, Matteo wanted her now, but it wouldn’t last. Greed and ambition would raise their ugly heads the moment Matteo saw a way of advancing the Zalotti family power. When that happened, he would walk away from Grace without a backward glance to see how his abandonment had affected her.

  Better to end this now than further down the road, when she loved him even more than she did now.

  Matteo had no idea what Grace’s thoughts had been just now, but whatever they were, he could now see the fresh resolve in her expression. She wasn’t just going to let him walk away; she was going to insist upon it.

  And with Leon and Natalia arriving tomorrow, and his time occupied with them, Matteo had absolutely no leverage with which to persuade Grace to change her mind.

  He released her and stepped away. “I won’t bother with coffee, thanks.” He didn’t look at her again before moving through to the sitting area to pick up the jacket and waistcoat he had earlier dropped onto a chair before entering the kitchen. “Have a good life, Grace,” he murmured as he quietly let himself out of the apartment.

  He kept his mind a blank as he walked down the stairs, in an effort to ward off the pain he knew was going to hit him the moment he had to accept he was never going to see Grace again.

  Antonio jumped out of the SUV to open the back door the moment Matteo left the building. One look at the thunderous expression on Matteo’s face must have cautioned him against speaking, because the other man closed the door behind him before getting back into the front passenger seat.

  Luca glanced at him in the driving mirror after starting the engine. “Home?”

  Whoever had coined the phrase “home is where the heart is” had known what they were talking about, because Matteo felt as if he had left that beating organ with Grace. He certainly felt cold and empty inside.

  “I’m expected to join my sister and her husband at the hotel for breakfast,” he instructed.

  Luca gave him another glance after maneuvering the vehicle out into the early morning traffic. “You’re still doing that?”

  He nodded. “I’m still doing that.” Bella and Bryce were expecting him, and he had other commitments to fulfill before the week ended.

  “You seem preoccupied today?”

  Grace glanced up at Carla, the two women having spent the morning together, mainly in silence, checking the alphabetical order of the books on the shelves. Customers had a habit of taking books down to read the blurb and then putting them back in the wrong place if they decided not to buy.

  Luckily, it was cold out today, so Grace had been able to wear a roll-neck green jumper to work to hide the bite marks Matteo had left on her neck.

  “I didn’t upset you with the stuff I told you about Matteo Zalotti on Tuesday, did I?” Carla winced.

  Grace smiled ruefully as she thought of all the things that had happened with Matteo Zalotti since. “Not at all.”

  “My Uncle Vinnie works for him, you see,” Carla admitted with obvious reluctance. “So I wasn’t exaggerating about how dangerous he is.”

  Grace had only seen the fun and passionate side of Matteo—because that was all he wanted her to see?—but that didn’t mean she didn’t know about the ruthless edge beneath his charm. “Works for him doing what?” she prompted casually.

  Carla shrugged. “The family doesn’t talk about it, but I’m guessing it’s whatever he’s asked to do.” She grimaced. “You don’t say no to Matteo Zalotti.”

  Not only had Grace said no to Matteo, she had told him she never wanted to see him again.

  Would he respect that request?

  The coldness of his expression and the dismissal in his voice when he left earlier this morning said that he would.

  It was what she wanted.

  What she had asked for.

  So why did the pain in her chest feel as if her heart was breaking at the thought of never seeing Matteo again?

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Natalia had some shopping she wished to do in Europe before joining us.” Leonardo Brunelli explained his daughter’s absence when Matteo joined him for dinner in the penthouse suite of his hotel on Friday evening. “She will be arriving on Sunday or Monday instead.” If Leon was affected by jet lag after flying in from New York earlier today, it didn’t show in the sharp intelligence in his eyes or in his meticulous appearance in a dark suit and white shirt with perfectly knotted pale silver tie.

  The other man was only six or seven years older than Matteo’s thirty-six, but Leon’s hair had gone prematurely gray during his thirties and his eyes were as cold and dangerous as a storm-tossed sea. A little over six feet tall and not overly muscular, one nevertheless only had to look into Leon Brunelli’s icy gray eyes to realize the man was danger personified and would be totally merciless if crossed.

  Natalia was Leon’s only child, born twenty years ago when Leon was only in his early twenties. His wife had died in childbirth. Leon had no other close family, and he had never remarried, so Natalia was doubly precious to him. Something Matteo was very aware of.

  To say he was relieved to be given a little more breathing space before he had to start the pretense with Natalia, when he was still smarting so much over Grace’s stubborn dismissal of him, would be an understatement.

  “I trust your sister’s wedding went well on Wednesday?” Leon continued.

  He smiled at the thought of Bella and Bryce’s obvious happiness together. “Very well.”

  “No last-minute nerves from the bride or any of the other interesting incidents that seem to occur at these intense family occasions?”

  Matteo studied the older man through narrowed lids. Could Leon possibly be referring to Grace and the dance they’d shared? No, surely not. Not unless the other man was having him watched. Which wasn’t completely out of the question; Leon was trusting him with the future happiness of his only daughter, after all. Which wasn’t to say Matteo would be willing to accept such an intrusion without comment.

  “The two families got on well together,” Matteo dismissed evenly.

  Leon nodded. “I’m sorry I couldn’t join you, but I had some business in New York that required my personal attention.”

  Matteo could guess what sort of business. The same sort that had required his own attention the previous week.

  Unless this was some sort of veiled threat toward him on Leon’s part.

  “Ricci has been dealt with?” the American prompted.

  “Yes,” Matteo confirmed tersely, still uncertain as to Leon’s mood.

  The older man nodded as he handed Matteo a glass of whisky before sinking down onto the white sofa opposite him. “We’re meeting with the Russians tomorrow?”

  Matteo was relieved to change the subject to something less personal to himself. “At the offices of Gregori Markovic,” he confirmed.

  “The other families around the world are impressed with your new alliance with Markovic.”

  It was noticeable that, unlike previous conversation on the subject, Leon didn’t include his own approval in that statement.

  As noticeable as the fact Natalia hadn’t come straight to London with her father.

  By Leon’s design?

  The unsettled feeling inside Matteo told him that he needed to remain wary of the man who was shortly to become his father-in-law.

  How the hell was he supposed to marry Natalia Brunelli, be a proper husband to her, provide the Zalotti and Brunelli families with heirs, when it was Grace he loved, and even the thought of bedding another woman made his cock shrink in on itself and want to hide?

  How?

  “Grace.”

  “What the—!” Grace lifted a hand and pressed it against her chest as she spun round in the darkness of the lane behind the bookshop. She had just finished locking up the shop at the end of a long week. Even so, she didn’t need the soft glow of the street light to know it was Matteo waiting for her in the darkness.

  Aptly?

  Because Matteo’s life was one of darkness and dange
r that could cause pain and harm to innocent bystanders, including her?

  Was she so innocent?

  Or was she guilty by association?

  Grace had thought about this a lot since she last saw Matteo, and much as she might have walked away from that life five years ago, and everyone in it, she was still her father’s daughter. That could never be changed, no matter how much she tried to ignore it. One day, if she ever wanted to have a family of her own, she would have to tell the man in her life that truth too. Anything else would be unfair to him.

  Unless he was part of that same dangerous world?

  “You frightened the hell out of me,” she accused angrily. “Matteo?” she questioned sharply when he stepped farther into the light and she could see how pale his face was, and the dark circles—from lack of sleep?—beneath his eyes. His hands were clenched into fists at his sides. He wore a tailored jacket over a white shirt teamed with faded denims. It was the first time Grace had seen him so informally dressed.

  “I can’t do this!” he ground out harshly. “I cannot fucking do this!”

  She gave a slow shake of her head. “I don’t under—” The air was knocked from her lungs as Matteo lunged for her, the momentum of his body crashing into hers knocking her back against the wall.

  “Wanting you is driving me insane.” His lips moved feverishly against her throat, his hands caressing Grace restlessly as he pressed his body against hers. “I need to be inside you again. I need it, Grace!” he repeated before his mouth claimed hers in a hot and demanding kiss.

  Grace responded as heatedly, her fingers entangling in the dark thickness of his hair as she returned the hunger of that kiss. It had only been thirty-six hours since she last saw him, but she was as desperate to kiss and touch him as he was her.

  And when caresses and kisses were no longer enough, their hands pulled at each other’s clothing in an effort to get closer still.

  Grace unfastened the button on the waist of Matteo’s jeans.

  Sliding down the zip.

  Allowing Grace to push her hand beneath the waistband of his boxers and encircle the throbbing fullness of his cock.

  “Yes!” Matteo groaned against her throat. “Fuck, yes.” He pulled down the front of his boxers so that her hand could stroke his silky cock from base to tip, steel encased in velvet, lingering to caress the bulbous top and gather up the pre-cum to ease the slide of her palm up and down that turgid length.

  Grace trembled as Matteo’s hand moved beneath her skirt to stroke the silky flesh of her inner thigh.

  She gasped when she felt Matteo’s fingers twisting the lace of her panties before he ripped them from her body.

  Groaned when Matteo, after deftly undoing and rolling a condom in place, then lifted her until her legs were wrapped about his waist, and the long length of his cock was pressed against the moist lips of her pussy, leaving his hands free to touch her.

  “Tell me you want me,” Matteo urged roughly, very aware he was on the edge of no return but having enough control still to stop this if it wasn’t what Grace wanted. “Tell me, Grace!” he rasped.

  “I want you,” she repeated obediently.

  “Say it again.”

  “I want you, Matteo,” she cried out. “I need you inside me. Filling me up. Claiming me.”

  Matteo lost the last remnants of his control, his fingers gathering up the moisture on her pussy lips before he thrust two of them inside her. He added a third finger, stretching and readying her for the width and length of his cock. He sought out and stroked that knot of nerves inside her until he felt the gush of her juices and she cried out her release.

  Matteo allowed her no respite as he thrust his cock inside her, holding on so tightly to her hips he was going to leave bruises as he thrust into her again and again.

  He groaned his own pleasure minutes later as the walls of Grace’s channel tightened like a vise about his cock, juices flowing copiously inside her as she hit a second climax.

  “Yes!” Matteo was thrusting so hard and deep into her now, he pushed her farther up the wall with each savage stroke.

  Harder.

  Faster.

  Until he couldn’t contain his release a moment longer, pleasure gathering at the base of his spine before surging along the length of his cock. He felt Grace’s release as his hot cum erupted into the condom for long and agonizing minutes until only the ragged and uneven sound of their breathing filled the air.

  Matteo rested his damp forehead against Grace’s equally hot one. “Are you okay?”

  Grace gave a snort of laughter. “I probably have brick dust embedded in my backside, but otherwise, yes, I’m more than okay.”

  Matteo released a shaky laugh. “I can’t believe we just did that. It might be dark, but it’s also the middle of November and bloody cold out. Although I didn’t really notice that at the time,” he admitted ruefully before he frowned again. “Anyone might have come along and seen us together.”

  Grace couldn’t believe their reckless behavior either. It was the exact opposite to the calm and ordered life she had carved out for herself since coming to England.

  Then Matteo Zalotti came into the bookstore where she worked, and the façade of her life had begun to crumble. Tonight, it had disintegrated into that same brick dust Grace thought might be embedded in her skin.

  It was also awkward as hell to disengage their two bodies under these circumstances.

  Somehow they managed it, and while Matteo was adjusting his clothing and disposing of the condom in a dumpster farther down the alley, Grace managed to push her ripped panties into her shoulder bag and straighten her own clothes.

  Within minutes, apart from Matteo’s disheveled hair and the beard burn Grace could feel on her skin from the evening stubble on Matteo’s chin, they once again looked respectable.

  They might look that way on the outside, but the sensual awareness still sizzling in the air between them was almost electric in its intensity.

  But their desperate physical need of each other and the increasing wildness of their lovemaking had changed nothing. Matteo was still head of the Zalotti crime organization, and Grace was still as determined not to be drawn into that life.

  She could see by Matteo’s pained expression that the same thing had just occurred to him.

  That he knew, despite the intense physical chemistry between them, they were still, and always would be, the same two unsuitable-for-each-other people.

  She grimaced. “Well, this isn’t in the least awkward.”

  Awkward didn’t even begin to describe how Matteo felt right now.

  He had resisted the pull of Grace for as long as he was able—a whole thirty-six hours—but by this afternoon, he had been climbing the walls in his need to see and be with her. Two hours later, he’d given up that fight to come and seek her out at the time he knew she would be closing and locking up the store for the weekend.

  Lurking in a back alley waiting for a woman like some bloody thief in the night wasn’t exactly his usual style, but then nothing about his craving for Grace was normal.

  The past two days had been frustrating as hell. Not just this physical ache for Grace, but Leon Brunelli’s enigmatic behavior last night. Each comment Leon gave, each question he asked, seemed to be made with the expectation of receiving one answer and then the other man frowning in disappointment when he was given a different one.

  Unless that was just Matteo’s guilty conscience making him think that was what was happening?

  It could be, and yet Matteo didn’t think so. There had seemed to be an uncharacteristic edge to the older man last night, one that Matteo hadn’t been able to penetrate, as they ate dinner together or afterward.

  But Leon Brunelli wasn’t his priority right now, Grace was. In truth, she had been Matteo’s first thought in everything since the moment he first saw her eight days ago.

  And yet he had nothing to offer her.

  No present.

  No future.

&nb
sp; Nothing.

  “Don’t look so worried, Matteo.” Grace’s laugh sounded hollow in the darkness. “We’re both adults, and we both consented to what just happened.”

  He knew that, had made very sure of Grace’s consent before he took their intimacy any further.

  “It doesn’t have to mean anything,” she dismissed.

  That was the problem. It did mean something to Matteo.

  It also wasn’t enough. Already, Matteo wanted her again. Wanted inside her. Worse, he needed to be inside her. Needed it desperately.

  His lips thinned. “I don’t—”

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, boss, but an urgent call just came in for you.”

  Matteo saw Grace’s head rear back as she turned to peer down the alley to where Luca now stood. Matteo had told both his bodyguards to wait in the SUV, but for all the awareness he’d had of his surroundings as he and Grace made love, Luca could have been standing there watching them the whole time. He could see by the flush in Grace’s cheeks that she was wondering the same thing.

  He glared at Luca. “Tell whoever it is that I’ll call them back.” He hadn’t finished speaking to Grace yet.

  “This person demanded you take the call.” Luca grimaced.

  “I said—”

  “Take your call, Matteo,” Grace told him. “I need to get home anyway.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  She frowned. “This is goodbye, Matteo.”

  “No!”

  “Yes.”

  “Grace—”

  “Don’t.” She avoided his hand when he reached out to grasp hold of her arm. “I meant it, Matteo. This is goodbye,” she repeated firmly.

  She nodded to Luca as she walked past him before continuing to the end of the alley and then disappearing as she turned left and was quickly swallowed up by the throng of Saturday-evening pedestrians.

  Giving Matteo with no choice but to stand there and watch her leave him.

  Chapter Fourteen