CHAPTER 8: Beneath the Surface

Aria's POV

"You don't get to decide what happens next," I told him, meeting his eyes through the handcuffs. "Not this time."

Milo's eyes widened in shock. "Brash words from a person in your position."

"My position?" I laughed, my voice cracking to my own ears. "I've been in worse."

He moved a step closer, his body between me and the pale light. "Have you?"

"You forget I lived eighteen years as Lorenzo's niece." I rolled over, the silk of my destroyed dress snagging on the sheets. "I learned to deal with monsters before I met you."

"Is that what I am to you? A monster?" His voice had fallen low, something painful and dangerous in his tone.

"Isn't that what you're trying to be right now?"

His fingers traced the line of my jaw, soft as a feather but persistent. "What I'm trying to be and what I am are different things entirely."

"Then who are you, Milo? Because I've seen too many versions to keep track."

He paused, his breath warm on my neck. "You've only ever seen what I've let you see."

"Bullshit." The word exploded before I could shut it off. "I watched you that evening in Milan. When you thought no one was observing. "

His body tensed. "What are you discussing?"

"The orphanage. The donation made secretly. The girl with scarred hands—you stayed with her until she fell asleep."

Space between us crackled, alive and charged.

"You had me followed," he said finally, voice locked with pent-up fury.

"No. I pursued you myself. That was 7 years ago though." I shifted, the handcuffs softly clinking. "I wanted to know whom I was really married to."

"And did you learn?" His face was impassive in the darkness.

"I learned contradictions." I glared at him, not blinking. "I learned a man who speaks of torture in one breath and donates to children's hospitals the next."

"We all carry multitudes, Aria." His hand skittered down my neck to my collarbone, inducing goosebumps in its wake. "Even you."

"Don't make the two of us one."

"No?" He laughed, wanton, aware. "The church-niece who approached the FBI? The wife devoted to the one she once did the exact same thing to? Seem we both bear our cover so admirably."

My heart thundered against my ribs. "How long have you known?"

"FBI? Since we got married." His hand still stroking, tracing the curve of my shoulder. "Lorenzo. that's more recent."

"Then why did you marry me, then?"

"Because I wanted you." The bluntness of his answer surprised me. "As soon as I met you at that charity gala, looking at me like I'd trodden on the sole of your shoe."

"Romantic."

"I never told you I was romantic." His mouth twisted into a thing that constituted a smile. "I said I claimed you."

"I'm not something that can be claimed, Milo."

"No," he said, surprisingly. "You're worse than that."

His hand wrapped around the back of my neck, fingers sliding into my hair. Not holding tight, but holding. The feel was possessive but somehow gentle.

"If you know about the FBI, why did you not have me murdered?" I inquired, more interested than anything else.

"Would you believe that I could not bring myself to give the order?"

"No."

He laughed, the deep rich sound jarring in the tension-filled room. "Bright girl. The real truth is far more complicated. I was. fascinated. By the woman willing to take on the Vitelli family from within. The one who had that kind of guts—or stupidity." 

"Now?"

"Now I'm in a difficult position." His thumb caressed my lower lip, the touch sending sparks running through me despite everything. "I won't let you destroy what I've made. But I find I won't destroy you either."

"So what's your decision? Keeping me prisoner in this room forevermore?"

"Tempting." His eyes narrowed. "But no."

With one smooth movement, he created a key and released the handcuffs. They fell away, my wrists exposed.

I rubbed them reflexively, confusion washing over me. "I don't get it."

"Neither do I." He took a step back, creating distance between us. "By all logic, you should be dead by now. But here we are, instead."

Slowly, I sat up, warily. "Why would you show me that man being tortured, then? Why threaten me?"

"Because you had to know the stakes." He raked a hand through his hair, his face flashing with humanity for a moment. "And because I had to remind myself what I should be doing to traitors."

"Instead of what?"

His eyes returned to mine, burning with an intensity that left me breathless. "Instead of this."

He closed the distance between us in two strides, his mouth claiming mine in bruising kiss. The kiss was punishment and lust rolled into one, his teeth scraping along my lower lip, his tongue demanding entrance.

I should have fought. Should have shoved him away, clung to what little dignity I had left.

Rather, my hands balled up in his shirt, pulling him towards me as flames ignited between us. The kiss deepened, becoming liquid, years of warped emotions turned into something fierce and consuming.

His hands tightened in my hair, angling my head back as his lips descended down my throat. "Tell me to stop," he breathed against my skin. "Tell me you don't want this."

"I can't." The admission wrenched from me, raw in a way nothing between us had ever been. "God help me, I can't."

A low, pleased growl shook his stomach as he sat me back against the bed, his body keeping me trapped. My dress had already been mostly undone from earlier, and he pushed the material out of the way with his harsh hands, exposing skin that went warm under his hot scrutiny.

"How long I've wanted you?" he growled, his eyes narrowing. "Not as prize. Not as trophy wife. But like this...willing, wanting."

"Show me," I brazened, shocking myself into it.

His eyes went dark to near black, pupils blown wide with desire. Not yet looking away, he slowly unbuttoned his shirt, revealing the sculpted planes of his chest and belly. Tattoos I'd caught glimpses of before but never really seen branched out across his skin...intricate patterns woven together with what looked like names and dates.

My fingers traced one that curved across his ribs. "What are these?"

"Memorials," he stated, his voice taut as my hand explored the tattooed skin. "To all the people I've lost."

"Family?"

"Some. Others. family by choice." He pinned my roving hand, pressing it flat against his chest where I could feel his heart pounding under it. "They're not names to me."

The weakness in that confession struck me more sharply than any demonstration of power might have. For one moment, I saw beyond the Don, beyond the beast, to the man beneath...scarred, torn, with potential for emotions more than I had allowed myself to accept.

"Your heart's beating fast," I panted.

"For you alone," he leaned, his mouth sweeping mine with astounding gentleness. "Always just for you."

This one was different...slower, deeper, a silent dialogue. My body molded to his, starved for more touch, more pressure, more everything. His hands traveled down my sides, leaving blazing trails in their wake, until they hit the bottom of my ruined dress and slipped underneath.

"Tell me what you want, Aria," he breathed against my mouth.

"I want." The words clogged in my throat, pride warring with truth.

"Say it." His hands traced maddening designs on my inner thigh, so close where I wanted them and not close enough. "I have to hear you say it."

"I want you," I finally admitted, the words both surrender and rebellion. "In spite of everything, God help me, I want you."

A flicker of something like triumph passed across his eyes, to be replaced at once by stern hunger. He retook my lips as his hand eventually, eventually slid to where I was famished for him, pulling a gasp from my lips that he devoured in his kiss.

"So wet already," he growled, voice tight with barely leashed restraint. "Is this for me, or for the fantasy of taking me down?"

"Do it matter?" I snapped, my breath held as his fingers grazed a very sensitive area.

"It matters." His movements stilled, and I had to glance up at his face. "It matters to me."

The raw emotion on his face left me speechless. This was not the calculated seduction I'd expected, nor the punishment he'd threatened. This was something else altogether...something raw and real.

"It's for you," I breathed, stunned. it was that way. "Just you."

Something shifted in his face, relief and desire mixing together in equal measures. His movements started once more, more deliberate this time, drawn out sounds from me I didn't even know I had. My fingers floated over him, tracing the hard edges and curves, the scars that held secrets I didn't yet understand.

When he finally cast aside the last barriers between us and stood at my threshold, he hesitated, his eyes fixed on mine. "This does not change things," he grumbled, voice rough with restraint. "Tomorrow, we will still be enemies."

"I know." I wrapped my legs around him, drawing him in. "But tonight."

"Tonight, you're mine," he snarled, plunging forward in one powerful stroke that seated us fully together.

I screamed with the gorgeous wholeness, my nails digging into his shoulders. He was still for a moment, allowing me to adjust, his forehead against mine as we shared the same breath.

"And you're mine," I whispered once more, the admission pulled from some deep place inside me.

His hold failed me at my words. He began to shift, creating a rhythm that had me gasping, clinging to him as ecstasy grew to impossible heights. Each drive was punctuated by tender words in Italian...some recognizable, others hidden in the mist of sensation.

My world narrowed to this alone...his body writhing with mine, the sweet rubbing, the pressure building that threatened to consume me entirely. When release claimed me finally, it was with his name on my lips, my body arching under his as waves of pleasure crashed over me.

He followed soon after, his hard body convulsing above mine, my name a curse and a prayer as he wracked through his own release.

Eventually, in the dark stillness, we were entwined, not a word being spoken, both well aware of the transient nature of that peace. His fingers traced idle patterns on the skin below, his breathing gradually slowing towards normal.

"This doesn't change anything," I finally said, echoing his own words back to him.

"Doesn't it?" He moved himself up onto one elbow, staring into my face with unnerving intensity. "Look at me and tell me that you don't feel anything."

"I feel." I searched for words, for something that could capture the storm of emotions. "I feel too much. That's the problem."

He nodded slowly, as if I'd confirmed something he'd been thinking all along. "So where does that leave us?"

"Exactly where we were." I sat up, pulling the sheet around me. "You're still Don Vitelli. I'm still working with the FBI."

"And Lorenzo?"

I hesitated, truth against safety. "Lorenzo approached me, yes. But I never agreed to his plan."

"Then why visit him?"

"Physicality aside, he knows something about my mother's death that I need to know."

Milo sat silently for a long moment, his expression unchanging. "What if I told you I could give you those answers?"

My heart skipped a beat in my chest. "What are you talking about?"

"I mean," he said to me, his voice tightly controlled, "that I know who had you mother shot. And it was not the Manheim family."

Everything in the world seemed to shift beneath my feet. "How? How do you know that?"

"Because I was present at the shooting on the night it happened." His eyes locked onto mine, unflinching. "And I witnessed who pulled the trigger."

My breath caught, shock and disbelief struggling within me. Before I could demand more, a knock on the door.

"Boss!" A voice bellowed in alarm. "We've got a situation. Lorenzo's thugs are rallying at the south warehouse. They've kidnapped Vincent."

Milo jumped up, bundling his clothes. "How many?"

"At least twenty. Armed."

He nodded, the Don once more, all trace of weakness gone. "Prepare the cars. We depart in five."

As the receding footsteps fell silent, Milo turned to me, his countenance rigid to something hard and firm. "We'll take this up later."

"You can't just go off like that after speaking like that!" I cried, scrambling up onto my feet. "My mother..."

"Will still be dead tomorrow," he cut in brutally. "Vincent may not be if I don't leave now."

He zipped himself up with military haste, then paused before the door. "Stay here. It's safer."

"And if I don't?"

A cold glint flashed through his eyes. "Then pray we don't meet tonight. Because outside, I am not your lover. I'm Don Vitelli, and I will do whatever it takes to keep what's mine."

He pushed the door open, then stopped, glancing over his shoulder for the third time. "No matter what you do, remember this...something is happening tonight that could change everything between us. Watch your next move, Aria."

The door closed softly behind him, and I was left with rumpled bedding, the imprint of his hands on my skin, and a decision that would change the course of our lives forever.

The gun in the bedside drawer, which he always kept, beckoned me like a siren's song. I could go after him, discover what really happened to my mother, maybe rescue Vincent...or I coul

d take this opportunity to make my escape, call my FBI handler when Milo was otherwise occupied.

Two options. Two possible versions of me.

And only one that I could live with.

I reached for the drawer, my mind made up.