“It’s enough,” I said quickly, suddenly choked. “Oh, Matthew, it’s more than enough. Please believe me, it’s all I want.”
He looked up again, eyes reignited with hope. “Then I’m going to ask again, and I want a straight answer. Nina Evelyn Astor de Vries, when all this is over, one day, when you’re free like I know you will be, will you be my wife? Will you let me be your husband? Woman, will you please fucking marry me?”
We blinked at each other like owls, stunned by the candor of our own emotions. And then, because I couldn’t stop myself, I threw my arms around his neck and closed the distance between us.
“Yes,” I whispered against his soft lips. “My answer is yes.”
He was still for a moment, as if he wasn’t sure he had heard me correctly. “I…I’m going to need to hear that one more time. Just—just to be sure you actually said it.”
A smile played over my lips. “Yes, I’ll marry you, Matthew Luca Zola. As soon as humanly possible, I’ll marry you.”
His eyes closed, and he mumbled something unintelligible.
“What was that?” I murmured.
They opened again, and a sly half-smile appeared. “Just a quick prayer. Something along the lines of ‘Thank fucking God.’”
I giggled. I couldn’t help it.
But the humor in Matthew’s eyes disappeared as quickly as it had come. Instead, along with the love that simply always seemed to shine there when he looked at me, some fierce undercurrent rippled to the surface. That animal edge my beautiful man could never quite tame.
His hands slid up and down my back, the angst of the day melted off. That was Matthew’s magic. Most of my life, I had been a glacier. He melted that wall and suddenly I was as volatile as a river.
He slipped my straps off my shoulders, and the top of my slip fell to my waist, baring my breasts and allowing him to bury his face between them.
“Do you feel it?” he asked as he pressed a kiss to one side, then another. “Do you feel how much I love you, Nina?”
I weaved my fingers into his hair, enjoying its lush, silky texture. I wasn’t sure that anyone who had been hurt like we had could ever fully trust another to love them. But maybe that was part of the bargain. Because I did love this man, more than I could really fathom for myself.
And maybe he felt the same about me.
“I do feel it,” I whispered, hardly able to keep my voice from shaking with want. “Please, Matthew. Show me.”
“I want us to show each other.” His tongue slipped between his full lips and touched the very end of my strained nipple. “Nina.” His voice shook slightly. “Please, I…please tell me we can—”
I pulled him back to me.
“Take me,” I said. “Please, take everything away. I want nothing between us.”
“Your wish is my command,” he growled, and with a sudden rip, my slip fell away from my shoulders in two shredded pieces of silk, joining the mess of clothes and feathers and wreckage on the floor.
Before I could argue, I was suddenly swept up and tossed onto the bed. I recovered just in time to find Matthew shucking the rest of his clothes. In his hurry, he abandoned his usual fastidiousness, kicking his shoes and tailored wool pants into the rest of the mess, affording me only a few seconds to admire the genuine beauty of his form—broad shoulders, narrow hips, the step-laddered sculpture of muscle and smooth golden skin that soon covered me on the bed.
He took a handful of hair and twisted it tightly behind my head. “Fuck.”
It wasn’t poetry. But I had never wanted that. Matthew’s sometimes coarse beauty was balm to my soul, accustomed as it was to the pristine polish of my family, my entire life. Who cared for a veneer when everything beneath it was broken? Matthew’s face was scarred from actual battles. His language was rough, sometimes unfinished, his clothes, while tailored, always slightly worn and frayed. And yet, I wouldn’t have changed a single thing about him. I loved him, not in spite of the imperfections, but because of them.
His tongue twisted in mad, frenzied circles down my neck, followed by his teeth, his lips, sucking hard, leaving their own marks. The spot over my left breast throbbed, the place where I had encouraged the remnants of such bruises for months when we were apart. As if those reminders of him could help me ignore the other bruises I had never chosen.
Then he sat up on his knees, spread my legs, and surveyed my naked body like a mercenary pirate examining the splendor of his conquest. Or no, perhaps not a pirate after all. In this light, this country, this room…Matthew was no longer stealing another man’s wife. Here, he was only taking what was rightfully his. Not a pirate, then. A prince.
“Let me see it.” He picked up the ring box from where it was buried in the linens and removed the piece of jewelry. “Give me your hand.”
Obediently, I held up my left hand. In September, I had removed the gaudy rings that had felt more like shackles for ten years. Sold them, in fact, before leaving an anonymous donation at a women’s shelter only a few blocks from the jeweler in Kip’s Bay. I watched with awe as Matthew pressed a kiss to my bare finger, then held up the ring. And as he slipped it down to my knuckle, he slid inside me as well, deeper than he ever had before.
“And there we are,” he murmured as he dropped my hand and fell forward to cage me between his arms. His lips found mine, and our tongues began a delicious grapple.
“There we are,” I gasped. “Oh, Matthew, please.”
“Please, what, baby? What do you need?” He pressed in deeper, willing me to take all of his considerable size.
“I—I—” I
