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Dio.

“But first…” She flattens her palm on my chest. My heart pounds under her hand, rabbit-fast and out of control. “We…we should use protection.”

I nod without argument, go over to the nightstand, grab the condom, and roll it on while she watches, her lower lip caught between her teeth.

“Better?” I ask.

“Yes.” She rises on her knees, reaches between us, and positions me at her entrance. The head of my cock nudges through her slickness, and she holds my gaze as she sinks down onto me in one slow, devastating drop.

Her gasp and my groan blend between us, sacred and profane, both a prayer and a curse.

She stays still for a moment, adjusting, her hands splayed across my chest. I grip her hips but don’t guide them. She told me to let her take what she needs, so I do.

The first roll of her hips is unhurried.

The second roll is harder. The third shatters any pretense of patience.

She finds an urgent, relentless rhythm, riding me with the fierce concentration of a woman reclaiming everything she nearly lost. My hands clutch her thighs, leaving marks she’ll wear as proof this was real.

“You have no idea,” I cup the back of her neck and bring her forehead to mine, sweat dripping between us, “what you do to me or how you make me feel.”

“Then don’t stop.” She grinds down furiously, her hands braced on my chest for leverage, her pace quickening. ”Don’t ever stop.”

I plant my feet on the mattress and thrust up into her, matching her pace and driving deeper from below. The new angle changes everything. She cries out, her head falling back to expose the long line of her throat.

“You’re close. I know it. Let go, Lucia. I have you.”

She tightens around me.

“Yes. Right there. Don’t stop.”

Her replies splinter into fragments torn loose by each downstroke. When her lips part, her eyes roll back, and her whole body goes rigid, I can tell she’s about to break.

“Come for me.” My voice is wrecked and barely holding together. “Let me feel it. All of it.”

She shatters, and her orgasm tears through her in waves. Her back arches, her spine lifts off the mattress, and her mouth opens in a sound that’s half my name and half a wordless, raw groan. Her cunt clenches around me, pulsing so hard that I feel every tremor around my cock as she milks me and demands more.

The sensation is too much and exactly enough.

“Fuck, Lucia!”

I grasp her hips and drive into her twice more. Hard. Desperate. My thrust stutters, and then I bury myself to the hilt and go rigid. My own hot, blinding climax rips through me. I spill into the condom in loads that seem dredged up from somewhere below my spine, and my vision whites out.

She collapses against my chest, trembling, her breath shuddering against my neck. My arms slowly go around her, our hearts slamming against each other through the thin barrier of skin and ribs.

Slowly, the world comes back.

I lift my head and peer down at her. Her cheeks are flushed, her lips are swollen, and her eyes are soft and heavy-lidded. She looks at me like I’m a man worth keeping.

I love her. Dio, I love her. So I tell her.

The confession tumbles out and lands heavily, like it’s been weighed down by gravity.

“I love you. Whatever happens and whatever comes next, I love you.”

I pull out carefully, dispose of the condom, then roll onto my side while taking her with me. Her body curves into mine, and I wrap myself around her, my arm over her waist. Our legs tangle, and my nose settles into her hair. I don’t want to let go. Not ever.

“You okay, tesoro?” My thumb traces her cheekbone, brushing away a tear I didn’t see fall.