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"Oh my God. All my life I've known this man, and he's never asked permission for anything. He apologized to Bruno once after punching him in the face, and people still bring it up every Christmas."

"Vittoria." His voice carries a warning that doesn't reach his eyes.

"No, no, this is beautiful. Valentino Conti, knocking. Asking." She wipes under one eye with her finger, careful of her mascara even mid-cackle. "You know what? Yes. Take her. Take her immediately, because I'm a married woman and yet my husband is downstairs talking about shipping routes instead of taking me to his room, so the two of you can get the hell out of my face before I become bitter."

"You've been married eight months," I say. "You're not allowed to be bitter yet."

"Watch me." She points at the door with the wine bottle. "Out. Both of you."

I'm already standing, already feeling Valentino's attention on me like sun through a car window.

"And Amanda?"

"Yeah?"

"Cousins," she says, grinning. "We're going to be cousins."

Valentino closes one eye at her, slow and deliberate, the closest thing to a wink that man's facial muscles will legally permit.

Vittoria makes a sound like she's just witnessed something she never thought she'd live to see.

"Go," she says. "Before I start crying again."

His hand finds the small of my back and steers me into the hallway. The door clicks shut on my best friend yelling something in Italian that I'm choosing to believe is a blessing.

We don't talk on the way to his room. The hallway is long and dim and smells like lemon polish and old money. His palm stays on my spine the whole walk, warm through the silk of my shirt, and my body follows that touch like it knows better than I do where I'm supposed to go.

His room is at the end of the east wing. He opens the door, lets me through first. I get exactly two seconds to register dark furniture and a window full of Chicago night before the lock turns behind us.

"Kneel."

One word. The wine stops helping. Whatever I felt in Vittoria’s room burns off the second he looks at me.

I turn around, and he's standing with his back to the door, still fully dressed, jacket and all, watching me with that stillness he gets when he's already made a decision and is waiting for me to understand it.

Heat climbs up the backs of my thighs. My pride makes one last, useless attempt to keep me standing, but my knees soften anyway.

The thick rug cushions my shins. He crosses the room without hurry, and I tip my head back to keep his eyes. He hasn’t touched me yet, and my breath already catches.

""You knocked on Vittoria's door," I say, because my mouth has never once respected a moment. "Very polite. Very civilized.”

"I'm done being polite." He reaches down and drags his thumb along my lower lip, pressing just enough that I taste the salt of his skin. "Open."

He doesn't take off the jacket. He doesn't take off anything. He pulls his zipper down with one hand, and takes his cock out, thick and hard and already flushed dark at the tip. The rest of him stays buttoned and pressed. Composed like he's about to chair a board meeting. The contrast short-circuits something in my brain. A moan slips out of me, embarrassing and honest, and the corner of his mouth lifts at the sound.

"There she is," he says, low.

I lean in and take him into my mouth, and the groan that comes out of him vibrates all the way down my spine. He's heavy on my tongue, hot, and I wrap one hand around the base of him, letting myself sink forward until my eyes water. Because two weeks is a long time, and I've been thinking about this with a frequency that would alarm a mental health professional.

His hand gathers my hair off my face, slow at first, almost gentle. Then his fist closes.

"Did you miss me?" His voice has dropped and become rough. As if he's swallowed gravell. "Hm? Did you miss this?"

I moan around him. Apparently it's the right answer, because his grip tightens and his hips move. He stops letting me set the pace. He fucks my mouth in deep, measured strokes, deeper each time. I breathe when he lets me and gag when he doesn't. Tears stream from the corner of my eyes.

I have never in my life felt more wanted than I do right now.

"Look at me."