Page 23

Mattia couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. It was like he’d frozen into a human statue with only a functioning heart to distinguish it from marble.

He’d never known his heart could beat so hard or so fast. Never known it was possible to feel another’s heart racing alongside his. But he could feel Elvira’s heart through their meshed, naked chests. It felt like his heart was trying to pound into it.

He was still buried inside her. Her frozen fingers were buried in his hair. The fingers of her other hand lay frozen on his back.

Finally managing to get air into his lungs, he lifted his face from the crook of her neck and stared at her.

Her eyes were closed, her lips pulled tight. Her breaths were coming out of her snub little nose in tiny jerks.

There was a faint tightening of the fingers in his hair, and her eyes opened and locked onto his.

The shock he read in her silver stare was the same as what she must be seeing in his.

What the hell had they just done…?

As that thought shot through his brain, the shock in her eyes evaporated into horrified understanding, and they sprang apart, Mattia yanking himself away from her as Elvira pushed at his chest and rolled away from him.

“What the fuck, Esposito?” she cried.

“Now who’s the one swearing?” he said shakily, dragging his fingers through his hair as he tried to understand how the hell they’d just ended up having sex.

Sitting upright with the agility of a gymnast, she snatched at his shirt – he didn’t even remember removing it – and punched her arms into it as she wriggled away from him. Black buttons were scattered over the bedsheets, and she hugged the sides of the shirt around her, wrapping the body he’d just been a part of.

“Not such a temptress now,” he observed, a bite forming in his voice as he lifted his backside to pull his jeans up.

She hugged herself even tighter. “Go screw yourself.”

“Don’t put this on me,” he snarled. “You’re the one who stripped her clothes off and took a shower.”

“Not because I wanted you to fuck me!”

“No, you wanted me to lose my shit with lust so you could take a shot at me.”

Her lips twisting, she suddenly leapt off the bed like an uncoiled spring and raced for her gun. In less time than it took to blink, she had it in her hand and aimed at him.

Breathing heavily, he took her in. With his black shirt swamping her and her hair still damp from her shower, she looked as sexy as hell and surprisingly vulnerable, and it suddenly hit him like a truck exactly what they’d done. What he’d done.

For the first time in his life, Mattia had lost control of himself. All control. And with Elvira Ranieri.

He’d never experienced anything like it. Never fought like that with anyone, man or woman. Never been infected with such a bone-deep need to possess someone.

Nothing came close.

Goddammit, he’d never felt a need to possess anyone before.

He, the man who didn’t even like sex, had succumbed to the purest, headiest, deadliest form of it imaginable. He could still feel the zing of his climax thrumming through his veins. Could still feel the compression of Elvira’s breasts on his chest and the heavy weight of her racing heart against his skin.

A form of madness had taken him in its grip, and God only knew what the consequences would be.

The silence between them was as stark as when they’d lain frozen in each other’s arms.

Disgust at what he’d done would hit him soon, that was for certain, but for now he had to deal with the here and now, and the only way to do that was to detach himself from the madness of what had just happened between them and what he was still feeling, and take back the control he should never have allowed himself to lose.

Taking a long, slow breath, he met the silver eyes that were no longer taunting him.

None of it had been one-sided. Not the passionate, furious fight. Not the passionate, furious sex.

The madness had gripped them both, and it had led to the most intense experience of his life.