“Not even to help you from the car.”
“All right.” I closed my eyes and waited, but nothing came. When I looked again, he was pulling back the sheets of his bed.
“Ven aquí,” he said, lying down.
“We had a deal.”
“Come here,” he repeated.
I trudged back to my side of the bed, climbed in next to him, and curled into a ball with my back to him as I had every night.
After a moment, he tugged me close with a loose grip on my bicep. I glanced over my shoulder at him and met his eyes, dark with demands once again.
He ghosted a finger over the tattoo. “Mine,” he said. “Mi mariposita. My rare and unusual, beautiful white monarch.”
“You’re wrong,” I whispered. “He made the wings orange, not white.”
He barely traced the outline of it. “The butterfly’s orange color warns of its poison,” he explained. “It’s dangerous to be colorless. And you, my wife, are toxic to predators.”
“This isn’t just a reminder to me.” I had suspected as much. “It’s a warning to others.”
“She is mine.” He moved some of my hair behind my ear and pressed closed lips to my mouth. His hand tightened around my arm, but he stayed still, not yet pushing for more.
He angled his shoulder over me, cocooning me. His butterfly. It shouldn’t have surprised me to feel him harden against the cushion of my ass. I should like to be able to roll over and be inside you. I tried to think of anything to keep from wanting that. To keep from falling into him as he slid his hand down my forearm, squeezed my wrist, caressed my hip and the curve of my ass.
I wanted him to keep going. To slip between my thighs and relieve me of the arousal he’d inspired, to chase my shame away without permission so I didn’t have to face that I wanted it.
I had to think of anything else or I wouldn’t just ask him for more—I would beg for it.
Out of habit, Diego came to mind. Had it felt like this to kiss him? Like I was standing at the edge of a black hole, and he was both pushing me over the edge and pulling me down into the dark? I’d always known that darkness was too easy to walk into, and now, Cristiano knew it, too. He’d drag me down, ruin and defile me, while Diego had wanted to keep me pristine.
No, the kiss with Diego hadn’t been a magic spell like Cristiano’s, because it wasn’t just about sex. I believed Diego had loved me on some level, as much as he was capable. And I also knew on some level that I’d known that what I’d had with Diego wasn’t real.
Cristiano was real. Raw. His honesty could be brutal, but it left no room for pretense, and my body responded in kind.
I moaned greedily and thrust my tongue into his mouth first, then gasped at my forwardness.
Cristiano smiled against my lips. “Goodnight. Sleep tight knowing you’re safe from me for a time. And should you realize that isn’t what you want, take comfort in the fact that this is far from our last kiss.”
When I awoke next, it was to a dark and empty room, yet I sensed dawn had broken. I rose from the bed and opened black-out shades to find the sun rising in the distant desert.
Below, Cristiano carried his suitcase to a town car.
No wonder he’d promised not to touch me. The sneaky bastard was going somewhere.
Cristiano was a master of words and manipulation, and that wasn’t news to me. But in place of the fear I’d been clinging to, I suddenly wondered if I could keep up with him. If I could learn to decipher the true meaning behind his words, thoughts, and actions—and play on his level. Something told me he wanted that too.
And just like that, already, that small shift in mindset was working.
I knew without asking why he was leaving.
He was going in search of answers that would fill whatever void existed in him. Of the key that could unlock the something—the everything—he wanted.
Or he’d drive himself mad trying.
And where would that leave me?
19
Natalia
A dark-haired, petite mirage of a girl wrung her hands in front of a dusty black SUV. I shielded my eyes from the sun as Alejandro took a beat-up suitcase from the trunk.
As I ran down the front steps, my flip-flops slapped against the stone. “Pilar?”
My best friend threw her arms around my neck. “¡Dios mío, Natalia!”
I took her by her shoulders so hard that she winced. Loosening my grip, I looked her over. “What are you doing here?”
Her crystal green eyes widened. “I have no idea.”
I whirled around. “What the hell, Alejo?”
He shrugged. “Cristiano said you might be lonely while he was away.”
“So he took my friend?”