When Heroes Fall (Anti-Heroes in Love 1)

It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before.

The way his mouth sealed over mine like a stamp of possession, his tongue parting my lips as if it was his right to claim this kiss and he’d already been patient for too long. The scent of him, bright as a citrus grove with an undertow of masculine musk was in my nose, the sound of his low, throaty growl vibrating from his tongue across mine. When he brought the long, impossibly hard length of his body flush against me, I couldn’t breathe from the feel of the hot erection pressed to my belly.

At that moment, every single atom in my body was owned by him.

One kiss.

For one kiss, I risked it all.

My career, my family, my freedom.

And my life.

But, Dio mio, I’d do it again and again if it meant feeling like this.

So alive I burned.

Only the sharp vibration of Dante’s phone on the patio table cut through the smoke and reminded me of myself.

Of my rules.

I tore my lips from his, my chest heaving with the effort, and pressed myself tight to the door as if doing so made me less conspicuous to that dark and hungry gaze.

“This is on pause,” he growled, his thumb stroking possessively over my thudding pulse point as if each beat spoke his name. “Now that I’ve had that red mouth, I’ll need it again.”

I just blinked at him as I tried to regulate my body, harness its wild impulses with the cool rationality of my mind. It took longer than it should have, than it ever had before, but finally, I found my voice.

“My meeting,” I reminded him weakly, shoving him back with two hands to his chest, trying not to luxuriate in the feel of his steel muscles beneath the soft fabric I’d left irreparably wrinkled. “I’ll be late.”

He let me push him away, putting his hands in his pockets as he followed me into the living room instead of answering his cell phone. I watched as he crossed to the desk while I collected my coat and purse, narrowing my eyes as he suddenly sent something flying across the room at me.

Instinctively, my hand reared up to catch the object. When I brought it down and uncurled my fingers, a bright red key fob with a silver horse rearing on it in silhouette stared back at me.

I gaped at him. “What is this?”

“Any Italian girl worth her salt knows what that is.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “But why did you just give me the key to your Ferrari?”

His grin was spectacularly wicked, and I realized with some degree of awe and concern that Dante didn’t have to have me pressed up against the wall to continue his seduction of me. “Addie told me you’ve been eyeing her. Why don’t you take her for that drive to Staten Island?”

My fingers curled around the key. Even though I didn’t want it to mean something that he trusted me to drive his million-dollar car, my heart panged like a plucked instrument in my chest.

“Thank you,” I muttered, my focus on putting my coat on so I wouldn’t have to bear the brunt of his megawatt grin.

“That sounds almost as good as please,” he told me in that smoky voice that made me high. “Not quite as good as your laughter, though.”

“Stop it, Dante,” I said firmly, shooting him my best schoolmarm glare. “Forget this happened. It was a momentary lapse in judgment.”

He nodded somberly, his lean hips against the desk, one hand playing with the chain of the ornate silver cross he’d taken out of his shirt. He looked like an invitation to sin on an altar, the worst decision a woman would ever make, but the wicked gleam in his eyes promised he would make it worth her while.

“I’ll try my best to make sure your judgment lapses again,” he called as I turned on my heel and started for the elevator. “Frequently.”

I shook my head but didn’t turn around.

Only when I was safely ensconced in the elevator on the way to the garage and that gorgeous car did I hit my head back against the ornate gold scrolled metal wall and curse myself for the smile that broke free across my face.

When I touched my lips to force the expression off my face, I traced the feel of his kiss echoed there in my flesh and closed my eyes on a groan.

I was already on the legal team of and living with the most infamous mafioso of the twenty-first century. It was debatable, but I’d already started down the slippery slope of moral degeneration.

Maybe Dante was right about making the risk worth something.

Something more than my career and its success.

Something worth the cost of my soul.

If I was going to damn myself anyway, I might as well do it by sleeping with the Devil of New York City.