He watched me as I finished my orgasm, the arousal in his eyes replaced by a different emotion. His fingers kept working my pussy until I was finished, and then he stared at me like I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. “I know, baby. And you know you’re the only woman I’ll ever want.”
The mattress was comfortable and the master bedroom was nice, but it wasn’t the same as Bones’s place. It didn’t have the same coziness, but I loved being in Tuscany no matter what. With him beside me every night, it was good enough.
I was dead asleep when a nightmare came to me. Knuckles was there, dragging me away from my family. He had Sapphire too, who was swollen with her pregnancy. She was in tears, and he had a gun pointed right at my temple.
My father was on his knees as a man held a rifle to his head. The horror on his face was because of what he was witnessing, not the gun at his head. The man pulled the trigger, and then my father’s body fell to the ground.
“God!” I jolted upright in bed, gripping the sheets and tipping over as I lost my balance. Hot tears fell down my face, and I sobbed as the images remained glued in my vision. I tried to suck the air into my lungs, but there was never enough oxygen. “Oh my god…” My hand moved to my chest, and I felt my racing heartbeat.
Bones sat up and pulled me against him. “Just a dream, baby. A dream.” He leaned down and pressed a kiss to my shoulder and then my neck. “It’s alright.”
“I’m scared…” I stared into the darkness, looking out the window to the fields that I couldn’t see. There were stars in the sky because it was a clear night. I couldn’t see anything else but the heavens above. We were alone in the middle of nowhere. No one was around.
“Hey.” He forced me to my back so he could look down at me. “I’m here. You know what that means?”
I stared at him, my chest still rising and fall sporadically. The back of my neck was beaded with sweat, and it absorbed into the pillow. I could see his muscular outline and the hardness of his jaw. His blue gaze pierced me like blades.
“It means nothing will ever happen to you. Don’t be scared.”
Like his words were a lifeboat and I was about to drown, I moved into him and held on. I found comfort in his muscular chest, in the thickness of his arms. I moved my face into his neck and focused on the steady pulse as it vibrated under his skin.
He cradled me beside him, hiking my leg over his hip.
“I’d never let anything happen to you, baby. So when the nightmares come, tell them to leave. They have no power over you.” He rested his face against the pillow beside mine, confident gaze chasing the rest of my pain away. “I’m the only one who has any power over you.”
My hand moved up his chest until it rested over his heartbeat. Steady and slow, it thudded with power. “I dreamt…that Knuckles took me and Sapphire. And…one of his men shot my father.” I closed my eyes, reliving that painful moment that hurt me. I took a deep breath, reminding myself it wasn’t real, and I opened my eyes again.
He stared at me with the same expression, his eyes unblinking. “I would never let anything happen to him either.”
My eyes moved to his face, surprise in my heart. “You just said you wouldn’t hurt him…”
“I know what I said. But I’d protect him as much as I would protect you—because I know what he means to you. That goes for the rest of your family too.” His hand moved to my cheek, and his fingers slid through my hair. “You’re everything to me, baby. And I never want my baby to be scared or sad. Your pain…” He rested his palm over my heart. “Is my pain.”
Bones pulled up to the winery in his truck.
I sat in the passenger seat, feeling resentful toward my family before I even opened the door. My father was blinded by hate, and so was everyone else. If only they understood how much this man loved me, they would be able to let go of the past and move on.
But the Barsettis were so damn stubborn that didn’t seem possible.
Bones looked at me when I didn’t hop out right away.
I was almost tempted to ask him to drive back to the house.
He killed the engine. “One day at a time.” Like he could read my mind, he addressed the sadness in my eyes.
“Yeah…”
Bones went to work, working in the warehouse where the bottles were placed in the boxes then dollied to the storage facility before they were placed on the truck for delivery. This man was undeniably rich, and now he was working for free—for someone else.