Giovanni (Benedetti Brothers 4)

With each passing minute, I’m growing angrier and angrier at myself, at my imprisonment. I looked around his bedroom today. Snooped a little. I figured it was my right. But I didn’t find anything out of the ordinary apart from a stash of cash. I guess a man in his line of work will always have cash like that lying around. I didn’t have much privacy to go through the other rooms, but I should have tried harder. I’m too obedient.

I go back to my seat and lay back and watch the sky, watch the clouds move across it, watch the big trees. It’s so pretty here, different than my rooftop, but I like it.

When I finally hear his voice, it’s close to nine-thirty. I turn my head to look at him. He opens one of the French doors and walks outside. He’s taken off his suit jacket and is rolling up his shirt sleeves. His eyes are all dark and intense, and they trap me the instant he sets them on me. I can’t look away if I try. His dark hair is ruffled, and he has that constant shadow along his jaw, that scruff that I still remember when he surprised me in my bed that first night.

I feel my face heat up at that memory and the one of last night. Of when I came so hard that I passed out.

He stops when he’s a few feet from me, eyes the bottle. I make a point of giving him a smirk as I finish my glass of his expensive whiskey.

“I thought you didn’t like that stuff?” he says, coming around to take the glass from me. He looks distracted. On edge. He pours for himself in the same glass and drinks while standing there, looming over me. “Why aren’t you wearing the clothes I had delivered?”

“Because I have my own clothes.”

“I thought you’d be more comfortable.”

“If you’re worried about my comfort, then you should let me go home.”

He looks over the length of me, and his gaze falls at my bare feet. I think how vulnerable I am. How much at his mercy. I swing my legs off and make to stand, but I must be light-headed because I stumble. He has to catch me so I don’t fall.

“Steady.”

My hands are against his chest. A moment later, I shove against him. “Let me go.”

He does, and I take a step back and wonder where I left my shoes because without my heels, I’m so much smaller than him. I look at his hand as he brings the glass to his mouth. To the dusting of hair on his arm, the expensive watch. I watch him drink, swallow. I remember what he did to me last night. I remember his hands on me. Remember him inside me and again, I feel my face and my core heat up.

When I meet his eyes, he’s watching me. “How much did you drink?”

I shrug a shoulder. “Don’t worry about me. I can hold my liquor.”

“Did you swim at least?”

“I’m not on vacation,” I say. “I was told this morning I wouldn’t be permitted to leave the house, in fact, which makes me a prisoner. What is this, house arrest? Is this what you have to resort to to keep a woman?”

He grins and walks over to the pool. “Nah. You’re just special.”

“I want to go home. I demand it.”

He chuckles, sets down his glass, and starts to strip off his clothes.

“What are you doing?”

He’s got his shoes and socks off, is undoing the buttons of his shirt, and a moment later, it’s off. Then his slacks. He turns to me.

“Swimming. Let’s go. In.”

“No. I told you, I’m not swimming.”

“It’ll cool you down, and trust me, you need to cool down because your attitude’s going to get you into trouble. You don’t want a repeat of last night—or do you? I imagine your ass is probably sore.”

I glare, but he just gives me a smirk before pushing his briefs down and off and diving into the pool. He doesn’t resurface until he’s gone the length of it, and when he does, he gracefully changes direction and swims a lap to the opposite end. All I can do is watch because he’s beautiful. He’s so fucking beautiful. His body is a perfect harmony of muscle, power, and speed. He glides through the water, effortlessly going back and forth and back and forth, seeming tireless. As if he doesn’t have a care in the world. When he does finally stop, he catches my eye. I can’t look away as he draws himself out of the water, his muscles bulging, his hair and body dripping, glistening.

He stands there and lets me look at him, and I do. I’m speechless.

He is your enemy.

He is your enemy.

But my brain can’t seem to make any sense to the rest of me because I’m staring like a fool.