Savage didn’t fully understand the depth of his mistake until he was buried within Bella’s velvet, wet heat. She moaned and sighed as he rolled his hips against her. Her hands roamed his back, her fingernails skating down the valley of his spine, scoring him as he pushed her toward the peak of her release.
Damn, she was lovely. Sweetly angelic, yet sexy as hell. She always had been, but now there was a strength in her too.
There was a power inside her, one that had been forged in the fire of what she’d endured the past three years. No longer the sheltered innocent, but a resilient woman who knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to take it.
And, incredibly, what she wanted was him.
Still.
The realization stunned him, humbled him. Made him want to hold her close and never let her go.
One taste of her a decade ago had ruined him for any other woman.
Now, every cell in his body was hammering with the need to make her his alone.
In flesh and vow.
God help him, he wanted to claim her in blood too.
He wanted that with a ferocity he’d never known.
Not true, he corrected. He had wanted Bella as his blood-bonded mate even then. Ten years of absence from her had only solidified that resolve.
He loved her, and blood bond or not, he knew he would destroy any male who thought to take her away from him now.
“You’re mine, Bella.”
He growled the words as he pumped into her, knowing they sounded more like a demand than pledge.
They were both. They were his purpose for breathing, and he couldn’t pretend they were anything less.
Not now.
Not when she was coming apart in his arms, her fingers digging into the muscles of his biceps as she cried his name and shattered with the force of her orgasm. The tight walls of her sex vibrated along his cock, tiny muscles gripping him like a slick fist as wave after wave coursed over her taut body.
He watched her come, trying to slow his own release just so he could revel in the pleasure he was giving her. But his need owned him. This female owned him, and trying to temper what she stirred in him was like trying to cage a wildfire.
He took her mouth in a deep kiss, drinking up her little sighs and moans as her climax began to ebb. When her eyelids slowly lifted, she gave him a blissful smile that he would kill to see on her lips for the rest of his life.
His voice was gruff, raw. “You’re mine.”
“I always have been,” she whispered.
Ah, Christ. That tender admission was more than he could bear.
Pleasure seized him, pushing his hips into a fevered tempo. Each thrust took him deeper, made his hunger for her coil tighter, testing its already razor-thin leash.
Bella moved beneath him, meeting every hard stroke, taking him even deeper as she lifted her hips and wrapped her long legs around him.
Her hands roamed his face and shoulders, caressing him, worshipping him. The knot of his orgasm gathered at the base of his spine, wringing a sharp groan from between his clenched teeth. Blood pounded in his temples, in his cock…in the deadly lengths of his fangs.
“Oh, God,” Bella gasped, tipping her head back as the flush of another release swept over her skin. “Ettore…I can’t hold on. You feel too good.”
He was beyond words now. He was only instinct and need, pure male. Utterly consumed by the remarkable female in his arms. He responded with a triumphant growl as she cried out beneath him. He couldn’t stop his hips from moving, nor his blood from pounding with the overwhelming urge to claim his female in every possible way.
The urge became a mantra as his orgasm sped toward its peak.
He didn’t realize he was staring at her throat until he heard Bella’s soft voice filter through the haze of his blood-tinged thoughts.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Ettore. I want it too.”
When he met her gaze, he found her brown eyes steady and unafraid.
So full of love, it staggered him.
He knew he should turn away, be the stronger one.
He should give her this choice when they both were clear-headed and fully able to process the ramifications of what a bond would mean. One taste of her blood and he would feel her in his veins for as long as either of them lived. He would know her deepest emotions as his own—every joy and sorrow, every pleasure or pain.
And if she should die before him, he would be cursed to feel that too.
The bond was irreversible.
Unbreakable.
Eternal.
Concepts that had never entered his mind with another woman were all he could think of now that he was here with Arabella.
He loved her.
To his soul, he had loved her all this time. And the part of him that was more than mortal wasn’t willing to wait another moment to claim her. That possessive, primal part of him wanted to bind her to him irrevocably.
Forever.
There was no place for logic in it, no room for regret.
There was only need.
Only love.
He roared with the ferocity of everything he felt, and as his release took hold of him, Ettore lowered his mouth to Bella’s neck and sank his fangs into her tender flesh.
Chapter 10
If the bliss of making love with him had nearly wrecked her, it was nothing compared to the pleasure she felt at the sudden, sharp penetration of his fangs into her carotid.
Bella gasped at the piercing pain, feeling his bite all the way to her marrow. But that initial jolt gave way to a pleasure that defied description as his lips fastened over her skin and he drew the first sip of blood from her wound. Heat raced through her veins like rivers of quicksilver, all of her senses—every fiber of her being—drawn toward the pulse point that now flowed beneath Ettore’s mouth.
Each suckling tug, every erotic sweep of his tongue, confirmed what she had already known.
She was his.
If she hadn’t been before, the connection he had just activated between them ensured she always would be. He could never take another as his Breedmate so long as his bond to her was intact. For him, there would only be her.
The joy that understanding gave her was almost too much to bear. It filled her heart, even as it awakened something raw and primal inside her.
“You belong to me now, Ettore.” She tunneled her fingers through his hair, holding him to her throat as he drank. “Mine.”
He moaned, still rocking atop her, their bodies intimately joined. His strokes intensified along with the suction of his mouth against her vein. The combined sensations flooded her with desire, stoking her need all over again.
“So good,” he murmured, his deep voice as rough as gravel, his breath rushing hot against her throat. She felt his tongue sweep over the twin punctures, sealing them closed.
He lifted his head to watch her now. His eyes were glowing as bright as coals, gazing at her with such a ferocity of emotion it stole her breath. She had never seen his fangs look so sharp and unearthly. She licked her lips, hungry to feel them at her throat again.
Everywhere.
He was ferocious and otherworldly, the most magnificent man she’d ever seen.
His wicked mouth curved as he caressed the side of her face and the tender skin where his bite had been. “I can feel you inside me, Bella. I feel your blood in my own veins, in every cell of my body. And I feel your pleasure. I feel how badly you need me to make you come again.”
As if to punctuate, he thrust long and slow and deep, a rumble of satisfaction vibrating through him as she cried out in helpless ecstasy.
“My sweet Bella,” he said, lowering his head to kiss her forehead, her cheek, her parted lips as she sighed. “I wish you could feel how much I love you.”
“Show me,” she whispered, reaching up to trace her fingers along his rigid jaw, her gaze drifting to his fangs. “Let me taste you now, Ettore. Give me your bond.”
She didn’t have to ask him twice.<
br />
On a snarl, he brought his wrist up to his mouth and bit into it. Blood dripped onto her breasts, hot splashes of crimson that inflamed her dark thirst for him as he guided her mouth to his wounds.
She sealed her lips over the punctures. The first drop of blood on her tongue felt like a kiss of flame. She moaned, both in shock and in thirst.
She lapped at his skin, astonished at the intense rush of heat through her body as she drank from him. Ettore’s blood felt alive with a wildness and strength she could barely comprehend. As powerful as an electric charge, each sip blasted into her body, into her cells…into her soul.
There was no fear left in her. No doubt. Everything peeled away, leaving only their love. This connection that nothing, and no one, could sever.
And beneath the contentment she felt as she sipped from Ettore’s vein was a deeper blooming of desire.
It was the most erotic thing, to drink from him as he moved inside her, watching her with those eyes that burned everything away except the bond they now shared.
She didn’t think her body could withstand another hot race toward climax, but Ettore’s blood had unleashed something animal inside her. Something fierce and demanding. Something violently carnal.
“Ah, fuck, baby.” He groaned, the tendons in his neck straining as she suckled his wrist and writhed beneath him. “I know. I can’t be gentle now either.”
Pulling his wrist away from her, he quickly sealed the wounds then flipped her over onto her stomach. One strong arm slid beneath her, hoisting her backside up to meet him as he slammed home from behind her.
He took her swiftly, aggressively, giving no quarter until they both were fully spent and collapsed on the bed in a sated tangle of limbs.
She didn’t know how long they lay there, wrapped in each other’s arms, their bodies slick with sweat and blood and the musky scent of their lovemaking. Bella could have stayed there for hours. Days. Forever.
She groaned when he rolled away, bringing her with him.
In the adjacent bathroom, the water began to run in the tub at Ettore’s mental command.
Bella rose off the bed with him, smiling as he caught her in his embrace and pressed a tender kiss to her forehead.
She drew back, searching the banked embers of his gaze. “That was…amazing.”
He inclined his head in solemn agreement. “Yes, it was. More than amazing.”
She traced one of the dermaglyph swirls on his chest. “So…where do we go from here?”
He grunted, a smile playing at the edges of his sensual mouth. “To the bathtub for starters. I’ve made a mess of you.”
“No, Ettore.” She slowly shook her head. “You’ve made me whole.”
His expression intensified, sparking a soberness that she could feel now, in his blood. In her own blood too, as it throbbed heavily in her breast and in the pulse points that all craved his bite.
“Ah, Bella. God, I love you,” he murmured. “But I don’t know where we go from here. Back to Rome to begin with. From there, we’ll have to figure it out. Right now, I only know that I need you with me.”
It was all the promise she needed. Him. With her. Together.
She could hardly believe this was her new reality.
Tipping her chin up, he kissed her with reverent care. Then startled her when he scooped her into his strong arms and carried her to the bathroom. He stepped into the tub with her, sinking down into the water with her straddled against him.
Bella sighed into the comfort of his arms and the softly lapping pool around them. “This is heaven,” she murmured, resting her head on the muscled pillow of his shoulder. “I’ve never been so happy. I never thought I would be.”
Ettore tenderly caressed her, his hands wet and warm and soothing as he bathed her. She started to drift, her mind relaxing as she watched the little ripples dance in the bath water.
The vision came on so suddenly, she flinched.
It formed beneath the clear surface—horrific, bloody, violent.
She saw a Breed male covered in mangled, melted skin. Dark soot and grime smeared all over his shoulders and burned head. He held a screaming human in his jaws. The man’s throat was torn open as the predator siphoned his blood in gulp after greedy gulp.
“Bella?” Ettore’s voice was flat with dread.
He had to feel her shock. Her terror.
His hands shook as he pulled her away from him so he could see her face. Her gaze was still riveted on the water, her mind still caught in the hideous vision.
“Sweetheart, what is it? Tell me what’s wrong.”
She could hardly find the words.
Because at that moment, the Breed male in her mind’s eye lifted his ruined head. His furious, blazing amber eyes seemed to reach out for her through the water.
“It’s him,” she murmured. “Massioni. He’s alive.”
Chapter 11
Bella’s vision weighed on Savage like a ton of bricks parked on his chest, a weight that was only increasing in the hours since she’d described what she’d seen in the water. The very thing he’d dreaded, the mistake he’d made in not making sure he had finished the job, was soon coming home to roost. He had no doubt of that.
Unfortunately, Bella hadn’t been certain if she’d seen Massioni in the immediate future, or days—even weeks—from now.
Nor did it matter.
The son of a bitch had survived the blast that should have killed him.
Vito Massioni was alive, and that meant Savage had failed in his mission for the Order.
He could only pray he hadn’t failed Bella in the process.
And to make certain of that, he was doing the only thing he could think of to ensure their safety.
“Everyone ready to go, sweetheart?”
Bella nodded as she strode toward him from the back bedroom. “Chiara will be right behind me. She’s having a bit of trouble with Pietro. The poor thing has been having nightmares most of the day.”
“Understandable,” Savage said. “The kid has been through quite an ordeal. You all have.” He drew Bella under the shelter of his arm. “We need to be on the road to Rome as soon as the sun sets. It’s only a few hours away, but the sooner I get you and your family there, the better I’ll feel.”
She peered up at him, stroking his tense jaw. “You’re sure your comrades won’t mind taking us in for a while?”
“You’re my mate, Bella. Chiara and Pietro are my family now too. The command center may not be a suitable home for a child, but somehow we’ll find a way to make it work.”
Her gaze was tender on him. “You’re a good man, Ettore.”
“I want to be,” he said. “For you. And that means making sure you’re as far out of Massioni’s reach as possible. At least until I can finish him for good.”
Savage seethed with the urge to fix his fuck-up personally and painfully with the bastard. There was a time when he would have.
Before Bella reentered his life, he’d thought nothing of charging into the fray of a dangerous situation to take out a target. He’d never had a death wish, but as a warrior pledged in service to the Order, his life had been expendable if it meant the difference between success or failure of one of his missions.
All that had changed now. Bella and he were bonded. Now, if he were injured—if he were killed—she would feel his anguish as if it were her own.
She would suffer everything he did, just as he would endure her every pain or fear.
So, no matter how viciously he wanted to make Vito Massioni pay for every hour of every year he’d held Bella prisoner for his own gain, Savage had to exercise caution. He had to be sure he didn’t fail—with her or with the Order.
She rested her head against his chest, where the heavy pound of his heartbeat throbbed. “I’m scared, Ettore.”
“Don’t be,” he murmured, placing a kiss on the top of her head. “I’m not going to let him get you. I’m not going to let him get Chiara or her son either.”
??
?I know you won’t. But I’m scared for you.” She drew in a shallow, ragged breath. “If I ever lose you again—”
“You won’t.” Guiding her gaze up to his, Savage urged her to see the resolve in his eyes. She had to feel it in her blood now, through the bond that would join them forever. He slid his hand around her nape and brought her to him for an unrushed kiss that ensured she felt all of the love and promise that he held for her in his heart.
He could have kissed her for hours, and he swore to himself that he would, once he made sure she and her family were safely returned to Rome.
Sensing they were no longer alone, Savage turned his head and found Scythe standing there. Christ, the male might be immense and formidable, but he moved like a wraith.
He held out his left hand, a vehicle starter in his palm.
“What’s this?” Savage asked, pivoting to face the former Hunter. The key fob was for a Range Rover—a new one, by the look of it. Scythe handed it to him.
“The truck you arrived in might get you where you’re going, but this will be better.”
“I left that vehicle half a mile away at the church. How the hell did you know what we were driving?”
Scythe didn’t answer, and Savage figured there was a lot about the reclusive male and his methods that would remain a mystery. Instead of pressing him, Savage slipped the welcome gift into his pocket.
“Thank you.”
Scythe gave him a faint nod.
“We’re ready!” Chiara called from behind them. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting.”
The petite brunette had her son’s little hand grasped in hers as she approached from the other end of the corridor. As they drew closer, Savage felt a cold shift in the air. He didn’t realize what it was until he looked at Scythe and saw that the male had gone utterly still. His onyx eyes were stark, almost haunted, beneath the harsh slashes of his black brows.
Chiara must have felt the chill too. She glanced up nervously at Scythe, practically tugging dark-haired Pietro along when the boy’s steps began to slow in front of the big Gen One.
But the child didn’t seem to have any fear for the sinister-looking male. His feet halted in front of Scythe, his little head tilting up to stare in unabashed awe. “How’d you hurt your hand?”