Chapter 20

If your woman isn’t the most annoying person on the planet, she’s not the woman for you.

-Cobie to Dante

Cobie

This dream was way better, was my first conscious thought.

I pushed back against the hard column of Dante’s cock that I could feel along my backside and groaned.

“Dante,” I breathed.

His big hand went to my hip and he pulled me back as he ground himself against me, not saying a word.

I didn’t need words, though. Not when it came to the man that had stolen my heart.

Dante wasn’t much of a talker. It didn’t surprise me that that extended to sex.

He growled, though, and that was just as good, if not better.

“Please.” I pushed back against him.

His hand smoothed up under my shirt to lay flat on the expanse of my belly, and then he went lower to where my panties laid against my skin, right underneath my bellybutton.

His fingers teased the waistband. First, they went along the entire length, circling around one hip before they came back to the middle where the tiny pink bow lay. Then, the tip of one finger dipped below the waistline to run along the length of my pubic hair.

Over and over, just barely teasing.

It was enough to set my body on fire.

“Dante,” I whimpered.

I felt his bearded chin along my shoulder, and then his lips were on my skin. My neck.

My jaw.

He peppered my body with kisses as he tasted me, and I started to shiver.

My legs were rubbing together as I tried to alleviate the ache he was causing, and I licked my lips before I finally took the plunge and shoved my panties down my legs.

Once they were kicked off, I spread them wide and threw one leg over his hips.

The room around me was dark so I couldn’t see anything. I could only feel.

But feeling was enough.

I felt more than enough, actually.

His hand hovered just at the apex of my thighs, his fingers digging into my skin as I practically willed him to move forward. Just another inch and his fingers would be where it ached the most.

I shifted my hips to hopefully help, but still, he didn’t move.

His lips had frozen at my neck, and I bit my lip as I reached for his hand.

The moment my hand touched his, he shivered.

“Like this,” I whispered to him as I guided his hand down.

The moment I felt that blunt finger of his touch my clit, I knew that I was going to come.

Which, apparently, was all the encouragement that Dante needed.

He took control then.

His lips caught my skin, and he sucked lightly.

His hand delved deeper until his finger rested at the entrance to my sex.

And, before I could tell him a single thing, he let that finger slip inside of me.

I was so wet from his ministrations, as well as the simple fact that the man behind me was Dante, that it was almost embarrassing.

He felt so good.

God, everything about him was perfect.

“Dante,” I breathed.

Still he remained silent, but it didn’t matter.

He was perfect.

His fingers were perfect.

His mouth was perfect.

Everything about him was perfect.

I reached behind me and started to feel.

He had pants on, but not his jeans. Sleep pants.

His sleep pants were doing barely anything to contain his raging erection, and when I pushed his pants and boxers down, his cock sprung free and slapped against my lower back with a meaty thud.

I shivered as my hand circled around him, and Dante growled.

“Fuck.”

His strangled curse word was enough to encourage me to continue. I pumped him with my fist, relishing in the fact that he filled it to overflowing.

I’d been with two men in my life, and both of them had been a disappointment.

Dante wasn’t even inside of me yet, and he’d already given me more than the other two men ever had.

“Dante, I need you.”

“No more talking,” he ordered as he rolled me over onto my back.

And then he was between my thighs, his mouth on mine.

Still, he was careful to keep his weight off of me, remembering without me having to remind him that I was still recovering.

Which made my heart beat faster than ever.

And then I felt his cock at my entrance.

I couldn’t see a thing, but his mouth hovered over mine, letting me know without words that he was there.

Seconds after that realization, he filled me in one long, slow thrust.

His mouth stayed fused to mine, and we breathed in each other’s breaths.

One thrust. Two thrusts. Three. Four. Five. Six.

And then I came.

I came so long and hard that I took him with me.

He followed me over the edge, and by the time I came to, the first rays of the morning sun started peeking through the blinds.

The blinds of Dante’s bedroom window.

I was in Dante’s bed.

Oh my God.

I was in Dante’s bed!

Then I said something I never should have said.

“Dante... I love you.”

I knew the moment I said it that I should’ve never put voice to those words.

He got squigged out even when I showed him too much affection. Why would I think telling him ‘I love you’ would be any different?

It wasn’t. In fact, the reaction I received was worse. Much worse.

He looked over at me, and I knew I’d lost him. He was no longer there with me. Well, mentally anyway. Physically he was there. But the rest of him? Poof in a cloud of smoke.

Dante’s short little fuse had been lit, and in a matter of seconds, everything was blown to smithereens.

“Dante...”

“I need you to leave.”

He yanked out of me so fast that I gasped in surprise.

“You what?”

He threw my panties and pants at my face.

“I need you to leave.”

I took them, clutching them to my chest, and sat up.

“Why?”

He wouldn’t look at me.

“Because I don’t want you here.”

“But…”

“I. Don’t. Want. You. Here.”

“You don’t want me here.” I sounded like a broken record. I couldn’t find the words. I literally felt like I was floundering in water. Drowning. Was my head above water?

I literally felt sick to my stomach. Two minutes ago, I was on top of the world. And now... well, now I wasn’t sure how much lower I could be.

“Okay,” I said, sitting up and reaching down to slip my panties over my feet.

In the process, I leaked all down my leg and on his precious quilt. The one that he’d freaked out about when I’d used it to cover up here when I was first recovering.

The quilt he’d thrown away. The quilt that he’d seen after I’d washed it and immediately took to his room to lay over his bed. I hadn’t seen it until today. Until he’d laid my head down next to it. It’d been only a glance. A short glance before he’d followed me down, placing his body on mine. Then I’d forgotten about everything but him. How he was making me feel.

And now, that feeling was nowhere in sight.

What was in sight was his release, which had come out of my vagina, dripping down on the quilt. I knew he’d seen it too because he flipped out. Again.

“Dante...”

“GET OUT!”

Yeah, I’d lost him. I haven’t even really had him, and I lost him. Perfect. That was my life in a nutshell, though. A series of events that always ended up with me disappointed.

“Okay,” I said quietly.

I dressed quietly. He watched me the whole time, anger in his eyes.

By the time I was leaving, I didn’t think it could get much worse, but yet again, I was wrong.

“You were an obligation.”

I froze, my hand on the knob.

That shatter I just heard? Yeah, that was my heart breaking into a million, tiny pieces.

I backed up, pulled open the door, and left without another word. Or at least, I tried to. But Dante, always so thorough, made sure to deliver the killing blow as I opened the door to my car.

“Never would’ve had anything to do with you had she not forced me. Extracted that promise from me on her deathbed.”

And that, folks, is how to finish the destruction of a woman’s heart. He completed the process by stomping on all of those shards that lay there from his first comments.

I turned, my foot half in my car, and let him see the devastation in my eyes.

“I should’ve just gone ahead and died like I wanted to. At least then I wouldn’t have known how it felt to have someone you thought you cared about and could count on, say things meant to break you. Congratulations. You’ve officially made me wish I had cancer again. Hope that makes you feel good.”

His eyes changed. But before I could listen to his nasty reply, I dropped all the way down into my car and slammed the door. Seconds later, I pulled out of his driveway… and his life.

***

Dante

The moment she left I knew I’d made a mistake. Hell, the moment I’d said the words I knew they were a mistake.

Yet, I’d still said them.

My heart, what remained of it, felt like it was suddenly gone. Not broken... gone.

I was glad to know that Mary, who’d been picked up while Cobie was napping earlier, was with my mother, safe and sound. Because the minute I saw Cobie drive away, tears coursing down her cheeks, I lost it.

I felt raw. Broken. Torn apart and shredded.

If it could get any worse, I’d probably accomplish it.

My knees hit the wood floor. The stupid, goddamned wood floor that had seen a thousand steps.

A thousand crawls. A hundred spills. Countless tears, and a few tantrums.

And I let one loose, too.

Why?

Because I knew I’d just made the stupidest mistake of my life. Nothing would ever be worse.

***

After composing myself, I went to her home, forgoing my usual route for expedience as I stopped in front of her place.

Only, she wasn’t there like I’d expected.

Somebody else was, though.

Somebody who was just as pissed off as I was, only he was better prepared.

I felt the blow to my face and had one thought.

It was good Drake had caught me off guard. That would be the only way he’d accomplish what he set out to do next.