A Love Most Fatal (Morelli Family #1)

27. Nate

27

NATE

It’s not until I’m back in my room and under the hot spray of my shower that I finally start to calm down. My heart is still pounding in my ears at Vanessa’s admission. I knew she killed people; I literally watched her kill two men behind my apartment building.

But they’d been attacking us, that was heat of the moment self-defense!

As I violently scrub soap across my body, I reason that killing a man threatening your family like a cartoonishly evil villain is also self-defense.

It’s not the story that’s made me freak out. No.

It’s how I felt listening to it.

I felt vindicated and relieved that he was dead, a strange sense of celebration when she told me what she did to him. I know who she is, and what she’s done, but never have I felt like I understood .

It became clear to me. I thought of Artie and Angel clinging to her like a life raft as they slept when they were sick, and about Willa and Sean kissing when he passes her in the kitchen. Even Mary, and her little snort of a laugh that surprises no one more than it does her. Vanessa lives to protect them.

Everything is to that end.

I might have killed him too, I think. If I was in her shoes that day, I might’ve done it.

That’s what scares me the most.

It’s fucked up, all of this, they’ve gotten into my head after two months of sharing spaces and making them human, seeing them cook and laugh together and tear up watching an action movie in the middle of the night.

I scrub my face so hard that it’s bright red when I get out of the shower and I don’t want to go downstairs, but Ranger is running in little circles, probably because he wants to see Vanessa, who I’ve just now decided I am going to stalwartly avoid for the next month.

“Outside,” I say when we get to the sliding door. Reluctantly, he complies, bounding towards the grass, his collar jingling as he does. It’s dark downstairs, everyone has gone to bed by now. All the lights are off, but bright moonlight floods the kitchen through the big rectangular windows. I stare out the sliding glass door into the full moon, which is heavy in the clearest sky.

There’s a scuffing noise behind me and I turn in time to see Vanessa drop a glass, which bounces once before completely shattering.

“Dammit,” Vanessa says, and leans down to start picking up pieces. I rush to help, crouching in front of her to get the biggest chunks before retreating to the pantry to get the broom.

“It’s okay,” she says. “You don’t have to help.”

“No, it’s fine.” I make quick work of the little shards, sweeping them into a pile while she transfers the bigger pieces into the trash can. Vanessa whips her hand back from her task and I see one of the pieces has sliced a cut in her fingertip, the incision already welling blood.

I drop the dustpan, making a further mess of the glass, and grab her arms to pull her up and towards the sink. Glass crunches under our slippers, the only sound before I hold her bleeding hand under cold sink water. It cascades over her palm and splashes red over the sink’s surface.

She hisses at first, but I hold her hand tight with her forearm cradled. In the drawer next to me, I retrieve a little towel and hold it against her finger. Maybe I’m squeezing too hard, but when I look up at her, Vanessa’s eyes are on mine, closer than when we danced at the gala. Her hair is still damp, dripping water onto her cream silk button-up pajama top.

“Does it hurt?” I whisper. It’s so quiet in this moment I think the whole house might hear.

Vanessa shakes her head.

“Let me get you a band aid.” I step away, the rest of the kitchen substantially cooler than the space where our bodies were pressed together. I have goosebumps all over my arms.

There’s a first aid kit in the pantry and I rifle through it, my hands shaking as I do.

Instead of taking the band aid I offer, Vanessa holds out her finger. It reminds me of when one of my students gets a paper cut and they don’t want to mess up putting it on. I return to my place much too close to her and wrangle my breath to a normal (albeit slow) rhythm while wrapping the fabric around her finger.

“It does hurt a little,” she says. I’ve seen her suffer worse blows in training without so much as a complaint, but I do what I think she wants me to do and pull her hand towards my mouth, pressing two slow kisses against her wrapped fingertip. “A bit better.”

I should step away now, step back and pick up the dustpan and broom and work on the glass and then go directly upstairs to bed. I should do a lot of things, but I might die if I don’t do the one thing I want to do, so I tilt my head closer to hers. She lifts her chin in response. I feel the breath from her nose ghosting across my lips before I kiss her.

It’s the briefest touch of our lips, but her lips feel molten—the kind of burn that would blister. I pull away, like maybe I can stop this if I leave right this second, but her free hand grasps the side of my T-shirt asking me to stay. I lean in again, but she pulls her head away, just enough to see my whole face.

Her eyes show something I’ve never seen, something frantic and vulnerable.

“I’m a criminal,” she murmurs in a rush. “I’ve killed people.”

“I know.”

“We can’t be . . . together. Not for real.”

“I know,” I echo. She’s made it clear that she could never marry someone like me, and I’ve made it clear I couldn’t be with her either, though my reasons feel flimsier each day. “We can pretend. Just tonight.”

After a pause, she nods. “Just tonight.”

No other words are needed before I pull her mouth to mine again.

She’s feverish this time, her lips moving over mine, her tongue pressing into my mouth, and I’m right there with her, meeting her at every stride, pushing against her and pulling her to me. She takes her hand from mine before wrapping her arms around my neck. I duck so she can hug her legs around my waist and then slide her on the granite counter. She gasps at the cold stone on her bare thighs but doesn’t stop kissing me.

My hands roam around her back beneath her shirt. It’s dizzying to feel the expanse of soft skin I’d thought of all night with her in that damn dress.

“Fuck, Vanessa.” I slide my palm down her spine. I think I may be able to fuel enough sexual fantasies for a year from just the memory of feeling her bare back while she sits in her tiny pajama shorts on the counter in front of me.

“More,” she whines, and it sends me feral. I’m engulfing her, trying to pull her as close to me as possible, trying to swallow her whole. She bites my lip, and it issues a moaning sound I’ve certainly never made before.

I want her closer, so I start unbuttoning her shirt until it’s all the way open and I have to stop for a moment to just take in what I see beneath. Her stomach is tight, defined with muscles I’ve seen many times in the gym, but her tits—holy fuck—they’re somehow better than my mind had painted them because now they’re real, the size of ripe grapefruits, pink nipples that are hard and pointy and so, so tempting that I don’t even fight the urge to bring one into my mouth.

She arches her back, pressing her chest against my face with these little labored breaths sounding from her. I suck my way up to her throat and then her jaw, sloppily lapping at her skin until she tugs my hair up so we can make out some more. She’s grinding against my front where I am unbearably hard through my sweatpants, and I squeeze my eyes shut not to come right this very second.

“You’re the most beautiful person I have ever seen,” I say. “It’s barely human how much I want you.”

“Have me,” she says. “Please, right now.”

I pick her up off the counter and she gives a little yelp before wrapping her legs again tightly around my middle.

We kiss, little fast kisses on the mouth as I walk over to the door to let in Ranger who’s been pawing at it. He circles at my feet, and we break long enough for Vanessa to laugh.

“Put me down, I can walk,” she says. I do as she says, and am about to guide her straight upstairs, when I see the dustpan still spilling glass on the tile.

“Lock Ranger upstairs and I’ll meet you there.”

Vanessa pulls my mouth down to hers for one more searing kiss before leaving me to do what I said. My boner is ridiculous as I gather up the glass as quickly as possible and deposit the shards into the trash. I’ll do another pass in the morning.

I’ve only been in Vanessa’s room once; the time Artie and Angel were sick and I sat next to her while she fell asleep. Now, as I stalk inside, it’s just her here, and she’s pulling closed her curtains. Only lamps are clicked on, and the space is cozy and inviting.

Once I gently shut the door behind me, she turns around and we watch each other, miles of plush carpet between us. Her shirt is buttoned only a couple of times, the buttons in the wrong holes, and her face is flushed pink.

“Tomorrow, we forget about this,” she says, and I nod. Then shake my head.

“I will probably never, ever forget.” I stare at the spot between her breasts where her shirt hangs open. “But I will pretend.”

“Like it never happened,” she says.

I am like a malfunctioning machine, unable to think of anything other than Vanessa, Vanessa, Vanessa , but I jerk my head into a nod.

This settles it.

We both move across the room towards each other like magnets, meeting in the middle where she leaps on me. The taste of her is ludicrous, it’s making me dizzy and ravenous, I am sliding my tongue into her mouth in the least graceful kiss I’ve ever had, as eager as I was in high school, and she’s meeting me and matching me at each turn.

My hands, too, are gliding all over her body, trying to memorize her curves like if I don’t touch every part of her now, I never will again.

“The bed,” she says between kisses, and I bring her there without having to be asked twice. She falls back onto the comforter with a huff, but keeps kissing me, reaching up to meet my mouth as I crawl over her.

She pulls my shirt up over my head and I shakily undo the last two buttons on her top before throwing it across the room.

I think I whimper, the sound that comes from me is involuntary and needy as I take in her tits again.

“Have them,” she says. “Whatever you want.”

I’m distracted cycling through a rolodex of “whatever I want” scenarios, but we only have tonight, I remind myself.

Only tonight, and that will be the end of it.

We will both be satisfied, and we can go on knowing what just once felt like.

I know that this never works in movies, the just one time to get it out of their systems , but I am convincing myself as I press messy kisses on her chest that by some miracle, this will be enough.

There is no slow seduction here, nothing smooth about me in this moment. For all the time I secretly fantasized about what this would be like, I am a needy mess now.

Her hands snaking up my torso and around my neck, into my hair, make me feel out of control. I am buzzing, breathing her name into her skin as I kiss and touch her.

I’ve never had less finesse in my life, but she’s reacting in kind.

“Please,” she whispers, and I guess I’m not the only needy one here. “Please touch me, Nate. Now.”

I am taken aback and also a bit sick with power at her asking so nicely for me to touch her pussy.

“You’re perfect,” I breathe, which only makes her squirm more. I give in to her pleas, because she did ask so nicely, and I think if I don’t sink a finger into her heat in the next minute, my heart will stop.

Her lips are wet and slick, and I slide my fingers through them, circling around her clit for a moment before pressing my middle finger inside of her.

My vision goes white.

“Holy shit, Vanessa,” I say, and she just moans. I press another finger inside and I have to close my eyes before I come at the sight of her face scrunched up in pleasure. I really might. I am 19 again, touching a girl for the first time, but this time it’s a mafia goddess instead of someone I met at a party.

“Nate,” she moans, her voice so high like a whine.

It’s another piece of her, another hidden gem given to so few.

“Tell me what you like,” I say, and add a third finger to her wet center. She groans. “Tell me.”

“This,” she says. “And more, please. More.”

I drop my face right next to her ear. “Can I taste you? Please say yes.”

Her breath catches in her throat, and I push my fingers in more forcefully. “Yes,” she groans. “Yes, anything.”

I kiss my way down her body and shimmy these flimsy shorts off her hips before looking at the pussy my fingers had just been pumping into. Through my sweats, I grab the base of my cock to keep myself in check.

I again squeeze my eyes shut for a moment as to not really embarrass myself.

It’s perfect and dark pink, and so, so wet. She’s not waxed or shaved bare, which thrills me. She’s neatly trimmed and spread wide open for me. It’s another secret, this level of grooming that’s just for herself and, again, I feel like the smuggest, luckiest man on the planet that I get to see it, get to taste it. I’ve won some sort of karmic lottery to be in bed with Vanessa Morelli.

As is everything with her, I dive in with zero finesse.

My tongue is probing into her instead of teasing, it’s like I’ve never done this before, but she groans and writhes anyway, and I keep up my ministrations.

I suck her clit into my mouth, and it makes her legs shake around my shoulders.

I’m at my task for minutes, my cock is as hard as it has ever been at the moans she’s making and just savoring the taste of her when I can tell she’s close. So close, I can sense it in her body’s movements, in the way her breaths are tight and fast, shallow in her throat.

But as she gets closer still, something breaks and she’s not quite there. This happens a few times, and I can tell she’s retreating, just a bit, embarrassed or frustrated or both.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “It’s—you don’t have to?—”

“No, baby,” I cut her off. “Tell me what you need.”

Her throat moves as she swallows looking down at me, and I keep my face between her legs.

“Your fingers,” she says. “And your tongue on my clit. I need both,” she admits, and I grin before diving back in. Her cunt squeezes around my fingers as I fuck them into her while rubbing my tongue against her clit.

“That,” she gasps, and her hips start shaking, fucking herself on my fingers and my tongue.

“Holy shit,” I say, and she only groans louder. Her hands are gripping the comforter on either side of her, though I can tell she wants to hold my hair. I grab one of her hands and put it on my head, where she immediately holds on tight.

The tingles of pain in my scalp are like a drug.

I’ve never done drugs, but I think this is what it might feel like.

I suck her clit into my mouth and increase my speed, thrusting my fingers into her perfect pussy. This time as her breathing picks up speed, she doesn’t stop until she’s gone over the edge, moaning loud into her room, probably waking the whole house in the process, but I keep fucking her with my hand and my tongue all the way through it, until she’s quivering around me, her ragged breath slowing.

I lighten up, languidly licking and fingering her until she’s come down.

I crawl my way back up her body and take her limp hands in mine. I massage her palms and kiss every knuckle while her breathing slows.

“Why are you so good at that?” she asks, and she’s still flushed. “How much practice have you had?”

“Some,” I say. “Never like that though.”

“You’re so hot when you’re horny,” she says, and I let out a long laughing groan into her neck. She giggles, actually giggles, but then takes a sharp inhale when I wrap a hand around her and grip her ass.

“Condoms are in the drawer,” she says, then like she has to explain herself, “Willa bought them for me when you moved in. I didn’t answer her calls for a day.”

I laugh, silently thanking her older sister for the foresight, and reach for the unopened box, ignoring the part of my brain begging me to stop and go through every single thing in and on top of her nightstand. I see a little journal and I want to read it so bad. I want to crawl around in her brain and study her messiest handwriting and read her words out loud to myself to see how her thoughts feel coming from my mouth.

When I’ve retrieved a condom and crawled back on her massive bed, she’s maneuvered to her hands and knees in front of me, and I am so shocked by this image that I have to take this opportunity to trace the lines of her silhouette. Her daily training shows in her limbs, the definition of her shoulders and toned thighs. Her back is arched as she peers over her shoulder at me and her hair is mussed. I want to see the red flush to her cheeks always, want to know that I’m the one that put it there.

I draw my finger down her spine, and she shivers.

“I want to have you,” I say when my fingers reach her pussy, still wet from my mouth and her own juices. “Here.”

Vanessa moans in response, her hips anxious to buck back onto my fingers.

Wanton thing .

I slide the condom on over my shaft and she watches over her shoulder every move. When she finds my eyes on hers, she chews on her lower lip.

“Make it good,” she says, and I blink at the meaning, the reminder that I ought to make it good since we just have the once. Just tonight .

God, thirty minutes with her and I’d forgotten this isn’t something we can do every moment of the day for the rest of forever.

“How many times have you come in one night?” I sound composed enough for a man who’s about to die here on the spot as soon as I get my cock in her. I tease her entrance, small circles on her labia. When she tries to push back onto me, I pull back further.

“I don’t know, three?”

Three .

We can do better than that.

“Great. We don’t stop until, say, five, then?”

“Nate,” she groans.

“Six?”

She laughs again, the sound igniting every pleasure receptor in my brain. I lean over her back, a trail of kisses up her shoulder until I’m close enough to speak into her ear. My dick is hard between us. “Come on. Vanessa Morelli isn’t a quitter.”

Vanessa swallows and I do not imagine her swallowing around my dick, not at all, not for a second.

“Fine,” she whispers with a smile. “Five.”

“Six,” I correct. She groans, but nods.

“Just do it, already,” she says. “Please, Nate.”

“What, this?” I sink two digits into her heat again and she moans. I might be ruined for any other erotic sound again, like I will be thinking about this any time I have a boner for the rest of my mortal life, and thereafter.

“More,” she says. “Please, Nate, I want?—”

I kiss her hard on the mouth, swallowing her gasps before kneeling behind her and, without preamble, I give her what we both very much want.

I can tend towards the dramatics, I recognize this. But when I say that Vanessa’s pussy wrapped around my cock is the best feeling I’ve ever experienced, well I’m being modest.

We both groan once I’m fully sunk inside her and I’m trying to be cool, but there is really nothing cool about me in this moment.

“You’re unreal,” I say, or more so wheeze. “How are you real?”

She starts wiggling her ass side to side and back and forth and I grip her hips to get her to stop, my thumbs pressing into her soft ass.

She does stop but her little whimpers tell me she’s not happy about it.

I pull out and thrust into her as an experiment, thankfully disproving the hypothesis that any movement will make me blow my load on the spot. I move a bit faster, then slower, then faster, all the while keeping her hips in place. She arches her back and we both moan at the new angle it provides.

“This is unnatural,” I say as I push further into her and then harder, making her breath hitch with every thrust.

“I’m going to come, Nate. Stop holding back,” she says, and I do. I can’t help but listen, rutting into her without grace, grunting with her moans, coursing my hands over her sides and down her back. I lose any semblance of rhythm with the building of my release, and when I finally come, it’s with heavy pumps into her while she keens beneath me and squeezes around me.

I collapse next to her, and she follows, lying down next to me with her head resting on my chest.

“I’m catching my breath, and then we have four more orgasms on the agenda,” I say. Her head lifts from my chest, eyebrows knitted together in the middle.

I push up to an elbow to meet her at eye level.

“Just tonight,” I say again. “But like, all night.”

That dimple makes an appearance on her cheek, and because it’s just tonight, I lean forward and kiss it before going to her bathroom to clean myself up.

We’ve got a full evening ahead of us.