The Villain’s Beloved by Bella J.

7

There wasa storm brewing in the dark clouds outside. I could smell the rain, feel the looming thunder coming from the distance. Maybe it was the universe’s way of telling me that I had made a massive mistake by bringing Charlotte here.

Roma. It was a beautiful city that spoke to my soul whenever I was here, walking its streets and watching its people. Knowing how magical this city was, I couldn’t deny Charlotte’s desire to experience it herself. Yes, my first priority was to keep her safe and out of the hands of the Bernardis. But her happiness had become my priority as well the second I told her I loved her.

Soft hands snaked around my middle from behind, and I closed my eyes, relishing the feel of her. Her presence. Her peace.

“Did you enjoy the spa bath?”

“Hmm-mm. Totally ruined a normal bathtub for me.”

I snickered, loving the thought of pleasing her. Even if it meant soaking in a bath for an hour.

“Thank you,” she whispered, leaning her head against my back.

I placed my hand on top of her twined fingers. “I would do anything for you, Charlotte. Never doubt that.”

The gentle pitter-patter of rain against the windows dwindled the silence. Secretly, I was thankful the weather didn’t allow any sightseeing today. It gave me one more day of being able to protect her within the confines of four walls.

“This hotel room is amazing, Elijah.” She maneuvered her body around mine to stand in front of me, her hair wet, her naked body wrapped with a plush white towel. “But a simple cabin, or even a tent would have sufficed.”

“A tent in Rome?”

She snickered, and her cheeks blushed.

I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “You deserve the best of everything. And this is the best hotel in Rome.”

“You know,” she smirked, “for someone who supposedly stalked—”

“Observed.”

“Stalked me…for years, I sometimes get the feeling you don’t know me at all.” She tightened her hold around me, and my cock stirred. “It’s not about money for me, or the fanciest food or most expensive hotels. For me…it’s about moments. Memories. The perfume.”

Perfume. The keeper of memories. The reason she had been buying herself the same brand of perfume for years—a reminder of her late mother.

I touched her chin with a gentle nip between my fingers. “I don’t know what it’s like to have fond memories of a mother, but I imagine it can’t be easy missing someone like that every day.”

The soft light of a single sunray that broke through the thunderous clouds touched the blue in her eyes, her unshed tears glimmering, igniting this deeply rooted need inside me to make it right. To comfort her and slay those motherfucking memories that broke her heart over and over again. But I wasn’t like her. I didn’t know how to comfort, how to sympathize or encourage. All I knew how to do was to hate and kill. I had been programmed not to care—a hardened man who didn’t give a shit about anyone else’s suffering. If I had to care about other people, their feelings, their pain, I wouldn’t be in the profession that I was. I wouldn’t have been able to secure owed debts or exact the revenge my clients craved. I’d be too busy searching for unicorns and fucking rainbows in the eyes of my victims, trying to find some sort of redeeming quality that would give me a simple reason not to slit their throats.

No. I wasn’t that man. But for her…I wanted to be.

A simple nudge of my finger lifted her chin so I could kiss her. There was no resistance from her, her lips parting and tongue welcoming me into her mouth, allowing me to explore and taste.

It was an instant high every time our mouths latched and desires collided. Her kiss was honey—an amber sweetness that overwhelmed my tastebuds, causing me to want more while knowing I’d never have enough. Charlotte was my ecstasy, the drug that rushed through my veins, corrupted my mind, and clung to my skin.

Taking everything she offered by opening her mouth filled my heart and enticed my body, tempting me with hers simply by being close. How could I ever be the kind of man she deserved—anything other than a monster? Nothing about me was whole. I was just an empty vessel held together by a thousand broken parts left behind by a boy I had chosen to leave in the past.

While I was with her, touching her, kissing her, hearing her fucking breathe next to me, something felt right. Somewhere between all those broken pieces was something whole…and it was her. But whenever our heated breaths mixed it created this fucking toxic hunger that made my control non-existent. And I didn’t give a fuck about being the man she needed, being the better man who would put his woman’s feelings above his own. All I cared about was burying myself in her, feeling her from the inside, hearing her screams of pleasure, the vibrations slithering across my skin. That was all I wanted.

Fuck this debt.

Fuck the Bernardis.

Fuck Italy.

And fuck that goddamn cello that lured me into her world, because now I had dragged her into mine. That was what monsters like me did. We took. We corrupted. We ruined. Give us a rose, and the petals would wither instantly while the thorns bloomed.

I snaked my hands around her waist, cupping her ass, lifting her on her toes, pushing her against my hardened cock. “Turn around.”

She stilled and inched back, but I pulled her closer, forcing her to take my tongue. It fucking burned inside me, my blood nothing but flames that scorched my veins.

A growl vibrated from my throat as I reached up, fisting her wet curls between my fingers, tugging hard as I licked down her jaw. “I said turn the fuck around.”

It was so easy for me to pluck the towel from her body while I forced her to turn, giving me the splendid view of her naked back, that enticing curve that trailed down toward her firm ass.

I bit my lip thinking of all the fucks I didn’t give in that moment—my mind and body completely consumed with this woman.

My hands settled on her waist, her skin hot even though her body trembled. “If I had my way, you’d walk around naked every minute of every goddamn day.” I eased her forward, toward the window that looked out at the wintery scene of the city of Rome. “I would have you thoroughly fucked, that cunt of yours possessed with a permanent ache to remind you who you belong to.”

A soft whimper brushed past her lips, and she reached up, weaving her fingers through the hair at the back of my neck. I palmed her breast—round, firm, her nipple hard and begging to be sucked.

“Elijah,” she whispered as I brought her one step away from the window, “people will see.”

“Let them.” I wiped her wet curls from her shoulder, peppering wet kisses along the flesh of her neck. “While most men would gouge out the eyes of those who see their women naked and panting while getting fucked, I want every goddamn man out there to watch me fuck you. I want them to see your body quiver as I pound into you, witness how your body surrenders to me as my cock fills your cunt.” Another nudge and her body was flush against the cold window. The sound of her gasp made my dick twitch and my balls ache.

Reaching between us, I unzipped my pants, fisting my length as I dragged the tip against her naked ass, down the slit, dipping between her thighs, groaning as her arousal coated my cock. Slick. Warm. My ultimate fucking undoing.

“I wonder how many people are out there now, watching us,” I rasped against her ear. “I want every fucking man and woman in this entire sick, twisted, fucked-up world to know you belong to me. That this pussy,” I jerked her hips back and plunged into her without warning, her warm breath misting the glass as she cried out, “is mine. Just mine.” I pulled out of her entirely before slamming back into her, and she placed her palms against the window as another moan escaped her.

Consumed with her heat tightly gripping my cock, I shed the skin of a lover and embraced the instincts of a goddamn animal. Primal. Starved. Ready to be sated.

Leaning back, I looked down to where I entered her, my cock disappearing inside her, slipping out and glistening with her slick lust wrapped around my length like motherfucking silk. Jesus—the sight alone had me heading to the edge way too fucking fast.

“Do you know what you’re worth, Charlotte?” I bit out, chained with toxic lust—an angered hunger that took control of my body. “Do you know what I’m willing to do to keep you?”

“No.” She whimpered, but she was lying. It was there in the slight tenor of confidence in her voice, her willingness to play her role perfectly for me. Her role as prey.

I bit my bottom lip, fisting her hair and forcing her face harder against the glass. I stilled inside her, and her hips swayed as her body demanded the decadent friction of my cock against her inner walls.

My hand gripped her hip, keeping her from moving. “You are worth a thousand last breaths. A million fucking slit throats. That’s what I’ll do for you, my sweet cellist,” I rasped against her ear and licked down her neck. “I will kill every man who merely thinks he can desire you, touch you, kiss you…fuck you as I do.”

“Please, Elijah,” she pleaded. “I need you to move.”

“I know you do.” I inched back, easing out of her, giving her just the tip. “But I like you like this. I like to see you crave my cock, desperately wanting to get fucked.” I tightened my grip on her hair. “Hurt, and used.”

“Please.” She tried to move against me, tried to force my dick inside her, but I inched back even more, loving the torture I inflicted on her willing body and needy cunt.

“Look out the window. How many people do you think are watching us right now? Looking at your tits squeezed against the windows, your naked body brushing against the glass.” A tremor wracked through her as I eased back inside her, little by little, allowing her pussy to wrap around my length. “I wonder how many men are jerking off right now while imagining it’s them fucking you. How many women wish they were you, getting fucked.”

“That’s the problem,” she whispered, trying to glance at me over her shoulder, a glint of defiance in her irises. “I’m not getting fucked right now…am I?”

A growl ripped from my throat as angered lust wrapped around my cock, the throbbing ache forcing me to spear inside her so fucking hard, she cried out and swallowed her own motherfucking words.

My thrusts started slow, but deep. Real fucking deep, my cock buried to the hilt inside her. Thrust after thrust, the ecstasy intensified, every muscle in my body wrapped in a goddamn vise, demanding a release. But I didn’t want it to end. I wanted to be inside her for the rest of my motherfucking life—live in the paradise I could only find between her legs.

I let go of her hair and slammed my hands next to hers on the window, my palms flush against the glass as I cocooned her. “Tell me, Charlotte,” I thrust deep and hard, lifting her on her dainty fucking toes, “would you worship next to me in Heaven? Or rule alongside me in hell?”

“Hell.” She breathed, answering without hesitation. “I’m going to hell with you.”

Jesus fucking Christ, that was the last push I needed to ram me over the edge, my climax ripping my goddamn body apart as I spilled my seed into her.

She cried out as she came with me, our cum gushing down her thighs and ruining my Armani suit pants in the process. But I couldn’t care less, the sound of her pleasure and the sight of her rapid breaths clouding the windows worth far more. It was fucking priceless, seeing her like this. Jaded and out of control—a stark contradiction to the controlled woman I’d watched for years, seeking perfection as she played the cello. This was what made her mine, the fact that I got the version of her no one had ever seen.

The Charlotte Moore no one would ever have the pleasure of seeing.

No one…but me.