CH-2
Isabella POV:
“You think I ever stopped wanting you?
I stare up at him.
And then I slap him.
Hard.
But my body arches against his anyway.
I’m not thinking when I slap him.
My palm connects with a sharp crack, but all it does is make his grip tighten in my hair.
His eyes flare, hot and golden. His breath hits mine. Everything about him screams danger—and yet my thighs press together like they remember the rhythm of his mouth, the weight of his hips, the way he made me burn for hours with nothing more than a look.
“You want me to pretend none of it happened?” I whisper. “That you didn’t abandon me?”
His jaw clenches. “I didn’t abandon you.”
“You disappeared, Dante. You left me wrecked. You didn’t call, didn’t write, didn’t exist.”
“I was protecting you.” He hisses the words through gritted teeth. “From your enemies. From your father. From me.”
Something in his voice sounds too raw, too real.
And that’s what pisses me off most.
Because part of me wants to believe him.
Wants to fall back into the fantasy I once had—the assassin in the shadows who only bled for me. The man who once undressed me with a single flick of his blade and said I tasted like sin.
I push him off me, roughly, and he lets me.
Because he always did.
=================
FLASHBACK – 3 YEARS AGO
It was storming the first time Dante kissed me.
We were in the De Luca training yard—me in leggings and a sports bra, sweating and bruised after two hours of hand-to-hand.
He stood over me, gloved and calm, barely winded.
“You drop your left shoulder every time you spin,” he said, offering me a hand. “Sloppy.”
I glared up at him. “Maybe I was aiming low.”
His lips twitched, just barely.
“Try again,” he said. “This time… don’t hold back.”
I didn’t.
I launched at him.
He let me slam him into the mat, straddle his hips, pin his wrists.
And then I felt it.
The shift.
The tension in his chest. The way his eyes locked on my lips. His breath caught.
And I kissed him.
Fast. Desperate. Angry.
His hands broke the hold. His mouth crushed mine.
That kiss was war—gritted teeth, soft gasps, and tongue like fire. When he bit my bottom lip, I nearly moaned.
When he flipped us, caging me with his body, I did.
“You don’t get to want me,” he growled. “You’re off-limits.”
“Then stop kissing me like I belong to you,” I gasped.
He didn’t.
Not that night.
=============
PRESENT
Back in my bedroom, I pace like a caged animal.
The attack rattled me—but not as much as the man protecting me.
Dante hasn’t changed much. Still moves like a shadow. Still speaks with that low, lethal voice that sinks under your skin and lays claim to your blood.
But his body…
It’s harder now. Scarred in ways that weren’t there before. His back has fresh burns. His ribs—tattooed in something ancient, black ink curling like vines over battle wounds.
I saw them when he peeled off his shirt and cleaned the graze from his shoulder earlier.
And I stood there too long, staring.
Wanting.
He caught me watching.
Didn’t say a word.
Just looked at me with those ruinous eyes and smirked—like he knew I’d always be his weakness too.
That night, I can’t sleep.
I walk past his door once.
Twice.
By the third time, I hate myself for what I’m about to do.
But I knock.
He opens the door bare-chested, barefoot, sweatpants slung dangerously low.
I forget what I came to say.
“What is it?” he asks, voice hoarse like he hasn’t spoken in hours.
I step inside.
“I need to know why,” I whisper.
His brow lifts. “Why what?”
“Why you came back.”
He takes a long breath and shuts the door behind me. Slowly.
“I never left you, Isabella. Not in the ways that counted.”
He stalks closer. The space feels smaller. Warmer.
“I watched from the shadows. I made sure no one touched you. Every man who even looked at you too long... paid for it.”
“That doesn’t fix anything.”
“No,” he says. “But it proves I never stopped wanting you.”
My breath hitches.
His fingers trail down my bare arm.
And then he leans in—his mouth a breath from my throat.
“Your father made me swear I’d stay away. Said if I didn’t, he’d bury us both. But if you think I ever touched another woman after you... then you never understood what you did to me.”
I swallow hard.
“You don’t get to say those things,” I whisper.
“Why?” His lips graze my jaw. “Because they still make you wet?”
I shove him back. “Don’t.”
“Too late,” he growls, grabbing my wrist. “You came to my room. You knocked on my door. Tell me it’s not still inside you.”
“I hate you,” I breathe.
He backs me against the wall.
“I can live with that. So long as you still burn for me.”
Before I can answer, his phone rings.
He pulls away, tension crackling between us.
“Don’t go anywhere,” he says, stepping into the hall.
The door doesn’t close completely.
I creep closer… and hear him say my name.
But not like a lover.
Like an asset.
Like a job.
“She’s under control,” he says coldly.
“I’ll deliver her when the time is right.”