Her Italian Hitman Read online

  Eliza’s eyes are huge and brown in the hot air whipping in from around the shattered glass.

  “I promise you, I’ll never let anything happen to you. I need you to trust me, ok?”

  I wait for her to nod, her arms tightening reflexively around my shoulders in a way I could get used to for the rest of my life.

  And then I throw her out the window.

  Chapter 3

  Eliza

  Give me a second. I need to get my story straight. My friends are in the bathroom getting higher than the Empire State. — fun, ‘We Are Young’

  He threw me out the window.

  Even an hour later, the knowledge hasn’t fully penetrated.

  Logically, I am fully aware of the fact that I’m safe and sound. Enzo jumped right out after me, latching onto the rappelling ropes he’d already set up the night before. Going out the window had apparently been the plan long before Gio Bianchi died at my feet, though I’m still struggling to untangle the order of operations in my own head.

  “It was a shit thing to do, Rossi.” I glare at Mr. Tall, Dark, and Deadly from across the tiny confines of my bathroom.

  Enzo is so big he takes up nearly all the space in the tiny little water closet. Like the rest of my shithole apartment, the bathroom is outfitted with white cement block walls. I call it jailhouse chic.

  My stomach pitches and the whole world rolls for a blinding second and I realize that reality might not be so far off now.

  One minute I was kneeing that dickhead in the balls, the next he was on the floor in a small puddle of his own blood. I don’t remember seeing him trip or bump his head on the corner of my massage table.

  But according to international man of mystery Enzo Rossi, the jerk that booked my six pm time slot tonight was some crime lord. An ex-crime lord now. Bianchi isn’t going to be criming it up again any time soon.

  Apparently, Enzo had planned on assassinating Gio Bianchi himself, at the end of my shift. Until my essential oils accidentally assassinated him first

  Enzo was actually going to hide out in my closet all night laying in wait for the perfect moment. That split second where Gio would be alone on the massage table and I would be safe. So he could take out one of the most dangerous criminals in the world.

  A sensual shudder runs between my slick thighs at the thought.

  “Don’t get me started on the violation of privacy,” I narrow my eyes at him, channeling my energy into frustration. It’s easier this way. If I’m angry, I don’t have anything left in me for all the other emotions coursing through me. The ones that don’t make any sense. The ones that have been thumping around wildly inside my body since the first moment I laid eyes on Enzo Rossi when he rushed in the spa door.

  Is this shock? Does shock make you horny?

  I can’t stop thinking about Enzo, watching me.

  His blue eyes fixed on me through a gap in the closet door while I work all night. Making sure I’m safe. Keeping track of my every movement. It’s so intimate, such an erotic image. I can feel heat making its way up to my face and chest, a flush that has nothing to do with the perpetually-broken air conditioning in this terrible building.

  For one blistering second his eyes meet mine, and I think I might melt.

  Then Enzo looks from my eyes to the tweezers I’m wielding. For the first time all night, I think I see the slightest flicker of fear cross the oceans of his blue eyes.

  He can’t help himself, though.

  “Mi scuso,” he says, that rich Italian tongue rolling around in a way that’s nothing short of obscene. Even his sarcasm is sexy. “I didn’t realize that when I grabbed you, saved your ass, brought you with me on the pre-planned escape route that I was going to use after assassinating the mob boss that you already killed when I got there—”

  “Sort of killed,” I lean in and pluck the last hunk of glass out of Enzo’s forehead. He’s left with a tiny sliver of a cut, and it only adds to his rugged good looks. It’s unfair how handsome the man is. His hair is black in a way that’s almost blue at the tips, thick and luxurious under my fingers as I tend to the wounds on his beautiful face. “We don’t know he’s all the way dead. Not for sure, right?”

  I pause my ministrations to look up at Enzo hopefully.

  He considers me in the unflattering yellow light of the bathroom. I wonder how long it’ll take him to say something about the hot pink bunny Band-Aid as I press it to the cut on his forehead. Instead, he tugs my hand, pulling me to a stop directly in front of him.

  “Killed, Eliza. Gio Bianchi is dead. The world is better off without him, but I’m sorry you had to see it.”

  The intensity of it catches me off guard. I’m not really sure what to expect, or why he’s looking at me with the heat of a thousand neon lights all of a sudden. I feel off-balance, dizzier than when we were rappelling down the side of a building and a million miles an hour into the night air.

  “I’m sorry you got mixed up in this. But I meant what I said, cara. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  The bathroom feels stifling suddenly; too small for me to be able to catch my breath.

  As if he can read my mind, Enzo swoops down, scooping me behind the knees and carrying me into the bedroom.

  There isn’t much more to my apartment. Just beyond the threshold to the tiny bathroom is the slightly less tiny bedroom. Enzo sets me down in front of the window at the foot of the bed. Beyond the sheer white curtains, the flickering light of the parking lot drips across the walkway outside. My heartbeat is louder than shattering glass in my head at the tender way he runs a big palm across me. It’s a soft, almost reverent touch.

  I know what’s coming next before it happens.

  I may not be experienced, but even a twenty-three-year-old virgin can figure out when the most beautiful man in the world is about to kiss her. Maybe it’s the sound of angels singing that gives it away. My brain spins, the million reasons why this is a bad idea tramping through my thoughts on parade.

  Enzo leans in, silencing them all in a single motion. He brushes his lips along my jaw. It’s the single most sensual sensation I’ve ever felt against my skin. He mouths the shape of my throat and collar until my skin is covered in goosebumps. I hear a broken whimper, and heat flames my face all over again at the realization that I’m even capable of making such a needy sound with all my clothes on. I’m not doing a very good job of convincing either one of us that this isn’t a good idea. I try to speak again, but my lips remain stubbornly silent.

  When his dark scruff scrapes its way back up, my mouth is working, but no words come out. Instead, I’m desperately seeking the shape of his own lips against me. It’s a desperate sort of motion, blind and restless. I find it with my eyes closed, fixing my lips to his as Enzo’s strong hands curl against me. His palm slides against the heated skin at the back of my neck, pulling my face even closer as I lean up.

  His mouth meets mine in the semi darkness, and for an instant, everything is right. The insanity of the night melts away and there’s nothing else, nothing but the place where his soft lips yield to the strength of his mouth beneath.

  It’s not enough, could never be enough. Kissing Enzo is like drowning. I take big mouthfuls, filling myself with him. Every breath is ragged, my lungs expanding painfully with need as my pulse hammers under the restless movements of his big hands. He’s under my skin, the scent of sweat and gunpowder clinging to him, more erotic than any cologne. I’m obscenely wet beneath my plain white cotton bikini panties, my nipples pearled tightly against the grey cotton uniform dress that still clings to my body.

  I’m clinging to Enzo now, too.

  My tongue laps needily against his while he growls into my mouth. I thought I'd been kissed before. I was wrong. There’s nothing in the gentle mouth-pushing of highschool hallways to be found in the way Enzo claims me. His lips and teeth and tongue are brands on my mouth, burning me, searing me, marking me as his for all time.

  Enzo’s hands are possessive, roaming
along my hips and coming to settle on my waist with a forceful grip. The sudden tightness of his fingers, digging into the soft flesh there, is enough to snap me back to the present.

  “Oh!” I break away from his mouth. It’s like blinking up from a fever dream. “Enzo—”

  It takes a moment to find my breath. Even as I realize that I need to stop, need to get a grip on the way my body is spinning out of control, there’s a buzz lingering along my skin. My heart is hammering against my ribs with the steady rhythm of a jackhammer. When Enzo’s grip tightens, dragging me up against him to feel the raw, throbbing evidence of his own desire, I think I might never be able to breathe again. There’s a spark in his eyes, the electric reflection of my own desire staring back at me.

  “I need you, cara.” Enzo’s voice is rough with need, his Italian accent as thick as the cock straining the limits of his pants. He leans down to nip my lower lip between his teeth, tugging it hard before looking at me with that blue fire burning in his sapphire eyes. “And you need me, too. I can feel it. Don’t fight it.”

  The sound of my palm meeting the chiseled lines of his rugged face ring out through the sparsely furnished motel room.

  Chapter 4

  Enzo

  Just a small-town girl. Living in a lonely world. She took a midnight train going anywhere. — Journey, ‘Don’t Stop Believin’

  My cheek stings, the skin tingling where Eliza slapped me.

  There’s a fire blazing in her brilliant brown eyes, but she’s made no move to step away from me. Inside my pants, my cock throbs harder than ever. I’ve been waiting for Eliza Piazza my entire life.

  The Rossi men tend to find love late in life. My grandfather didn’t meet Nonna until he was nearly thirty— unheard of for the time in Italy. My father met mama a month shy of his thirty-ninth birthday. Same age as I am now.

  One look at Eliza, ringed in a neon halo and a dead mob boss at her feet was enough for me to know: she’s it for me.

  The way she’s looking at me now, fire and need burning bright in her amber eyes, lets me know that I have a lifetime of tangled sheets in my future.

  “Don’t tell me what I need, Enzo Rossi.” She narrows those dark brows at me. The tiny silver hoop in Eliza’s eyebrow gleams in the grey light streaming in from the dingy motel parking lot. “I make my own decisions. I decide what I need.”

  She looks so serious, so damn beautiful.

  I shouldn’t smile at a woman who just slapped me hard enough to leave my ears ringing. As both a hired gun and a Sicilian, there are things you just know are bad for your health.

  But I can’t help it. Eliza’s dark eyes and passion make my heart and cock swell for her in equal measure. She’s like the world’s most exotic flower. I’m more than willing to take the risk of getting past a few thorns to get to her beauty

  “You’re right, tesoro.” My fingers are in her hair before Eliza realizes I’m moving again. I love watching her plump lips round out to a perfect O of surprise as I tug out her hair tie in one easy motion, sending the tumble of dark curls raining down around her shoulders. “You decide what you need. For the rest of our lives, you get to decide what you need.”

  Eliza wears confusion as well as she does annoyance. I watch as they chase across her beautiful features, obliterated only by lust as I lean down, nipping at the plump swell of her bottom lip again.

  Her kiss is sweet and strong, the most potent liquor ever distilled. I’m immediately intoxicated by it, drunk on her passion. Her mouth moves against mine with a hunger as she captures my bottom lip, sucking it hard enough that it hurts.

  I grasp her wrists in my hands, pressing them against the wall behind her, pressing myself against her. Even pinned between my throbbing cock and the wall, she’s defiant. The tilt of her chin, the fire in her eyes — it just makes me want her more.

  “So, tell me, Eliza Piazza. Tell me what you want. Tell me what you need.” I whisper, staring into her espresso eyes, drinking deep of them.

  “You,” she answers.

  I shake my head. “What do you want from me, Eliza?” I let go of one wrist, caressing it with the back of my hand. A light brush that wracks a shiver from the girl in front of me.

  “I want you to touch me,” Eliza whispers. Her voice is desperate, needy.

  “Like this?” I brush my hand down the length of her arm, across her ribs, and over one shirt-covered breast. She shivers beneath me, but her eyes don’t waver from mine for a second.

  “Yes, but more,” she pleads.

  “Like this?” I whisper, sliding my hand down her stomach, using it to slowly gather the hem of her dress up until I can brush against her skin.

  “Yes, but more,” she begs.

  This time I don’t ask a question in response. I answer her with my body, pressing a deep kiss into her lips as I slip my fingers beneath the smooth cotton of her panties.

  Drenched. Soaked. Her pussy is desperate for attention. It opens for my fingers easily. Eliza’s panting breaks our kiss, so I work my mouth down her chest, pressing my lips against the exposed skin of her cleavage.

  I could spend eternity there, my fingers coaxing Eliza open, her tits welcoming my mouth. Her curves are as sinful as I’d imagined. I can feel the weight of her breasts drawing me in like gravity, and I happily lose myself in them.

  Her hands grip my hair, pressing me harder against her flesh, but dragging me down. Down the length of her torso, down onto my knees, down between her thighs. I keep my eyes locked on hers as I push her dress all the way up to her waist, exposing her drenched white cotton underthings.

  “Such a good girl, Eliza. Look at you. Pure and innocent, si?”

  My teeth scrape against her skin lightly, giving her another sensation, a harder edge to contrast the feather-light touches of my fingers and tongue. I trace the curve of one milky white inner thigh up to its apex. All the while looking into her eyes, cementing my desire for her the best way I knew how.

  Her expression is twisted, almost painful in its raw lust. She nods back at me, her bottom lip captured by her teeth.

  I slip my thumb under one side of the band of her panties, sink my teeth into the other and pull. The slick cotton sticks to her mound for half a second before I peel it away. I can already smell Eliza’s arousal, her feminine scent that makes my cock throb with an almost painful ache.

  “You deserve so much, Eliza. You have skin made to be touched, lips meant to be kissed, curves meant to be worshipped.” I kiss my way along her, breathing in deeply as I whisper a prayer against her skin, a hymn to her beauty.

  “And a pussy made to be fucked,” I growl, slipping my tongue up the entire length of her slit. Her hips jerk, legs twisting, one knee giving out completely. I’m already holding her up, though, keeping her from falling with my hands on her waist.

  Holding her above me as I lick, suck, and worship every inch of her petite pussy.

  “Oh my god, Enzo,” she gasps, squirming against me as my tongue moves in long strokes before moving to gently circle her clit.

  “Si, cara. Come for me, I need to taste you,” I murmur against her, her body muffling my words, but my actions screaming my intent. I work her harder, faster, keeping an even tempo but demanding her body give me what’s mine.

  She scrabbles at the wall, her fingers grasping for a purchase that doesn’t exist. Nothing she can grab hold of can brace her for the monumental wave of pleasure that wracks her body. I dig my fingers in deep, pressing into her waist until I feel her bones.

  The peak of her climax hits her with so much force that she rises up onto the balls of her feet, and then her toes as the pleasure plateaus with the pressure of my tongue. I hold it pressed directly against her, a constant and insistent push.

  I make her come, and I hold her there.

  Eliza writhes against me, her hands coming down to dig into me for the grasp she couldn’t find anywhere else. I support her, as I plan to always do from this moment onward. I might be claiming her body, her purity, h
er innocence. But Eliza has already claimed my heart.

  Chapter 5

  Eliza

  How lucky can one guy be? I kissed her and she kissed me. — Dean Martin, ‘Aint That a Kick in the Head’

  My first orgasm at the hands — and mouth — of Enzo realign my entire worldview. A shift in my entire outlook on life. Before he made me see the stars in heaven, my priorities were simple: keep my head down, save up, get out of here, and maybe someday far in the future, I’d consider being happy. Looking for love. Maybe start a family.

  Then I had my first real orgasm. Not the small things I’d managed to wring out of my own body. They are as different as night and day, the overwhelming pleasure on the tip of Enzo’s tongue nothing at all like the ones I had found at my own hands.

  Now my priorities are even more simple:

  Do whatever it takes to have this man’s babies.

  I relax my grip on his hair, amazed that I didn’t rip out two fistfuls in the throes of passion. I watch as Enzo straightens up, towering over me before leaning down to cup my face and press a tender kiss against my lips.

  My hands find the bottom of his tight black tee and peel it up and over his chest. A collection of scars and tattoos grace his skin, each more rugged than the last. Every inch of his body drips with masculine perfection. I’ve never wanted to kiss something more than I want to cover every inch of his muscular physique with my lips.

  I follow the sinuous lines across his torso and up to his arms. Beneath the tips of my talented fingers, I feel every scar. The swollen, puffy, smooth skin of fresh scars on one bicep and across his ribs. The slight raises of older scars on his lower back. The almost imperceptible silver lines on his chest, three of them crossing back over each other.