A Hunger for the Forbidden - By Maisey Yates Page 0,35

at his side, but her expression was still relaxed, her smile easy. A lie. Why had he never noticed before that Alessia’s smile wasn’t always genuine?

He’d assumed that it was. That Alessia displayed and felt emotion with ease and honesty. Now he wondered.

The last of the guests started to file out, leaving Alessia and Matteo standing in the empty ballroom.

He looked around, at the expansive room. This was his hotel, separate from his family dynasty, and often, looking at it, at the architecture, the expanse of it, filled him with a sense of pride. He had hotels all over the world, but this one, back in Sicily, a hotel that belonged to him and not to his family in any part, had always filled him with a particular amount of satisfaction.

Now it just seemed like a big empty room.

He picked up his phone and punched in a number. “Delay cleaning until further notice, I require the ballroom for personal use for a while.”

Alessia looked at him, her dark eyes wide. “What do you need the ballroom for?”

He shrugged. “Anything I want.” He walked over to the edge of the stage and sat, gripping the edge. “It is my hotel, after all.”

“Yes, and you’re a man who takes great pride in the ownership of whatever he can possess,” she said.

“And why not?” he asked, loosening his tie, trying not to think of Alessia’s fingers on the knot, trying not to imagine her fingers at the buttons of his dress shirt as he undid the collar. “That’s what it’s always been about in my family. I go out of town—” and off the grid “—and my bastard cousin has taken over my office. My younger brother has managed to charm his way into the top seat of the fashion houses for Corretti. So you see? In my family, ownership is everything. And if you have to stab someone to get it, all the better.”

“Metaphorical stabbing?” she asked, wrapping her arms around her waist, as if holding herself together. He hated that. Hated that he might cause her pain in any way.

“Or literal stabbing. I told you, my family has a colorful history.”

“You said you and your brothers weren’t criminals.”

“We’re not. Not convicted, anyway,” he added, not sure why. Maybe because, in his heart, he knew he was one.

Knew he could be convicted for assault several times over if evidence was brought before a court.

“Why are you saying this?”

“What do you mean, why am I saying this? I’m telling you the truth. Was what I did that day near your father’s gardens legal? Answer me,” he said, his words echoing in the empty room.

“You saved me.”

“Maybe.”

“They would have raped me,” she said.

He remembered it so clearly. And yet so differently.

Because he remembered coming upon Alessia, backed up against a tree, a stone wall behind her, two men in front of her, pressing her back to the tree, touching her, jeering at her. They had her shirt torn. They were pushing her skirt up. And he’d known what they intended to do. The evil they meant for his angel.

And then he remembered seeing red.

He pushed off from the stage, standing and pacing, trying to relieve the restless energy moving through him. Trying to ease the tightness in his chest.

He hadn’t simply stopped when he’d gotten those men away from Alessia. Hadn’t stopped when they quit fighting back. He hadn’t stopped until Alessia had touched his back. And then he’d turned, a rock held tightly in his hand, ready to finish what he’d started. Ready to make sure they never got up again, ready to make sure they could never hurt another woman again. Any other woman, but most especially Alessia.

But then he’d looked into her eyes. Seen the fear. Seen the tears.

And he’d dropped his hand back to his side, letting the rock fall to the ground. Letting the rage drain from his body.

That was when he’d realized what he had done. What he had been about to do. And what it had done to Alessia to see it. More than that, it confirmed what he’d always known. That if he ever let himself go, if he ever allowed himself more than his emotionless existence, he would become a man he hated.

“I did more than save you,” he said. “A lot more.”

“You did what you had to.”

“You say it as if I gave it some thought. I didn’t. What I did was a reaction. Blind rage. As I was, if you were not there,