you were beautiful the other way too.” She paused to bite her lip, and then admitted, “But I miss your hair. And your laugh lines.”
He smiled wryly. “I can grow the hair back, but there’s nothing I can do about the laugh lines. They’re gone I’m afraid. Actually, it was kind of weird waking up, looking in the mirror and finding a much younger version of myself looking back.”
Ildaria grinned, but then alarm covered her face. “Your tattoos!”
G.G. shook his head. “All gone.”
“Si,” she sighed. Ildaria had known that would happen if he ever turned. The nanos removed piercings, tattoos, and anything that didn’t match up with the blueprint of a mortal body at peak condition. Tattoos and piercings hadn’t been on that blueprint. It wasn’t unexpected, it just made her sad. She had loved his tattoos.
Lifting her head, she raised her eyebrows and said, “You vowed you would not turn. You loathed the very idea. What made you change your mind?”
“I found there was something else I loathed more,” he confessed with a wry twist to his lips.
Ildaria’s eyes narrowed as she recalled Mary saying G.G. did not like to share his toys. Finally, she asked, “What?”
“The idea of you with Juan after I died,” he said, his voice grim. “I’d go through hell and back to make sure that didn’t happen.”
Ildaria’s eyebrows rose and she pulled back when he reached for her. Perching her fists on her hips, she glowered at him and said, “So, you would not turn to be with me, but you will turn to make sure no one else is?”
G.G. pursed his lips briefly, and then grimaced. “Well, when you put it like that, it sounds kind of fucked up, doesn’t it?”
“Si,” Ildaria said coldly. “Loco.”
Sighing, he slid his arms around her and tugged her stiff body close. “But now that I’ve been turned, you’re kind of stuck with me. Forever.”
“Hmm,” Ildaria said, unimpressed.
“And while I may be loco, I love you,” he pointed out, bending his head to press a kiss to her neck.
Ildaria fought the shiver that wanted to slide down her neck, trying to remain unresponsive but it was next to impossible when he touched her and that new life mate magic kicked in.
“I love your body too,” he added, his hands sliding up to cup her breasts. “You should always greet me naked.”
Ildaria’s eyes were just closing as she gave herself up to the mounting pleasure growing inside her, when his words sank in. In the next moment, she’d pushed away from him with horror. “Oh, no!”
“What?” he asked with concern.
“Your mother,” she said unhappily, shaking her head and covering her face. “I wanted to make a good first impression. I baked a cake last night, and I was going to be dressed and wear a pretty apron, and be holding the cake like Betty Crocker. But instead, how does she meet me? Naked on top of her bambino again.”
G.G. blinked several times as he processed what she was saying, and then he cleared his throat and said, “Uh, honey, this wouldn’t have been a first impression. She’d already met you,” he pointed out.
“But I wanted to make a new first impression,” she wailed and could have sworn she heard a short huff of laughter before he pulled her back into his arms.
“Angel, love,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “You don’t have to worry about making an impression on my parents. They both love you. My mother, especially. They’d take you naked, dressed, on or off me.” Pulling back, he urged her face up and added, “But more importantly, I love you.”
“I love you too,” she breathed, leaning into him as his hands began to slide over her body again. “But you should take off your pretty new suit before we ruin it.”
G.G. released her reluctantly, and began to shrug out of his jacket, but teased, “You just want to see my new and improved body.”
“Si,” she agreed, backing up to the bed as she watched him undo the buttons of the shirt. “You do look fine in a suit, but I like you in jeans and a T-shirt too.”
“Yeah?” He tugged the shirt out of his slacks and shrugged out of that too, and Ildaria almost changed her mind. The man was beautiful no matter what he did or didn’t wear, she thought as she climbed blindly onto the bed, her gaze locked on the play of muscles in his back as he