Her cheeks are pink, her eyes are wide, and her lips are parted around heavy breathing. If it wasn’t for the situation I’d think she was
aroused, and the thought sends a jolt of heat through me. Well, shit. I guess it’s been too long since I had sex, especially with a girl as gorgeous as Jacinta.
“Can’t I?” I quirk an eyebrow and demonstratively pull out a gun. I’ve forbidden her guards to use them in her presence which is probably why Jacinta feels so comfortable fighting them. I didn’t want them to accidentally hurt her, and it seems she knows as much.
Jacinta eyes my gun for a few seconds, but she doesn’t lower her arm and only takes a cautious step back. “You aren’t gonna use it.”
“Why do you think so?”
She looks me in the eyes, pretending to be confident even with her whole body quivering from tension. “Because you know what my father is gonna do if you hurt me.”
It’s true, but I can’t let her know that, so I chuckle and shrug. “But maybe it will make him think twice before hurting my people.”
I raise my gun just to scare her a little-but instead of surrendering, Jacinta suddenly swings her shard at me and takes off into the park. It’s not a bad choice either. All three of us are trained killers while Jacinta clearly has more experience in lounging in her bed than running through the forest.
Just a few seconds later Jacinta slips on the moist grass, but I catch her at the last moment. She immediately curses and tries to push me away, but Hector catches her arms, Marco takes out a piece of rope, and a couple of minutes later Jacinta is on the ground with her wrists and ankles tied up.
She glares at me when I step closer. “I am not going anywhere.” “As expected.” I huff with a chuckle and grab Jacinta under her
arms, forcing her to stand up.
Her eyes widen when I wrap my arms around her middle, and she shrieks and tries to jump away from me-but I’m stronger than her. I grab her waist and lift her off the ground, pushing her over my shoulder.
“No! Put me down, you asshole!” Jacinta immediately starts thrashing and kicking around, making it twice as hard to hold her. “If you drop me, I’ll kill you. I swear to god, I’ll kill you!”
“If you don’t want me to drop you, stop trying to get out,” I grunt when she almost kicks me and slap her thigh, making Jacinta let out a high-
pitched noise that sounds like anger and embarrassment. I kinda like it, so I do it again, and Jacinta hits my back with her elbows in response.
“Goddamnit, can’t you calm down?” I stop to readjust her on my
shoulder, and Jacinta freezes as if genuinely scared that I’m gonna drop her. “Don’t make me force you.”
“Oh, and what are you gonna do? You can’t hurt me.”
Jacinta sounds too confident even in her position, and it sends a wave of warmth through me. The teasing implication of her question and the soft curves of her body in my hands make my mind fuzzy with the image of what I could do to her.
“I don’t need to hurt you in order to torture you.” I slap her again and grip her tighter, continuing on my way to the mansion.
It’s hard to say if Jacinta understands what I mean. She goes quiet for a few seconds as if contemplating my words, and eventually she curses me loudly and threatens to kick me, but she never does. All the way back to the mansion, Jacinta doesn’t kick me again, so it seems that my threat worked-but I wish it hadn’t.
I wish I had an excuse to keep playing with her.
As soon as I put Jacinta into an armchair in the living room, she glares at me and tries to push me away with a Spanish curse on her lips. She looks disheveled with her palms bleeding after squeezing the shard and her hair plastered all over her face. She must be exhausted, but she keeps kicking around as soon as anyone steps closer-but eventually, Jacinta allows Alice, a young servant, to help her with the rope, and I leave them to that.
“Should I expect you to mess up again?” I stop in front of Marco and Hector with a frown. I know both of them well enough to not give them any punishment, but I can’t just forget that they let Jacinta escape.
“No.”
“No, sir.”
They look grim and ashamed, and it’s good. They should be.
“Marco, go to Alberto. He’ll take care of your wound.” I gesture for him to go to the kitchen and turn to Hector. “You stay with Jacinta. Follow her everywhere. If anything like this happens again, you will be the one to respond, understand?”
“You know I won’t stay here forever,” Jacinta yells from behind my back, and I chuckle and glance at her over my shoulder.
“Of course. Eventually, your father will offer a deal good enough to get you back.”
Her face falls, and I can see a glint of fear in her eyes, but I don’t stay to enjoy my small victory.
I have people to speak to in Riccardo’s name: drug dealers, police officers, mobsters, and members of our own clan directly below us. He has plenty of duties on a regular day, but I’ve grown up helping him, so it’s not that big of a deal. I spend the rest of the day in Riccardo’s office planning an airport exchange with a dealer from NYC, so I don’t even notice the darkness behind the windows until a servant knocks on the door.
“Signor Paolo, Senorita Jacinta is asking to see you.”
Huh? I raise my eyebrows and straighten up. Why would she want to see me?
My thoughts immediately dart to our conversation in the forest, but no, Jacinta is too young and innocent to actually accept my offer. She can’t be into anything but sweet and vanilla sex-yet while I walk to her room, I feel the heat of arousal spread under my skin. Jacinta has been nothing but a tease lately. What if she finally decided to go a step further?
“Yes?” Jacinta responds after I knock on the door of her room, and I clear my throat, make sure there’s not a trace of interest on my face, and step inside.
“Did you want to see me?”
I find Jacinta standing on the other side of the room, next to the huge window showing the park and distant lights of other houses in the neighborhood. She turns to me as soon as I enter, and her light dress slightly sways from the motion, pulling my attention. It’s white and almost translucent in the dim light of the bedside lamps, emphasizing the curves of her figure, and something in me lights up in response.