Matteo

Two weeks later

Two weeks.

That’s how long it had taken for my body to knit itself back together, for the bruises to fade, the stitches to come out, the fire in my chest to stop feeling like ash.

Two weeks since I’d been pulled out of that twisted wreck, half-dead, and told I might not walk again. Now I was standing on both feet, breathing air that didn’t taste like blood. It was unbelievable but not impossible.

But before I went back to reclaim my place, I needed to see her.

The warehouse Lorenzo had chosen for her training sat on the edge of the city, tucked behind abandoned shipping yards. From the outside, it was nothing but rust and concrete, forgotten by everyone who didn’t know what it was being used for. Inside, though, the place carried the pulse of sweat, effort, and violence.

I slipped in quietly, keeping to the shadows along the wall. She didn’t know I was there, and I wanted it like that for a moment.

Adriana stood in the centre of the mats, fists taped, hair damp and clinging to her face. She was throwing different combinations, including jabs, hooks, knees, and kicks. I had never seen her move so fast.

Her trainer barked commands, and she answered with the crack of her fists against his chest. When he lunged for her, she pivoted, slipped under his arm, and came back with a sharp strike to his ribs that made him grunt.

My chest tightened.

From Marco’s updates, the first time she’d picked up a gun, her hands had been unsteady. The first time she’d thrown a punch, she’d flinched.

Now? Now she looked like she belonged in that ring. Not polished or perfect, but relentless. She moved like someone who knew the only way out was forward.

I stayed where I was, watching her land a kick that sent the trainer stumbling back. She didn’t even stop to celebrate; she reset her stance, eyes locked, breathing hard but steady.

This wasn’t the Adriana I’d met, the one in heels and silk, all soft curves and stubborn fire. This was someone forged by fear, by loss, by the need to survive. And she was learning fast.

Too fast.

Every punch she threw made me proud because the better she got, the closer she came to walking into Riccardo’s world, into the shadows I’d spent my whole life trying to claw out of.

I clenched my jaw and stayed silent. My brothers thought training her was smart. Maybe it was. But standing there, watching her sweat and work so hard for this, I wasn’t sure if we were saving her life or cutting it short.

Still, I couldn’t look away.

She ducked another swing, rolled across the mat, and came up on her feet like she’d been doing it for years.

My hands curled into fists at my sides. She was changing right in front of me, and whether I liked it or not, I knew I couldn’t stop her.

My boots hit concrete with a deliberate thud, and Heads turned almost immediately. The trainer’s hand paused mid-swing. A man at the edge of the mat instinctively straightened, the nick of an old reflex.

Some of them squinted, blinking as if they couldn't believe what they saw. They were all in disbelief: a rumour had been planted that I wouldn't be out of the hospital for another week. But I had healed earlier than expected.

Her eyes found me before she registered the rest. The look that crossed her face was a raw, beautiful thing: disbelief edged with something like fear, and under it all a hunger I had no right to deserve.

Her whole body changed in a heartbeat. She moved and launched toward me in a quick gesture.

She hit me full and hard. Her legs locked around my hips instinctively, and without thinking, I lifted her.

Two weeks ago, the same motion would have wrenched my stitches and left me gasping. Now it felt natural, as if the body had remembered what it was supposed to do and obeyed without question.

Her sobs were jagged and honest. She pressed her face into the hollow below my jaw and did not try to speak. I let her, breathing the scent of her, and it steadied me.

Hands that had once only dealt damage now cupped her head like they were measuring how much of her was there to hold.

When she pulled away enough for me to see her face, it was streaked with tears, mascara blurred into the skin beneath her eyes, and her lips were trembling.

She searched my expression like someone trying to make sure she wasn't dreaming, and I gave her what she needed: a small, crooked smile and the words I had never admitted to her face.

“I love you,” I told her, and the sentence came out softer and truer than I expected. It felt like a declaration and a promise both.

She laughed a wet, incredulous laugh and kissed me with a force that made the world shrink to the two of us again. The kiss was not delicate but searching and tasting.

When she broke the contact, she cupped my face between both hands and looked at me as if she was searching for every scar and hair on my body.

Around us, the room stayed quiet but alive: a man cleared his throat, the trainer returned to his pad and watched with the wary respect of someone who had seen the impossible happen and wasn’t sure whether to be afraid or to cheer.

Marco stood with his arms folded, watching the two of us with a complexity of relief and calculation on his face.

Lorenzo’s expression folded through several emotions that might have been pride, and a practical worry already taking form behind his eyes.

At last, Lorenzo broke the spell with a sound that was half a bark, half a laugh. “About fucking time,” he said, voice rough, and it broke the room like a dropped stone.

Marco’s mouth quirked the smallest degree of acknowledgement, and the trainer made a small, almost apologetic bow toward us.

Adriana pressed her forehead to mine and mouthed against my skin, words I could feel rather than hear. “Don’t ever do that again.”

I wrapped my arms around her and let myself believe it would be easy to keep that promise. It would not be easy. War was coming, and we both knew it.

I lowered her slowly, but I didn’t let go of her hand. My voice cut across the space, firm and final.

“She’s done for today.”

The trainer froze mid-step. His mouth twitched like he might argue, but I gave him a look that could’ve carved steel. “I said she’s done. I want my wife home.”

The word wife echoed like a claim stamped in blood. No one challenged it. Adriana’s lips parted, her chest rising, and she clung tighter to me as if the title had settled into her bones.

I guided her out, my palm heavy at the small of her back, steering her past men who lowered their eyes as we passed.

Outside, the car sat in the driveway, black and gleaming. I opened the door for her, watching the sway of her hips as she slid inside.

The moment I joined her, the air shifted. The doors shut, sealing us into leather and shadow, and before the driver could even glance back, my hand was on her thigh.

Her skin was hot, still slick with sweat from training.

My fingers traced the length of her leg, slow and deliberate, until they hooked the hem of her tiny sports skirt.

I pushed it lower, exposing the soft inside of her thigh. Her breath hitched, a little gasp slipping past her lips, and that sound fed the hunger already twisting inside me.

I wedged my hand between her legs, pressing against her pussy through the thin under lace that barely covered her.

The heat of her soaked straight into my palm. Adriana trembled, her nails biting into my arm, her thighs spreading without me asking.

I leaned in close, my mouth dragging against her ear, my words came out rough and low.

“You feel that, princess? That’s mine. I’ve been starving, Adriana. Today, I’m going to worship this pussy until you can’t walk. Until you forget every second I was gone. I’m a hungry man, princess, and I’m going to feast on you until you scream.”

She whimpered, her head falling back against the seat. Her eyes fluttered shut, mouth open, chest rising in shallow, desperate breaths. My fingers pressed harder, rubbing slowly, circling fast till her hips twitched.

The driver cleared his throat softly and shifted into gear, but I didn’t stop. My hand owned her lap the entire ride, teasing, pressing, reminding her exactly what was waiting when we got home.

And by the time we reached the penthouse, Adriana was trembling so badly she could barely climb out of the car.