The Emperor (Dark Verse, #3)

by RuNyx

she told him, tugging at...

“Let her ...

he growled, looking up at her, the sight of him on his knees before...

“Let her watch how I’m going to fuck her mom hard a...

Oh my. With that, he straightened to his full height, having grown a few inches taller somehow, broader, more filled out, still towering over her in her heels. Dante Maroni as a boy had been her unrequited; Dante Maroni as a man was her undoing. His hands went under her ass as she unzipped his pants, taking out his hard, familiar length, feeling the heavy weight throb in her palm. He lifted her easily, lined himself up against her, and thrust home. Home. He felt like home. Amara felt her eyes burn and closed them, her body shuddering with the pleasure of connecting with him, her heart weeping knowing he would leave after. She shouldn’t keep doing this. She couldn’t stop doing this. His mouth took hers, her taste on his lips making...

“Missed...

he pressed his forehead into hers, his eyes dark a...

“I missed you so fucking much, ...

Amara felt a lump in h...

“I missed yo...

she whispered, and his eyes roved over her face, as though memorizing her, trying to trace if anything had changed since the last time he’d seen her. The last time they’d been in the same space, tempers had been high and she’d called him a coward in her frustration of being stuck in the same loop with him because he either ...

“I’m s...

she murmured, taking in the slash of his dark brows, the wide forehead, his strong nose, shaven jaw, swollen mouth, his hair that was usually slicked back from his face falling forward as he fucked her. She took every part of him in, seeing how much he’d changed physically from a decade ago, from the twenty-year-old boy who had rooted himself in her life to the thirty-year-old man he had become. She knew he understood what she meant. But something was wrong. His eyes were too dark, too heavy. She’d spent enough time learning the browns in them—how the sunlight hit every fleck, turning them to burnished gold; how night made...

“Da...

she rasped out. He kissed her, silencing any question on her lips, picking up his pace, lifting her higher so he hit that magical spot deep inside her, turning her liquid in his arms. Tilting her head back, she gripped his shoulders as he kissed down her neck, licking her scar like he loved to do, his mouth wrecking her heart. Over the years, he had kissed every inch of her body, seen every one of her physical scars, and lavished them with love like they were the most beautiful badges of bravery. They were her veins of gold, he’d said so many times. Losing herself to the ...

“Fuck, your pussy has bee...

Dante muttered, his own pleasure loosening the filthy tho...

“She’s missed me, has...

“Y...

Amara panted, trying to push back against him but he kept her pinned in place, hammering into her, the door shak...

“Fuck ...

he licked the line of her neck, biting her pulse point, sending sparks of ecstasy...

“So horny, you’re dripping al...

Dirty-talking Dante was her kryptonite. She went crazy when h...

“What are you going to do...

she challenged, clamping her walls deliberately around him as he entered her again. He b...

“Own this ...

he grit out, changing the angle...

“Own you. Fucking all of you. So deep you won...

Fat chance of that. She bit her lips as he lifted her higher, taking her hardened nipple into his mouth through her dress, the fabric rubbing wet against h...

“Oh ...

she whimpered, her voice straining as he hit her g-spot again, and she exploded all around him, gasping for breath, her walls clenching and squeezing him, her body shaking ...

“Just like...

he groaned, burying his face in her neck, his mo...

“Come on my cock, baby. Fucking soak ...

She kept coming as he hit her spot, over and over again, before he exploded inside her, soaking her walls with his seed, pushing in as deep as he could go. They stayed there for a few seconds, catching their breaths, the intensity of the experience still making her shiver as he stayed lodged inside her, his face in her neck, pressing soft, sweet kisses to her skin. This, this was exactly why she had been waiting for him, for so many years. Months of separations dissolved in the moments of connection, so true, so ...

And she saw something in his eyes, something she had never seen before. Fear. That brought her up short.

“Dante-”

“Ask me to kiss you...

he commanded, something he hadn’t said to her in ages, his eyes so heavy, so dark, his pupils and irises merging to make a black hole, absorbing everything that she was into...

“Kiss...

she told him and he held her face, pulling her up to her toes, pressing his mouth to hers in the softest, most soulful kisses he’d ever given her. He stayed that way for a long minute, before pulling out of her, pulling away from her, and adjusting his attire. Amara watched with silent eyes as he left, as quickly as he’d come. Like a tornado without a warning, he’d blown in, shaken her foundations, wrecked everything inside her, and...

She got the news two weeks later. She saw the news two weeks later. Dante Maroni was dead.

Amara. A decade ago, Dante had loved the girl she’d been. Now, he was awed by the woman she had become.

Most people weren’t capable of that kind of love—to give so much without losing themselves. Yet, she did.

Fuck, he missed her. And he had no shame admitting how completely, utterly in love with her he was. If there was one thing his mother had taught him right at the beginning of his life, it was emotions and that feelings were powerful. And a man who denied them out of a misbegotten sense of societal norm was a fool. There was nothing more forceful than emotion,

The address was a farmhouse eighty miles out of the city, deep in the country, registered under the name of one Alessandro Villanova.

He and Tristan watched the four adults in the room, and suddenly, Dante knew exactly what the Syndicate was about. Children.

“He… was warning me. Telling me he had them torture and rape her just to see if she knew anything, and then had her rescued by an anonymous tip.” Torture and rape her. Torture. And. Rape. Her. Rape her. Amara. His Amara. At fifteen fucking years old. All his doubts over the years solidified and suddenly memories flashed through his mind—her stiffening if he came up behind her, her hesitation the first time she’d undressed him, the panic that hit her out of nowhere in the middle of fucking sometimes. Dante had always chalked it up to her post-traumatic stress, well aware that the experience of her physical torture would never entirely leave her. He had had his doubts sometimes, but never, not once, knew she’d been violated like that. The doctor had never said a word about it during the days he’d spent at the hospital, the police report had nothing about it. She had never said a word. Not. One. Word. Every time he had been with her, fucking her brains out or eating her pussy or talking dirty to her, she had never shared something that he should have known. And now she had vanished.

It was time. Time for him to take the throne. Time for him to find MrX. Time for his queen to come home. Lorenzo Maroni’s countdown had begun.