A/N: THANK YOU @FunnyPsycho for being my new Italian expert. Appreciate you so much. Small update you guys might find interesting: I was using the term 'fiorella' as a cute-sounding endearment. Apparently, this word is actually an Italian name, not a nickname. As much as I love imagining how it sounds in Nero's sexy voice, I had to change it for the sake of accuracy. @FunnyPsycho made some fantastic suggestions. Gioia, joy, is cute and apparently comes from southern Italy, where the mafia originated. How perfect is that? So, fiorella is no more. Just fyi. Say it with me: dj-YOY-a. Ros brings him joy, does she not? Even from the very beginning, before he knew it.

Also, about this chapter. Was originally planning on dragging things out more, making you guys beg a little. But this scene wanted me to write it and wouldn't take no for an answer, so here it is. Enjoy.

Bring tissues and an extra pair of panties.

***

36 hours later:

door before he can even finish knocking.

The sight of him makes my heart thud painfully in my chest as he runs a hand through that thick, tousled hair, standing tall in a black t-shirt and dark blue jeans, and for an electric second he just looks at me and I look at him, and then I am in his arms.

He surrounds me and I can't breathe, I can't think, all I can do is wrap myself around him, feel him and smell him and when our mouths meet, it's like neither of us has consumed anything in years, we are so hungry for each other that our lips bruise, our teeth clash and our tongues tangle and he holds me so close that you can't tell where one body begins, where the other ends.

We stumble inside, slam the door shut and collapse against it and his hands are at my hips, at my waist, tugging at my hair and tilting my head back so he can devour my mouth, make battle with my swollen lips.

My tears taste of pure happiness, the salt mixes with the sweetness of his mouth and when we pull apart just an inch, our lips are pink and wet, he holds my head in those rough palms and our noses brush together gently, the tip of his nudging affectionately against the side of mine.

My fingers clutch the fabric of his t-shirt and I meet his eyes, and they are the brightest, warmest, softest things I have ever seen. His pupils are so large, he gazes down at me and my heart is so full that nothing else, no one else, could ever possibly matter.

Our chests rise and fall together and we breathe the same air, inhale the scent of each other because damn it, it's been so, so long. I feel too much right now, too much joy and need and affection and pure want, to even be able to form words. After everything, he smells the same.

And then I bury my head against his solid chest and his arms wrap around me tight, pulling my body impossibly close against his, and into my hair he mumbles hoarsely, "I am never letting you go again, dolcezza." His voice is so heavy with emotion that each is word is a gruff whisper.

The heat of him pressed against me is comforting and dizzying and my body remembers him, remembers the kind of blissful havoc he can wreak so skillfully. My skin is alight and waiting for the feel of his bare touch.

What I want, what I need, as his fingers trail a tingling path down my spine and my hands sift through his messy hair and our chests are flush against each other, our breaths mixing together, isn't just sex. I need to love him, to show him how I love him and to feel him love me, touch me, have me, the way we know best.

I grip his cheeks in my hands, the stubble rough against my palms, tilting upwards to gaze at him. "Let me look at you," I whisper, studying those same sharp cheekbones, straight nose, full lips, golden skin.

I run a finger across a faint scar above his upper lip, notice a small dent near his right eyebrow, brush my thumb across it where it dips into the skin. Small imperfections, proof of what happened to us. His exhales fall softly against my lips as I push my fingers through his hair.

"You're so beautiful, Rosalina," he mumbles near my mouth, a thumb grazing my cheek while his other hand presses softly into my hip, into the curves hidden beneath my thin dress. His eyes take me in hungrily, flitting across my eyes, my nose, my mouth, as if making sure that I'm really here. "How have you been, amore mio?"

"I'm okay." My fingers brush gently over his mouth, feel the heat of his breath. "I missed you, Nero."

The rough pads of this thumbs reach out to rub away my tears. He places a soft kiss onto my forehead. "I was wretched without you, gioia." He tilts my head back, meets my wet eyes with the burning soft intensity of his. "I've been working my ass off, Rosalyn, so that I could ask you to be with me, and know that you wouldn't be making a mistake."

I sniffle, and my heart aches, aches for him, for us. "I love you Nero. It's not a mistake."

And then a breathless laugh leaves me because my feet leave the ground as he picks me up into his arms. "Where's your bedroom, carina?"

I point him in the right direction, my nose brushing against his neck with every heavy step. My stomach has turned into a pit of sugary desire, butterflies dancing around my gut.

I use a foot suspended in the air to push open the door, he takes a couple long strides to the bed and tosses me onto it. Resting on my elbows, my dress is disheveled, the skirt bunched around my waist, and I watch him, my thighs clenched together, my face flushed from arousal, and love. God, I love him so much that I might explode.

There's something wild and dark in his gaze. His eyes travel over me, head to toe, and I fall backwards, my knees spreading teasingly apart, so he can glimpse my drenched panties between my open thighs.

He scrubs a hand over his mouth, a small Italian curse escaping into the charged air. In a swift motion, he tugs his shirt off his shoulders, and I take a moment to stare. Oh. Muscled and lean and tanned, unlike the last time I saw him, when he had just left the hospital.

And he's all mine.

As he slides off his belt, letting his jeans fall to the ground, I notice a scar, maybe four inches, below his navel on the left side, stretching horizontally just above his hipbone. From the surgery, I think.

But then my eyes take in the outline of his hardness through his black briefs, and my lips part, and any thoughts of his injuries vanish away, because shit, I know I'm going to be tight. He might just split me in half.

And he must see the look on my face because he gives me a dazzling, knowing smirk. Which manages to make me, somehow, even wetter.

He comes to hover over me, runs those rough palms up my thighs, under my dress, over my hips, taking the fabric and peeling it off, over my head. His bare touch is like fire, sets every last inch of my skin alight.

His eyes roam over my chest, nipples taut and straining against the thin fabric. And then those long, smooth fingers trail up the inside of my thigh, float so close the center of me, and then when he finds the dampness of my underwear, I arch up into him, a breathy sigh falling from my lips.

And then he reaches behind me, undoes the clasp of my bra, tosses it away. The tips of my breasts are hard and dark, aching for his touch.

My fingers tangle into his hair as he brings his mouth down over a nipple, wet and hot and oh, he strokes the other beneath a rough thumb, his erection pressing into my leg. Soft sounds leave me as he runs his lips and tongue across my heaving chest, my legs wrapping around his abdomen to rub my aching core against him, whimpering from the teasing friction of us sliding against each other, almost bare.

And then I push him gently onto his back, straddle his hips, and we both moan when his hardness presses in the space between my thighs. I drag my lips down, over his jaw, down his neck, across his chest, sucking a dusky nipple into my mouth, trailing lower, onto his navel. I run a finger softly across the pale, raised scar that sits above the band of his underwear, my lips following with a string of chaste kisses. His hands have threaded themselves gently into my hair, shallow breaths escaping him.

When I make my way back to his mouth, our lips tangling together again in a wet, needy kiss, his hands gripping my hips beneath his calloused palms, I whisper, "You're mine, Nero."

His eyes, dark and bright and almost golden, glint when they meet mine. "All yours, la mia anima. And you're mine." His voice is a gruff, low whisper, heavy with need.

And then he lays me onto my back, we strip ourselves of those last scraps of cloth, and the heat of his heavy body hovering over me makes me melt into the mattress. The tip of him twitches against the inside of my thigh, and I'm practically gushing all over the sheets, and he pulls away a little to go grab a condom from his jeans but I tug him back, tilting my hips upwards into him. "Nero," I mumble against his lips. "They put me on the pill to make me less hormonal. Don't wear a condom. I want to feel you."

His hand trails a path down my body, over my breast, between my legs, lifting a knee upwards and hooking my leg around his waist. We both let out rough, throaty sounds as his hardness brushes at my slick entrance, bare and unprotected. He presses his forehead against mine, our noses nudging each other tenderly. "I want to feel you too, cuore mio. Are you okay right now?"

I know he's asking because of what happened to me, because he knows, he saw, what Marco came so close to doing, against my will.

"I want you so bad, Nero." My fingers are pressed into the planes of his hard chest.

And so he tilts his hips, slides into me slowly, inch by inch, and we both let out soft, obscene curses because he's hard and huge and I'm tight and wet and the feeling is so intense that I whimper, pressing my eyes shut and letting the pleasure and pain wash over me, his love for me radiating from every nerve in his body. "I love you," I choke as he starts moving, rocking softly into me.

"Ti amo, Rosalina," he mumbles against my lips, a chaste kiss to my mouth, to the tip of my nose, against each eyelid. "I love you."

He pulls out almost all the way and gently thrusts back in, and our fingers tangle together against the headboard, pressing into the wood as he fills me so completely, in and out, and I tell him I love him and he says it back, over and over and I'm crying and he kisses away my tears.

"I love you, Nero," I breathe, gasping as his length hits that perfect spot, sweet waves of bliss taking over my limp, shivering body.

"I love you, Rosalyn," he mumbles against my lips, his hips flush with mine as he thrusts into me, a hand caressing a burning path down my breast and along my side.

And then we're both close enough to taste it, and the tips of my fingers dig into his hipbone, my breathless whimpers encouraging him to go faster, harder, deeper. And then the knot of rising pressure in my gut tugs and climbs and he hits me just where I need him to, and I feel him tighten inside me just as I tighten around him, and we fall apart together, heaving and panting and oh, there is no way paradise is any better than the hot, sweet pleasure of our shattering, consuming orgasm.

We grip each other until the last waves of bliss ebb away into the warm, sticky air around us. When he pulls out, I feel empty, and then he slides down my shuddering body to wipe away the mess between my legs. He places a soft kiss against the apex of my thighs and I am so sensitive and spent that it's almost painful, but in the best way.

And then he wraps his arms around me and I wrap myself around him and our sweaty bodies stick together everywhere. He sighs roughly into my hair, "I might not be going to heaven, cuore mio, but I know what it feels like when I'm inside you."

And we spend the next who knows how long laying there together, in each other's arms, kissing and touching, hands roaming everywhere, whispering, skin against skin, how we love each other.

Those broken pieces of my heart that left with him in that café, they fit back into place with every loving touch, and that hole in my chest that wouldn't stop hurting is finally, completely whole again.

***

A/N:

*Graceful shrug*

That took a lot of energy to write, not gonna lie.

Please vote and comment to refill my fuel tank. ;)

Hope that lived up to your expectations. ❤️❤️

XOXO Ami