The Unwanted Conti Bride (The Legendary Conti Brothers) Read Free Page A

while pretending that her lips still didn’t tingle from the heat of his touch. That she didn’t burn at the memory... “I didn’t mean that you take them without their... Damn it, Luca, you and I both know he will ruin her over this.”
    “Maybe ruin is exactly what Mariana wants. Maybe to be utterly debauched by me is her only salvation.” The words were silky, casual, and yet...for the first time in her life, Sophia saw more than the hauntingly beautiful face, the wicked grin, even the seductive charm. “You would not understand her, Sophia.”
    “I just don’t think—”
    Sophia watched that lazy face swallow away that fury, saw the emotion blank out of his eyes as easily as if someone had taken an eraser and wiped it away. “I don’t give a damn about your opinions, so, per carita , stop expressing them.” He bent toward her, diminutive as she was to his own lean six-two. “What is it that suddenly interests you about me, Sophia? Have you finally decided you need another orgasm to sustain you for the next decade?”
    Flames scorched her skin; that was how hot she felt. Yes floated to her lips, as if every cell in her had conspired to form that word without her permission.
    This was easy for him, too easy—riling her up, sinking under her skin. Even knowing what he was, still she reacted like a moth venturing to a flame. “Not everything has to have a sexual connotation in life.”
    “Says the woman who needs to be utterly and thoroughly—”
    This time her hand clamped his mouth. Sophia glared at him. His breath kissed her sensitive palm.
    Long, elegant fingers traced the tender skin of her wrists, leaving brands on her sensitive flesh. Slowly, as if savoring every second of touching her, he pulled her hand. “What did you think I was going to say, Sophia?”
    She pursed her mouth and took a deep breath. “I have a proposal I’d like to make to you, one that is mutually beneficial.”
    “There is nothing that you can offer me—” his gaze flicked over her, dismissal and insult in that look “—that I won’t get from another woman, Sophia.”
    “You haven’t even heard it.”
    “Not interested—”
    “I want to marry you.”

CHAPTER TWO
    N OT “ WILL YOU marry me, Luca?”
    Not “I think it makes sense for me to marry you now even though I’ve hated you for a decade and chose your brother over you just a few months ago.”
    Not “I need you to save my stepfather from sure financial ruin, so, please, oh, pleas e, won’t you make me your wife?”
    No, Sophia Rossi proposed marriage as she did everything else.
    Like a charging bull and with the confidence that she could bend, twist or generally command him into doing her bidding. Probably with an adoring smile on his face, and the marble digging into his knees if she could manage it.
    Dio, where did the woman’s strength come from?
    Luca Conti swallowed his astonishment. Her loyalty in considering this for her family’s sake, when he knew how much she hated him—and with good reason—was admirable. He ignored the thudding slam of his heart against his rib cage—she was a weakness and a regret he’d never quite forgotten—and gave free rein to the riding emotion.
    Amusement. Sheer hilarity.
    It burst out of him like an engulfing wave of the ocean, like a rising crescendo of music, punching the air out of his throat with its force. There was a knot in his gut. Hand shaking, he wiped his wet cheeks.
    What merciful God had granted him this wonderful moment?
    For reasons all too Freudian, Luca hated his birthday. Loathed, despised with the hatred of a thousand exploding supernovas. But his self-loathing, as brightly as it flared from time to time, to his brother Leandro’s eternal gratitude, had never overtaken his respect for life.
    Over the years he had become better at handling his birthday. There was even a memorable threesome sprinkled through a couple of them. But not one of those miserable thirty birthdays had presented him with