Chapter 10: Obsession Never Waits

The dining room glowed with the soft warmth of golden sconces and candlelight, as if nothing in the world could reach them behind the estate's tall, fortified walls. The long mahogany table had been meticulously set, every piece of silverware aligned, every crystal glass gleaming. Yet none of that mattered.

Not to Adriano.

He sat at the head of the table, his hands steepled loosely beneath his chin, watching her.

Siena.

Her name was the only word echoing in his mind.

She sat across from him in a simple black dress — sleeveless, sharp at the neckline, hugging her waist like sin itself. Her hair was pinned up, a few strands rebelliously escaping to kiss her bare neck. Every time she shifted, the candlelight touched her skin like it wanted to taste her.

Adriano hadn’t touched his food.

He was too busy memorizing how she held the wineglass. The exact curve of her lips when she sipped. The way her throat moved when she swallowed.

She was maddening.

Infuriating.

Irresistible.

“How’s Lucia?” he asked, voice low.

Siena didn’t look up right away. She cut a piece of grilled salmon with calm precision, as if she hadn’t noticed his eyes on her for the past twenty minutes.

“She’s sleeping better,” she said finally. “The pediatrician you brought in adjusted her medication.”

Adriano nodded once. “Good.”

Silence fell again. Not the comfortable kind — not with them. It crackled, tense and layered. Like something buried just beneath the tablecloth was waiting to claw its way out.

He reached for his glass of wine, sipped once, and set it down.

Still staring.

Siena finally met his gaze.

“You’re burning a hole through me,” she said flatly.

Adriano didn’t flinch. “You wore that dress on purpose.”

“It was hanging in the wardrobe,” she said. “Like everything else you’ve picked out for me since I got here.”

His jaw tightened. “You could’ve chosen something else.”

She raised an eyebrow. “So you admit it’s a trap?”

“I admit,” he said, leaning slightly forward, “that I know exactly what you look like in black.”

The air between them snapped. Siena pushed her chair back just an inch.

“I’m not yours,” she said.

“You live under my roof.”

“That’s not the same thing.”

Adriano leaned back, but his eyes never left hers. “You’re not mine. Not yet.”

Her stomach twisted at the phrasing. Not yet.

The hunger in his voice wasn’t lust. Not entirely. It was something else — something older, darker. A need that had festered for years, untreated. A need that now had a face and a name and a daughter sleeping upstairs.

He didn’t want her.

He wanted everything.

And she could feel it every time his gaze slid down her shoulders like a threat.

“Why are we doing this?” she asked suddenly.

His expression barely moved. “Doing what?”

“This,” she gestured vaguely between them. “The dinners. The silence. The power games. You have Lucia now. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“No.”

His answer was immediate. Cold.

“I want you,” he said.

Siena’s fingers curled into fists under the table.

“But not like this,” she replied. “Not through threats and confinement.”

Adriano’s lips parted, then pressed shut again. His eyes drifted to her hands. Her arms. Her mouth.

He couldn’t stop.

“I waited six years,” he said finally. “You think I’m going to let you slip away again?”

Siena stood up. Slowly. Deliberately.

“You don’t own me, Adriano.”

He didn’t rise.

He just watched her — hungry, haunted, and furious.

As if letting her walk away now would rip something out of him he wasn’t ready to lose.

But he didn’t stop her.

Not yet.

Because obsession has a patience that love never could.

---

Siena turned from the table, her pulse pounding in her ears.

Every step away from him felt like walking a tightrope in a hurricane — dangerous, impossible, necessary.

She didn’t look back.

Not even when she heard the quiet scrape of his chair.

Not even when his footsteps followed.

But she wasn’t surprised when the deep timbre of his voice slid into the silence behind her.

“Siena.”

She didn’t stop.

“Don’t walk away from me.”

Her hand was already on the door handle when she felt it — his palm closing over her wrist. Firm. Unyielding. He spun her around, and her breath caught as her back hit the wood. Not violently. Not gently either.

The air between them burst with heat.

His eyes searched hers — for defiance, for hatred, for anything he could name. But she gave him nothing. Just parted lips and fire in her gaze.

“You think I don’t see it?” he whispered.

“The way you tremble when I’m near. The way you breathe faster when I say your name. You want to hate me. But you can’t.”

She opened her mouth — to deny, to scream, to push him away.

But she never got the chance.

In a single, breathless motion, Adriano gripped her hips and lifted her, pressing her back against the paneled wall beside the door. Her legs instinctively wrapped around his waist, his hand steadying her with terrifying ease.

And then he kissed her.

Hard.

Like a man starved. Like he’d spent six years thirsting for this moment.

His mouth devoured hers — no hesitation, no permission sought.

Heat burst in her chest as his lips moved against hers with brutal precision, one hand gripping her thigh, the other buried in her hair.

And Siena...

She didn’t fight.

She couldn’t.

She gasped into his mouth — not from fear, but from the jolt of need that surged through her spine. Her hands clenched the collar of his shirt, fingers twisting into the fabric, dragging him closer.

The kiss deepened — messy, breathless, desperate. It wasn’t sweet. It wasn’t tender.

It was war.

Years of silence. Of longing. Of betrayal.

It all came undone in the space between his hands and her gasp.

When he finally pulled back, both of them panting, her lipstick smeared against his mouth, she didn’t speak.

Neither did he.

But his forehead pressed to hers.

And for a moment, just one, they breathed the same air.

Together.

---

His hands slid down her thighs, anchoring her tighter against him, and Siena could feel every sharp line of his body pressing into hers. The hard wood of the wall bit into her spine, but she didn’t care.

His mouth claimed hers again, slower this time — but no less desperate.

Tongue, teeth, lips — a symphony of pressure and hunger that had no right to feel this good.

Her fingers slipped into his hair, tugging, pulling, grounding herself in something real — something dangerous.

Adriano’s breath caught in his throat as she kissed him back with a fire that startled even her. Her mouth moved against his with a feverish edge, tasting anger, grief, want — and him.

Always him.

His name was a curse and a craving, and it clung to her lips as he pulled away just enough to look her in the eye.

"You still taste like revenge," he murmured, voice low and rough.

"And you still kiss like a threat," she replied breathlessly.

His thumb traced her bottom lip. Slowly. Possessively.

“You don’t know what you do to me, Siena.”

“I think I’m starting to,” she whispered.

Then his expression shifted — darkened.

Not with lust.

But something else.

Something colder. Sharper. Deeper.

He lowered her to the floor with careful precision, but didn’t step back.

His chest rose and fell rapidly. His knuckles were white at his sides.

“I can’t think when you’re near,” he admitted. “I can’t breathe. I built an empire, Siena. I became something men fear. But you… you make me forget everything.”

She blinked, startled by the intensity of it.

“You say that like it’s a problem.”

“It is,” he said flatly. “Because when it comes to you, I don’t think straight. And that makes you the most dangerous weapon in this house.”

Silence stretched between them.

Siena stepped back slowly, her heels clicking against the floor.

She reached for the door handle — her breath still uneven, her pulse still too fast.

“I didn’t ask to be your weakness,” she said softly.

He stared at her.

“No,” he replied. “But you are.”

---

Siena stepped into the corridor, her hands trembling. Her back still tingled where it had met the wall. Her lips still burned from his mouth. And her heart… her heart was beating all wrong.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

She was here for her daughter. That was it. That was the rule.

But rules didn’t matter when he looked at her like that. When he kissed her like the world would end tomorrow.

She didn’t stop walking until she reached her bedroom.

Behind her, Adriano stood in the hallway. Alone.

His jaw clenched, fists curled at his sides.

He let out a long, ragged breath — and for the first time in years, he felt unsteady.

Because Siena Costa wasn’t just back in his life.

She was under his skin.

And if he wasn’t careful…

She would be the one thing that could destroy him.

---