Promised To The Don: The Runaway Mafia Princess novel Chapter 11

Alessia

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The door closed behind me with a soft click.

I didn’t speak as I slid into the leather backseat, crossing my legs at the ankle, folding my hands in my lap.

Antonio rounded the front, tugging the door shut behind him before settling into the driver’s seat. The SUV purred to life beneath us.

We pulled out, flanked on all sides. Two black SUVs, identical to ours, one leading, one tailing, their windows blacker than ebony. A convoy for a Capone.

But all I could feel was the space between me and Antonio.

Antonio Rossi showed up at the Capone estate about six months ago as a driver, of all things. My father’s newest hire. He used to pick me up from school, open my door, keep his eyes respectfully lowered like a good soldier.

He always looked annoyingly perfect doing the most mundane things, parking the car, adjusting his cuffs, standing silent in the hallway like he’d been born to be watched.

Which, of course, made me watch him.

And watching turned into wondering.

And wondering turned into wanting.

Naturally.

So I pulled a few strings and had him reassigned. My old bodyguard was a fossil, slow, dull, practically asleep on his feet. Antonio Rossi was anything but.

He never said a word about it, never let a single thought slip, but I knew. I could feel it in the way his jaw tightened when I brushed too close, the way his eyes dropped just a fraction too late. He wanted me. He just wasn’t stupid enough to admit it.

I wore dresses that pushed the definition of “appropriate” and watched his jaw tighten in the rearview mirror. I handed him my purse in public like he was nothing more than my personal valet. I leaned close enough that my perfume clung to his collar long after I was gone.

I wasn’t subtle, and I didn’t have to be. He was a man. Eventually, he’d break. They always do.

I tilted my head, lips curling in a soft smile that I knew looked anything but innocent, “So,” I drawled, “did you like the dress?”

No response. I watched him. The sharp line of his profile, the cut-glass edge of his cheekbones, the way his throat flexed when he swallowed.

“I asked you a question, Antonio.”

His hands stayed glued to the wheel, knuckles tightening against the leather, veins pulling tight across the backs of his hands. He didn’t turn his head, didn’t risk it. A soldier to the bone, disciplined, contained, locked down.

And I… I couldn’t resist pressing harder.

I leaned forward from the backseat, the silk of my skirt whispering over my thighs. The leather sighed beneath me as I moved closer, close enough to feel the current rolling off him.

“It’s Chanel,” I murmured, my fingers skimmed the center console, resting lightly on the stitched leather between us, “Custom. Isabella said it was too… grown-up for a seventeen year old. ”

He glanced at me from the rearview mirror, just once.

“You wore that for him?” he asked, voice rough.

The corner of my mouth lifted, lazily, “No.”

Another glance, this one slower, like he couldn’t help himself, like the mirror wasn’t enough but it was all he’d allow.

My hand slipped from the console, brushing over his forearm where it rested on the gearshift. Hard muscle locked in place. His whole body went tense.

“You haven’t said a word about my hair,” I mused, fingers drifting to the soft ends pinned at the nape of my neck. I tilted my head just enough for him to catch the movement in the mirror. “Or my lipstick. Or the heels you nearly snapped that guy’s fingers over when he stared too long at them.”

“Alessia,” he warned.

“I asked you a question, Antonio. Did you like the dress?”

He exhaled through his nose and said nothing. So I slid even closer, just enough that my knees brushed the console and the scent of my perfume bled into his airspace. I reached up, and let my fingers graze the back of his neck, just below the hairline.

The effect was instant. He stiffened under my touch like a man struck.

“Alessia,” he growled. “Stop.”

I didn’t.

I dragged my nails gently up into his hair, twisting one dark curl around my finger, “Why?”

“Because you don’t mean it.”

I smiled, “You’re so sure?”

He didn’t answer but his hands tightened on the wheel again. I leaned in further, close enough to brush my lips against the shell of his ear.

“Tell me no,” I whispered.

His throat worked. The SUV hummed beneath us, carrying us through the Chicago night, but he stayed silent. He didn’t say it. He didn’t push me away.

I sat back slowly, victory curling on my lips as I caught his eyes in the mirror. “That’s what I thought.”

Leaning into the seat, I let my skirt slide higher, silk slipping up my thigh until I knew he could see it. Until I knew he had no choice but to look.

And he did. He always did.

“You’re quiet tonight,” I said, “Usually you’re so talkative.”

His eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, annoyed. That signature glare of his.

It only made me smile. The corner of my mouth tugged upward, amused. He never talked, not unless spoken to, not unless it was necessary but teasing him was just too easy. And God, he made silence look good.

“Come on,” I whispered, drawing out the syllables. I leaned in again, closing the space between us, I trailed one finger up the seam of his jacket sleeve, slowly, until I found his wrist, “Do you like the lipstick?” I asked softly, “It’s new. I picked it just for tonight.”

He inhaled sharply through his nose. “I noticed.”

“And?”

His grip flexed on the wheel, “It’s distracting.”

“Good,” I let my hand fall to his thigh for just a second. “You deserve to be distracted.”

“Alessia,” his voice was tight now, “If you keep doing that, I’m going to—”

“What?” I whispered, eyes bright. “Pull over?”

He shot me a look then, a full one, not through the mirror. He turned, just enough to face me fully, “If someone caught that... they’d kill me.”

I blinked.

“Your father would put a bullet in my head before I could explain. Salvatore wouldn’t even ask why. And your fiancé...” he trailed off, scoffing under his breath. “You know exactly what Rino would do.”

I rested my chin lightly on his shoulder, smiling against the tension radiating from him. “I don’t care.”

“You should,” he said tightly.

“I don’t.”

His jaw flexed, eyes fixed ahead, refusing to give me another inch. “This is dangerous.”

I let my lips curl into a slow smile. “So are you.”

“Alessia,” his warning came out rougher.

I slid my hand across his arm again, slower this time, “He kissed her, Antonio.”

I watched his lips press into a hard line, the muscle in his jaw ticking.

“I had to sit there and watch while he shoved his tongue down her throat just to humiliate me. And I smiled. I played the part. I didn’t make a scene but it burned.”

His knuckles tightened against the wheel, veins straining under his skin.

“I want to get even.”

“Stop,” he rasped. “You don’t mean this. You’re angry—”

“I want a kiss.”

He froze.

“Alessia—”

“I want a kiss, Antonio," my tone slipped into a whine, petulant and demanding. I didn’t sound soft anymore.

“I’m not asking for forever,” I said. “I’m asking for a moment, something that’s mine. Something that doesn’t belong to the Lombardis.”

He just shook his head like I was out of my mind, so I said it again, softer this time.

“I want a kiss.”

For a heartbeat, I swore he’d drag me over the console and kiss me like he’d been dying to all along.

But he didn’t.

“I’ll kiss you,” he said at last.

My heart stopped.

“But not tonight.”

I swallowed, “Then when?”

His eyes flicked to me, dark, “On your eighteenth birthday.”

I blinked, “What?”

“That’s when I’ll touch you,” he said, like it cost him something to hold it there, “That’s when I’ll let myself want the things I’m not allowed to want now.”

His jaw clenched.

“But not before, because you deserve a man who knows the difference between power and consent. And I will not be one more hand that takes something from you before it’s yours to give.”

My heart thudded.

“You’ll be eighteen. You’ll be mine... if you want to be. But if you ask me again before then...”

He exhaled like he was burning from the inside.

“...I’ll drive us into a wall just to stop myself.”

I sank slowly back into the leather seat, pulse fluttering at my throat, and he looked at me, one glance, one deep, searing look in the rearview mirror.

It scorched all the way down.

I didn’t say another word the rest of the drive but I smiled.

And I counted down the days.

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