“Oh God,” he repeated, breathing labored and eyes wide. His hands traveled up my waist and rested under my breasts, earning my approval. “I thought…I thought only whores did that….”

I arched an eyebrow. “Disappointed?”

“Oh, no. No.”

Leaning forward, I brushed my lips against his. “Then return the favor.”

He was only too eager, despite his weariness. After pulling the chemise over my head, he ravaged my body with his mouth, his hands cradling my breasts while his lips sucked and teeth teased my nipples, just as I’d done to him. My desire grew, my instincts urging me to take more and more of his life and stoke my body’s burning need. When he moved his mouth between my legs, parting my thighs, I jerked his head up.

“You said once that I think like a man,” I hissed softly. “Then treat me like one. Get on your knees.”

He blinked in surprise, taken aback, but I could tell something about the force of the command aroused him. An animal glint shone in his eyes as he sank to his knees on the floor, and I stood before him, my backside leaning against the bed.

Hands clutching my hips, he pressed his face against the soft patch of hair between my thighs, his tongue slipping between my lips and stroking the burning, swelling heart buried within. At that first touch, my whole body shuddered, and I arched my head back. Fueled by this reaction, he lapped eagerly, letting his tongue dance with a steady rhythm. Twining my hands in his hair, I pushed him closer to me, forcing him to taste more of me, to increase the pressure of his tongue upon me.

When the burning, delicious feeling in my lower body could take no more, it burst, like the sun exploding. Like fire and starlight coursing through me, setting every part of me tingling and screaming. Imitating what I’d done to him earlier, he didn’t remove his mouth until my climax finally subsided, my body still twitching each time his tongue tauntingly darted out and teased that oh-so-sensitive area.

When he finally broke away, he looked up with a bemused smile. “I don’t know what you are. Subservient…dominant…I don’t know how to treat you.”

I smiled back, my hands caressing the sides of his face. “I’m anything you want me to be. How do you want to treat me?”

He thought about it, finally speaking in a hesitant voice. “I want…I want to think of you like a goddess…and take you like a whore….”

My smile increased. That about summed up my life, I thought.

“I’m anything you want me to be,” I repeated.

Rising to his feet, he pushed me roughly against the bed, holding me down. He was ready again, though I could see the effort it took. Most men would have collapsed after that loss of life energy, but he was fighting through his exhaustion in order to take me again. I felt the hard press of him against me, and then he pushed—nearly shoved—himself into me, sliding almost effortlessly now that I was so wet.

Moaning, I shifted myself up so that he could get a better position and take me deeper. His hands clutched my hips as he moved with an almost primal aggression, and the sound of our bodies hitting each other filled the room. My body responded to his, loving the way he filled me up and drove into me. My cries grew louder, his thrusts harder.

And, oh, the life pouring into me. It was a river now, golden and scorching, renewing my own life and existence. Along with his energy, he yielded some of his emotions and thoughts, and I could literally feel his lust and affection for me.

That life force warred with my own physical pleasure, both consuming me and driving me mad, so that I could barely think or even separate one from the other. The feeling grew and grew within me, burning my core, building up in such intensity that I could barely contain it. I pressed my face against him, smothering my cries.

The fire within me swelled, and I made no more attempts to hold off my climax. It burst within me, exploding, enveloping my whole body in a terrible, wonderful ecstasy. Niccolò showed no mercy, never slowing as that pleasure wracked my body. I writhed against it, even as I screamed for more.

Doing this might make Niccolò immoral in the eyes of the Church, but at the heart of what mattered, he was a decent man. He was kind to others and had a strong character whose principles were not easily shaken. As a result, he had had a lot of goodness and a lot of life to give, life I absorbed without remorse. It spread into me as our bodies moved together, sweeter than any nectar. It burned in my veins, making me feel alive, making me into the goddess he kept murmuring that I was.

Unfortunately, the loss of such energy took its toll, and he lay immobile in my bed afterward, breathing shallow and face pale. Naked, I sat up and watched him, running a hand over his sweat-drenched forehead. He smiled.

“I was going to write a sonnet about you…. I don’t think I can capture this with words.” He struggled to sit up, the motion causing him pain. The fact that he’d managed all of this was pretty remarkable. “I need to go…the city’s curfew…”

“Forget it. You can stay here for the night.”

“But your servants—”

“—are well-paid for their discretion.” I brushed my lips over his skin. “Besides, don’t you want to…discuss more philosophy?”

He closed his eyes, but the smile stayed. “Yes, of course. But I…I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I need to rest first….”

I lay down beside him. “Then rest.”

A pattern developed between us after that. He’d work on the fresco during the day—his progress slowing significantly—and spend his nights with me. That twang of guilt never left him, making the experience doubly exciting for me. My essence drank from his soul while my body enjoyed the skills of his.

One day, he left to run errands—and didn’t come back. Two more days passed with no word from him, and my worry began to grow. When he showed up on the third night, there was an anxious, harried look to him. More concerned than ever, I hurried him inside, noting a bundle under his arm.

“Where have you been? What is that?”

Unwrapping his cloak, he revealed a stack of books. I sifted through them with the wonder I’d always had for such things. Boccaccio’s The Decameron. Ovid’s Amores. Countless others. Some I’d read. Some I’d longed to read. My heart gave a flutter, and my fingers itched to turn the pages.

“I’ve gathered these from some of my friends,” he explained. “They’re worried Savonarola’s thugs will seize them.”

I frowned at this reference to the city’s most powerful priest. “Savonarola?”

“He’s gathering up ‘objects of sin’ in order to destroy them. Will you hide these here? No one would force them away from someone like you.”

The books practically shone to me, far more valuable than the jewelry I’d amassed. I wanted to drop everything and start reading. “Of course.” I flipped through the pages of the Boccaccio. “I can’t believe anyone would want to destroy these.”

“These are dark days,” he said, face hard. “If we aren’t careful, all knowledge will be lost. The ignorant will crush the learned.”

I knew he spoke the truth. I’d seen it, over and over. Knowledge destroyed, trampled by those too stupid to know what they did. Sometimes it happened through forceful, bloody invasions; sometimes it happened through less violent but equally insidious means, like those of Fra Savonarola. I’d grown so accustomed to it that I barely noticed anymore. For some reason, it hit me harder this time. Maybe it was because I was seeing it through his urgent eyes and not just observing it from a distance.

“Bianca?” Niccolò chuckled softly. “Are you even listening to me? I’d hoped to spend the night with you, but maybe you’d rather be with Boccaccio….”

I dragged my eyes from the pages, feeling my lips quirk up into a half-smile. “Can’t I have you both?”