I’m sick with nausea.
“All I did was try to leave!”
Is there no way out? Am I trapped?
“That isn’t how he’ll see it. You tried to humiliate him. If you left, his enemy wins and he’d rather see you dead.”
“If I die, he loses, too.” But it’s a last-ditch effort, a weak retort. I know he’s right, and the knowledge makes me nauseous.
He laughs mirthlessly. “Don’t you see? Punishing you sends a message to anyone else who might cross him.” His beautiful, terrible face contorts with disgust. “His favorite thing to do.”
I stare into the eyes of a man raised by a monster and wonder.
How much of a monster is he?
Chapter Twelve
“It is an honor I dream not of.” Juliet, on marriage, Romeo and Juliet
Romeo
In my world, marriage is only a convenience. We don’t marry for love. Rarely, anyway. Anytime anyone does, it doesn’t end well. Fucking look at my sister and where that brought her.
My parents married for convenience, my grandparents the same, and I’ve known from a very young age that any modern-day principles about love and equality and shit like that were not for me.
But now… now, as I look into Vittoria’s eyes, I see fear, among a myriad of other emotions. She’s afraid. She’s intimidated. She’s intrigued.
And she’s fucking turned on.
I don’t know her past, but I’ll make it mine to know, because any wife of mine will be mine fully.
“Tell me, bella,” I say, intentionally gentling my voice. I’m not used to using a gentle tone. I command an army, and have rarely had any use for bullshit like civilities.
She eyes me warily, as if she doesn’t trust me. Good girl. She shouldn’t.
“Yes?” Her back’s ramrod straight, as if she wants to physically tell me that she won’t give in to me quite yet.
She will.
“We looked into your past. You were doing well for yourself. You had a steady job, you were looking to get a home.”
A flicker of pain so brief I almost miss it flits across her face, so quickly I wonder if I imagined it.
“Of course you did,” she says, but without a trace of anger. She expected this. Probably tried to do the same for me. “And you want to know.”
I nod. Waiting.
She tosses her head. A gentle floral scent wafts in the air, and a deep longing for a deeper taste of her than I’ve had curls low in my gut. I want this woman. I want her more than I’ve ever wanted a woman before, and it’s not lost on me that it’s probably because I can’t have her as easily as I’d like.
She might go along with things. She might even marry me. But she won’t give herself to me unless I’ve earned it.
She gives me a haughty look, her nose in the air. “So what is it you want to know, sir?”
She tosses the sir at me like she’d say cur, like it’s a crumb, but I swallow it whole. I’ll have this woman for my own, and not just by name.
“Ahh,” I whisper. “I like that.” In a split second I imagine doing that now, carrying her to the bed and working her body to climax until she screams herself hoarse. I want to pin her down and ravage her. But no. My betrothed won’t be seduced so easily. I have to admit… I like that.
So I take my time. I bring her close to me, and I run my thumb along the small of her back, noting how her spine softens, and she moves a little closer to me. Probably doesn’t even know she does.
“Like what?” she says, lowering her voice.
“I like it when you call me sir.”
“Right. Of course.”
I feel a corner of my lips tip up, like I’m flirting with a smile. Jesus, I haven’t smiled in so long I almost forgot what it felt like. “You’ve got a mouth on you.”
She shrugs one petite shoulder. “I do.”
I trace my thumb along the fullest part of her lower lip. To my surprise, the seductive pink tip of her tongue darts out and licks my thumb before she stifles a groan. Her eyes widen, as if she surprised even herself.
Fuck.
I shake my head from side to side, tsking. “What would I do with a mouth like that?” I gently guide her lips open. She suckles my finger, her eyes never leaving mine. The tension of her mouth makes my cock hard. With a soft pop, she releases me. I stifle a groan.
Who’s the one in charge here?
I’m mesmerized by her lips, so full and pink and slightly dampened. I imagine what it’d be like to have those lips on my body, wrapped around my cock…
“I don’t know, sir,” she says, her gaze growing wicked. “Something tells me you’d do something, wouldn’t you? Maybe… lots of things with my mouth.”