Her laugh was a touch hysterical, and she shook in my arms. “You think that was the first time he did that, too?”
“You stupid, selfish bastard,” Luca snarled. “How could you let them anywhere near her?”
“That’s enough!” I barked at him, and Nora cringed.
I smoothed her hair back from her pale cheek, petting her. The silky sensation of the brunette locks gliding beneath my callouses helped to calm me more than it seemed to soothe her.
I stared into her lovely eyes, so that she could see the truth of my promise deep in my soul. “I’m going to kill Alberto for you. He will never breathe the same air as you again.”
And her father… He was a dead man too. I’d have to wait until my coup was complete, my position of power secure, but he would be in the ground soon enough.
I would always protect my wife.
Chapter9
Nora
“Don’t worry, Nora,” Dante reassured me, his thumb caressing my palm as he led me into his awful dungeon. “Only pleasure tonight. I promise.”
Luca followed us in tense silence. After his brief outburst at dinner, Dante had threatened his friends again to get him to stop talking.
Despite the monster’s reassurances, my feet dragged as we entered the perverted space. “I don’t want to be in here. Please.”
I didn’t want Luca to suffer anymore. I didn’t want either of us to suffer.
Dante paused and turned to face me, curling two fingers beneath my chin to lift my face to his. “I’m not going to hurt you. I will never lie to you, remember?”
I bit my lip, unsure what to say. He’d been truthful so far. He hadn’t hurt me with the rope last night, and judging by the way his emerald eyes had blazed at dinner, I believed that he intended to keep his promise to kill Alberto. For me.
My cousin was a key ally, a respected capo. Even Luca hadn’t dared to kill him on my behalf.
No, Luca had witnessed Alberto assaulting me, and he’d let my attacker live.
My teeth pressed harder into my lower lip as uncertainty nipped at me. How could I think badly of Luca for even a moment when Dante had us trapped in his sadistic playroom?
Dante scooped me up in his arms and carried me over to the enormous bed. He laid me down gently, cupping my cheeks in both hands to claim a deep kiss. I didn’t fight him. Maybe I should’ve bitten him, but I was becoming accustomed to his possessive kisses. He would take one from my lips whether I wanted him to or not. A kiss didn’t hurt. It was easy enough to simply allow my mouth to shape to his.
Dante broke away from me and flicked his fingers at Luca. “Stand at the end of the bed. And I don’t want to hear a single word, no matter what. I’ve already been too lenient with you today because I didn’t want to upset Nora. Don’t make me change my mind.”
My gaze riveted to Luca’s, and I widened my eyes apologetically. I didn’t dare speak to him directly, but I wanted to convey that everything would be all right. I knew that the humiliation of Dante’s control—the way he taunted Luca by touching me however he wanted—was shredding my proud, powerful husband.
But I was unharmed, and he was physically whole. We would be okay. We would survive this and get out of here together.
I resolved to keep my eyes on him. I wouldn’t allow them to drift closed like yesterday, when I’d floated in Dante’s wicked ropes; when I’d forgotten Luca entirely and been consumed by transcendent ecstasy.
My cheeks heated with shame at the memory. What must he think of me? I’d leaned into Dante as he pleasured me, and I hadn’t so much as glanced at Luca. I hadn’t thought about his suffering at all while I experienced bliss.
I hadn’t wanted to become lost to Dante’s games, but it’d happened, nonetheless.
I would be stronger this time.
I locked Luca in my steady, earnest stare, willing him to see the depth of my loyalty to him, not to the monster who held us both captive.
Dante gently grasped my right wrist, directing it toward one of the black iron bedposts. A fur-lined leather cuff was attached to it by a short chain—it wouldn’t cut into my skin the way the metal shackles had shredded Luca’s flesh while Dante used me to torment him in the worst way.
The dark memory made me shudder, and Dante pressed a kiss to the inside of my wrist before buckling the cuff in place around it.
“Only pleasure, Nora,” he reminded me.