A Beauty So Cruel Manuscript (2)

by Alone Eagle

  I wasn’t going to cry. I wouldn’t cry. I’d cried far too much already in my childhood. I wasn’t normal. If I were someone else, I might be pleading and bawling my eyes out, but I wasn’t someone else.

  I was strong.

  Salvi’s eyes dropped from my face as they traveled to my bare body.

  He had me where he wanted me, and he looked fucking thrilled about it. Hungry.

  I knew what my body looked like. I was aware of my curves. My breasts were larger than I wanted. They were nice to have, but they were too full. Too desirable. Too womanly.

  I didn’t how it was possible for his eyes to get any smokier and darker. I had thought Vlad was vicious, but Salvi was on another level.

  Savage. That was the word for him.

  At least the beast could be tamed but the devil never could be.

  I turned my face away from him, averting my eyes from his, so he couldn’t see the fear in mine.

  He leaned down and his scent, his cologne overwhelmed me and penetrated my nostrils. I turned my face further away. The smell was nice, and it didn’t belong to someone like him.

  Salvi leaned down, leaving bite marks on my neck.

  I squirmed below him.

  “So fucking pretty,” he murmured in my ear. “So, this is what Vlad has been enjoying, huh?” he mused.

  He wasn’t asking a question.

  My eyes widened then. So, he knew that I’d been sleeping with Vlad? How had he known? There was only one answer. Enzo. He must have told him that Vlad was with me but didn’t want me anymore.

  Salvi’s words made me afraid. He spoke only of the vile things he wanted to do to me. I could sense the evident lust in his voice. I tried to squirm below him, but he had me locked in, caged. My arms and legs were useless now.

  “I wondered why he got rid of you? I’m not going to though. I’m going to keep you forever. I own you now,” he whispered.

  I gulped deeply before my mind took me to when Enzo had reached out to backhand me. I remembered Salvi’s reaction.

  “Are you going to punish me?” I asked him quietly.

  I held my breath as I waited for his answer. He was my new captor now. A hysterical burst of laughter wanted to burst out of me, and I feared I was beginning to lose it. From heaven to hell, and now here we were.

  He gazed at me with raised eyebrows. “Is this punishment not enough for you?”

  I didn’t answer him because I felt his bulge through his pants.

  His mouth roamed over my neck before heading toward my breasts. He let go of one of my hands, so I took the opportunity to punch him, but then he gripped both of my wrists tightly in a single hand, stopping me. His strength overpowered mine. There was no contest. He gave me a devilish smile and ran his rough hand over my breasts. He teased the pink tips until they were taut and sensitive. I hated that they were hardening for him. I couldn’t control my body’s reaction.

  Then his warm mouth clamped over my nipple.

  I was in his mouth.

  I stared angrily at him and wanted to choke him.

  I moved again but I ended up shoving my breast further into his mouth. I broke out a hand from his single-handed grip, but then he held me down with both hands. His gaze met mine before he bit down. Light at first, then harder. His teeth pierced and stung my skin and I tried but failed to stifle my cry of pain. My nipple was on fire. It flamed and turned bright pink, then he switched to the other one. Tears prickled in the back of my eyes.

  I cried out against him again. I knew he could see the tears but that didn’t stop him from doing this.

  Then, he hovered above me and licked a salty tear near my eye that was about to fall. His tongue made me squirm with disgust and I held my breath at the closeness.

  “Your tears are everything, sweetheart,” he whispered against my cheek.

  Then, he bent down again and blew a cool breath on each of my injured, bruised nipples in turn, making them pucker and easing the pain. After that, he kissed them almost gently. This act reminded me too much of what Vlad had once done.

  They weren’t bleeding but they were searingly tender and swollen. I was relieved though, I’d first thought he would take more vengeance on me for trying to punch him, and he would bite me again.

  But he hadn’t. What did I just witness?

  He was hurting me, intentionally causing me pain, yet then trying to ease the hurt afterward. A confusing war of emotion and sensations kicked off in my mind and body. Regardless of fear, my body was reacting to this sick yet sweet gesture. A part of me reminded me not to believe this aftercare act of his.

  Something told me to fight back. I had an idea. It clicked into my mind, but I needed to gather my strength for this one.

  Salvi was still looking at me while sucking on me. I couldn’t have my breast in his mouth when I did this. That wouldn’t end well for me.

  When I lifted my head, his eyes narrowed on me cautiously. His head left my chest and edged closer to me. My movements were slower. I didn’t look like I was about to attack him, so he let me come close to him.

  Then, I stuck out my tongue and swiped it across his bloody lower lip, tasting the blood again, letting it engulf my senses. Sometimes you had to do things with a monster that you had never imagined.

  Salvi stopped for a second, caught off guard.

  I hid a smile. I had him now.

  I had him in the palm of my hand.

  I grew up surrounded by foster fathers. If there was one thing, I knew for sure it’s that the opposite sex secretly craved intimacy and attention the same way we did.

  I wasn’t ever going to be a victim.

  I’m a fucking survivor.

  I had my opening now. I used my body to shove and flip him over. I was grateful that I was on the seat. It was easier to flip him onto the floor. He was heavier than me. He made a sound as we landed on the floor of the limo. I secretly gave thanks to kismet that we were in a large limousine and not a small, cramped car. I wouldn’t have been able to flip him so easily if we weren’t.

  Now, I was on top.

  For a moment, his guarded, surprised eyes stared up at me.

  My hair was wild and tangled. I was sure I had kohl smudged down my face. My skin was glistening and flushed. My hands rested on his chest, and my bare breasts hung above him. His gaze dropped to them before averting back to my face.

  I punched him across the face, hitting his jaw hard.

  That was going to leave a bruise on his pretty face.

  His expression changed when his face jerked toward me again. Now I saw it for the first time. Anger. I had hit him. The bruise already becoming prominent on his face. He was no longer smiling at me. His gaze was murderous. I had just slapped the Don of one the ruling families, and I had no regrets.

  Without warning, Salvi leaned up and pulled my hair back hard, making me arch my back.

  “You want to be a tough girl?” he murmured with an edge to his voice that frightened me. Then he demonstrated his strength and sat up, his upper chest rising from the floor despite my full weight pressing him down. My back was pressed against the seat cushion immediately as he loomed menacingly in front of me. We were still on the floor.

  I stared at him, bewildered. Both of us were panting now, mingling our breathing together.

  “Go away, Devil,” I shot at him, breathless now, but fear was quickly taking the strength in my voice from me.

  He only gave me a taunting smile, and his blue eyes beamed at me.

  I hated him. I hated how his eyes twinkled at me. It reminded me too much of Vlad. The name bothered me. It didn’t leave my mind. It was stuck in there permanently. If he wanted to save me, he would have done it already.

  He doesn’t care about me.

  Salvi’s hand slipped into my underwear, and two fingers touched me down there.

  I shuddered and twisted, tried to kick him and turn away, but nothing worked.

  “Sweetheart. I wanna make you come with my mouth.”

  Th
e explicit words stunned me. Just then, Salvi pulled out his fingers, and slowly sucked on them one by one. I was caught off guard. The gesture, the movement was too intimate, too erotic, too wrong.

  Then, he slid his fingers back inside of me roughly. It hurt much more than the first time. I screamed at him to stop, but then his other hand dropped from my hair and reached up to cover my mouth.

  I froze.

  I stopped screaming.

  His hand pressed down harder against my mouth.

  He didn’t need to.

  I stopped screaming, fighting, thinking.

  Everything stopped.

  The devil was doing things to my body, touching me, but I couldn’t connect to them anymore. My body could feel them, but I didn’t think it was happening to me. It felt like I was someone else now. I was light-headed. That little movement, that little gesture took my mind elsewhere.

  27

  Chapter 27

  Seventeen years ago, Five years old

  “Hey there little Dahlia,” the voice said. “I brought you candy.”

  I looked at him eagerly. My five-year-old self was happy.

  “Let’s play a game, okay?” the voice said.

  I looked at him, confused, but nodded.

  “For every piece of candy, I give you, you should take off a piece of your clothing.”

  I looked at him with further confusion.

  Less clothes equaled more candy?

  “It’s okay, babygirl,” the voice cooed at me.

  I stuck out my lower lip at him and replied, “Okay. But my candy first.”

  “Oh, negotiating, are we?” the voice chuckled at me.

  I grinned and nodded, wanting to please him.

  He gave me Snickers, and I pulled my dress over my head. Then, cold air hit me. I wore my underwear now.

  I felt weird. So weird. This didn’t seem like a fair game. My clothes were already off, and I was just given one candy?

  I opened my mouth to speak, but then he reached out and clamped his hand down on my mouth, muffling my questions.

  “Let’s keep the game going. No questions,” the voice said.

  28

  Chapter 28

  Present

  I snapped back into reality when I realized the devil had stopped moving. Salvi was still hovering above me, but his hand no longer covered my mouth. He was studying me, staring at me intently. His eyebrows were furrowed, angling down toward his nose.

  I became aware of my surroundings and gazed around in confusion. I glanced down at my thighs. My underwear was still on, and he still wore his clothes. His pants weren’t unbuttoned. Although, I could see his bulge threatening to come out. My body didn’t feel stretched out and sore.

  I met his hazy, blue devil eyes then.

  “Why’d you stop?” I asked slowly.

  My tongue felt foreign in my mouth. It was strange. For a second, I thought his humanity was evoked and his conscience had made him stop.

  He arched an eyebrow at me. “You weren’t fighting back.”

  I flinched at his words, instantly taking back my previous thought.

  Then, he smiled at me. A smile that could pass for sweet.

  Was he joking? It baffled me. I didn’t understand his smiles and mind games.

  I didn’t smile at him or react to his expression now.

  The smile left his face. I was still painfully aware of how close he was, and I was still exposed.

  “What happened to you back there?” Salvi asked me.

  I avoided his question like it was the plague.

  He didn’t deserve to know anything about me.

  Salvi tilted his head as he stared at me.

  “You zoned out,” he commented.

  I didn’t offer him any information and averted my eyes.

  I could feel him move closer to me until his face was a few inches away.

  “Who hurt you?” he asked in a dangerously low voice.

  I could detect the threat behind his words, but did he really think I would fess up all my darkest secrets to him? Was that concern I detected on his face? My mind seemed to be playing tricks on me.

  He had smiled at me earlier, as if I would drop my panties for him if he treated me well.

  I knew better. I wasn’t a child anymore.

  Was this his natural reaction or was he acting?

  Vlad would react like this.

  Not this devil.

  I turned to face him again and gave him a bitter resentful smile.

  “You did.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. He pressed his lips together, but he no longer touched me. “Tell me, what’s on your mind?”

  Again, it was a demand, not a question.

  I met his blue eyes.

  They looked more angelic now.

  I wrapped my arms around my bare body, trying to hide myself from his view. I felt so vulnerable. I didn’t have much more energy to fight anymore. I had a dissociation. A hand clamped over my mouth was one of my worst triggers. It made it hard to function after that. It wasn’t something I could come back from so easily.

  Just then, Salvi asked, “How old were you?”

  I knew what he was asking me. He’d figured it out.

  His strong gaze was filled with curiosity and something else, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

  I didn’t know why I needed to tell him the truth about my past. My mind was floating, sometimes it lingered in the past and sometimes in the present. I wasn’t myself right now.

  “I was five,” I whispered, averting my gaze from him.

  I felt him stiffen but he didn’t say anything.

  “I was eleven. I was seventeen. Different men,” I admitted.

  I was astonished that I had revealed something so personal.

  Then, I looked up at him. His eyes were terrifying now. Hard as they focused on me. He didn’t look angry nor surprised.

  Then I said something stupid, that I knew I would end up regretting.

  “I don’t like this punishment,” I said quietly.

  I shut my eyes as a tear leaked from my eye. I angrily swiped it away before he could notice but I knew he had. It wasn’t something I could hold back now.

  The fight in me was lost. It was hard for me to focus now.

  I stared at him again. “Vlad will hurt you,” I said stubbornly.

  You, stupid, stupid girl. Still thinking about him? my inner voice shot at me.

  A part of me still refused to believe he was responsible for all of this.

  Salvi’s face lifted into amusement now.

  “Sweetheart, he sold you.”

  I shut my eyes at those cruel words, not wanting them to be true.

  “I’m all you have now,” Salvi said.

  He reached out toward me again, but I froze, and my eyes widened. A small whimper left my lips that I couldn’t prevent. I tried to lift my arm to block him, but my limbs felt so heavy. It was getting harder to lift them.

  I thought his hand was reaching to pinch me again, and I ended up saying, “My breasts are too sore.” I was pleading with him without him even asking. I hoped he understood.

  The devil paused in movement.

  “I wasn’t going to touch you there.”

  I stared at him suspiciously, not knowing his next move. He was so close to me, yet he kept his distance.

  He touched my hair and rested a hand against the crook of my neck. It was warm against my skin.

  I gazed up at him in confusion, unsure of what he was doing or his motives.

  It almost seemed like a tender act.

  I blinked in disbelief.

  “What in the devils act are you doing?” I eyed him warily, but I still didn’t move from his touch.

  His lip turned up in a smile, and his eyes softened at me.

  Then he leaned in even closer to me, until he was only a few inches away and just stared at me, holding my gaze.

  I opened my mouth to speak but nothing came out. I was stumped now. He
was planning on hurting me, violating me, and now he had stopped? Oh, why were these dangerous mobsters so confusing? I couldn’t read them well.

  I had expected them all to be trained, heartless killers. I wasn’t sure if they did this on purpose so women unfolded before them and they could lap it up. I still stared at him suspiciously but allowed him to rest his hand there. He didn’t make any other move on me.

  He just held my neck and my eyes the entire time.

  I didn’t know how many seconds or minutes passed.

  Just then, the car abruptly stopped, and I slammed against Salvi’s chest, his hand still held my neck. His other gripped the seat tightly so he wouldn’t fall.

  There was shouting going on outside and the sounds of shots being fired. I didn’t understand what was going on. Salvi looked out the window, fully alert now.

  Just then, his phone rang.

  He reached in his back pocket and glanced down at it before answering.

  There was a voice on the other end before Salvi hung up and repocketed it. He took out a gun from his pants pocket. My eyes were drawn to the shiny object and my heartrate accelerated.

  He looked at me again. Something passed between his eyes.

  Stay, he seemed to command me without speaking.

  I made no move to leave, not because I was listening to him, but because I didn’t think I could. My limbs were like lead and I just didn’t have any fight left in me.

  Then, Salvi exited the vehicle, leaving me alone in my darkness. The spot on my neck now felt empty and cold, missing the warmth.

  There was shouting outside. I didn’t bother to look.

  Instead, I leaned my head back on the seat and stared at the roof of the car. My hands limp by my sides. I was so lost. My mind wandering and flitting to places that I didn’t want to revisit. Dark and dangerous places of my childhood. A mental dark place. A tear threatened to leave my eye, but I reached up and wiped it away before it could fall. I was dying inside slowly. A ghost girl trapped alone in this world.