She’s trying to make me feel better. It doesn’t work. All that means is that Claudio couldn’t put it off any longer, and when he saw an opportunity, he grabbed it. And the opportunity happened to be me – but it could have been anyone.
That bruises my very soul. Despite all the evidence of how little Claudio cares about me as a person, I just wanted to feel special. Desired. Wanted.
The hell with this. I’m leaving, and next time I won’t get caught.
He’ll punish me tonight until I cry, I’m sure of it.
I’ll endure it, and I’ll pretend to submit. But the second an opportunity presents itself, I’ll run for it. I won’t do it in panic, like I did tonight; I’ll plan, I’ll be careful, and then I’ll run to someplace that he could never find me.
Diego pokes his head in the doorway.
“Twenty minutes until dinner,” Donata says brightly.
“We’re lucky. Kostya just messaged and says he’s running a little late.” Diego arches an eyebrow. Then he smiles at Donata. “Thank you. You’re a life-saver.” And he leaves the room without even looking at me.
She’s a life-saver, and I’m a loser. I don’t know how I could feel any worse.
Donata and I head into the dining room as soon as the food is ready, carrying it on trays. I had set the table, at least, with beautiful white china that I found in the china cabinet.
The burnt smell is gone. Claudio is moving through the room, shutting windows, not looking at me.
“Claudio, not everyone knows how to cook,” Donata calls out to him. “You should have checked with Heather first. I’m going to start coming here a few days a week and teach her. I’ll start day after tomorrow. I’d come tomorrow, but I’ve got baby checkup appointments.”
Claudio shoots her a look of annoyance. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I know I don’t.” Donata somehow manages to sound sweet and tough at the same time. “I’ll be here at one p.m. I’ll bring the ingredients,” she adds. Claudio looks as if he wants to say no, but instead, shrugs in reluctant acceptance. I don’t think he could get away with refusing his boss’s wife a request like that.
A few minutes later, Kostya and two of his men arrive. One of them is that slimeball Makar, the one who checked me out. The other one is named Andrei.
Claudio sits by my side throughout dinner, an angry, bristling presence. I get the impression that he dislikes the Russians for some reason other than the fact that they almost took me as a sex slave this afternoon.
After Donata and I serve the men, Kostya starts making conversation. “So, where did you two lovebirds meet?” I don’t miss the sarcasm he imbues in the word “lovebirds.” Yes, everyone knows how little Claudio cares for his wife.
This marriage is a joke to these people. I’m a joke. Damn them to eternity...I will run so far away...I won’t even be on the same damned continent. I’d leave the freaking planet if I could.
Claudio answers for me. “Her brother owed us a debt. She’s the payment.”
Dear God. How could he reveal such a shameful secret? My cheeks turn bright red and I stare down at my plate. I slowly take a bite of tender veal piccata, and wish I could evaporate.
“And how are you enjoying married life, Heather?” Kostya tries again.
Claudio raises his voice. “Please do not ask her questions. I do not like her speaking with other men. She is my property, and she speaks when I give her permission. And it doesn’t matter in the slightest whether she enjoys married life or not. I enjoy owning her; that’s what’s important.”
So that’s how it would be if I stayed with him. For the rest of my life. Till death do us part. My stomach churns as I force myself to eat.
To my shock, Kostya nods with approval. “I am impressed. I had heard that you American mafia were getting soft when it comes to your women. I see that this isn’t the case.”
I sneak a glance at Donata. She’s sitting there demurely eating her veal, looking like the sweetest, most submissive little wife.
I can tell that she and Diego have a marriage of equals, but she certainly knows how to play her part. In fact, I think she’s exaggerating it just a little bit, secretly and very subtly mocking them with her play-acting, and I think Diego’s in on it.
I’m so jealous of their connection it makes me ill. I want that. I want a husband who adores me, who values my thoughts, who loves my company. Instead I have Claudio, who sets my body on fire with longing and then stamps on my heart and crushes it.
Numbly, I follow Donata’s lead throughout dinner, getting up to clear the men’s places, serving them first before we eat, bringing them dessert.
After dinner, Makar pulls out a sterling silver lighter and lights a cigarette.
I see a look of genuine anger on Claudio’s face. Did his parents die of lung cancer or something?
Kostya catches it too.
“Smoke that outside,” he orders the guy. “Don’t stink up the man’s nice home.” Makar apologizes graciously, and leaves us.
Kostya pushes his chair back and stands up, and Andrei jumps to his feet too. Kostya says to Claudio “Congratulations on your marriage. Your wife is very beautiful, and she certainly seems to know her place.” But there’s a questioning look in his eyes as he glances at me.
Diego and Donata get up to go too. Donata insists on helping me clear the table, and minutes later, everyone is gone.
Then Claudio turns to me with a face like thunder.
“What the hell were you thinking?” He isn’t yelling. That’s somehow scarier.
I swallow hard. “I was afraid that if I told you I’d burned dinner, you’d punish me.”
“That’s nothing on what will happen now.” Rage simmers in the air like heat from an oven. “I told you not to leave me.”
Leave him? How can you leave a man who isn’t even with you?
“As if you care!” I scream at him. “This marriage is a lie! It means nothing! You mean nothing to me!”
His eyes darken with rage. “That does it.” His voice cracks like a whip, and the air sizzles with his rage. I know that something terrible is about to happen. I wish I could swallow my words, even though they’re true.
He stalks out of the room, leaving me alone in the living room. The minutes tick by, and I sit down on the sofa and wait quietly for Claudio to deliver my doom.
When he comes back, he’s holding his cell phone. He turns it towards me so I can see the screen. There’s a video playing, showing a man crossing the street.
It’s being taken from maybe half a block away, but I recognize the walk, the mop of dark curls.
It’s my brother. And there’s a car swerving towards him. My brother spots it and turns to run, dashing down the sidewalk.
“No!” I scream, in horror. “Please, no, Claudio! I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I’ll never do it again!”
Right before the car hits my brother, Claudio presses a button and the screen goes dark.
Chapter Twelve
Heather
Claudio throws me over his shoulder and carries me into the bedroom.
I’m crying so hard that I can barely speak. He tears my clothes from my body, and I slap at his arms uselessly, clawing at him. “Is he alive?” I scream. “Did you kill him?”
“You are my wife, and I’ll prove it to you,” he growls. His eyes seem to glow with a strange light; he’s like a man possessed. “You’re mine.”
I thrash and struggle as he secures one wrist and then the other, and chains me up with the cuffs at the end of the bed frame, so I’m standing facing him. He adjusts the chains so I’m standing on tip-toe, completely helpless.
“You could have been killed!” he snarls. “You could have been taken! Do you know what kind of enemies I have? Men who are just like me! Beasts from your worst nightmares! You do not leave me, and you do not go anywhere unescorted, ever! What I’m about to give you isn’t even the smallest taste of what they’d do to you!”
“Answer me, you basta
rd! Is my brother alive?” I scream at him.
He doesn’t say a word, just walks away to a chest of drawers. He returns with a riding crop. When he gets close to me, I spit in his face. He slowly wipes it away with his hand.
“Tell me! Now!”
He draws back his arm and then slashes my breast, leaving a burning red stripe of pain, and I buck against the chains, biting my lip to keep from shrieking. “Every time you give me an order, you get another stripe.”
I don’t care. This is my brother’s life.
“Tell me!” I scream.
The whip snaps through the air, leaving another slash that cris-crosses the first. “Say that you’ll never try to run again.”
I’ll run the first chance I get. I’ll run a million miles. I’ll circle the globe a dozen times, I’ll run so fast. “You’re a monster! Is my brother alive? Tell me!” I howl. He responds with another slash, and then stands there, waiting.
“Say it. Say you’ll never leave.”
I shriek at him until my throat is raw, until my breasts are burning. The muscles in my arms are on fire. The strength slowly bleeds from my body, washed away by chilling despair.
Then I collapse, hanging from the chains, and I sob and sob. My breasts are red-hot, crossed by lines of fire. I feel the pain pulsing with every heartbeat. He unchains my wrists, but he’s not done with me yet. He moves me on to the bed, lying face up, chaining my hands to the bed frame.
“Please,” I beg, defeated. “I’ll never leave, if you just tell me my brother’s alive. I swear it. Please, please just tell me, Claudio. I’ll do anything you ask.”
He looks down at me, as if from a million miles away. His eyes still burn with anger, a fire that will never extinguish. “You’re chained to my bed. You’ll do anything I ask anyway.”
He stalks away, returning to the chest of drawers. I can’t believe he’s being this cruel.
A thought whispers through my head, in the midst of my despair. I don’t think he’d kill James. If my brother was dead, Claudio would have nothing to hold over my head any more.
I have to believe that. If I don’t, I’ll lose my mind.
Claudio returns, and he’s holding something. I spot a jar of lube, and something else that he sets down on the night table where I can’t quite see it. “Now you’re going to rape me?” I spit the words at him bitterly.
“Please,” he says scornfully. “My cock is something you have to earn, and you don’t deserve it tonight.” He drips lube on my bare, waxed pussy, and begins to massage it in. The sensation is increased a thousand-fold without the thick curls of my pubic hair in the way. His fingers are firm but gentle, and he drags them along in slow strokes.
My treacherous body responds at once. I pulse with desire, and my legs spread for him of their own accord. Does he mean this to be part of my punishment, humiliating me with my need for him? If my hands were free, I’d slap myself for my body’s treachery. I’d claw my own flesh, I’d punch my own face.
But I can’t. I’m restrained, helpless, and he’s drawing slow trails of ecstasy through my wet slit.
His thumb slides over my clit, rubbing in slow circles. I try to fight it at first, but it’s useless. I’m throbbing with need. I’m desperate for release. My hands are restrained so I can’t touch myself; he controls my pleasure and my pain.
When his hand slides off me, I moan in low protest. He fetches a vibrator and it’s studded, and it’s almost as big as his cock. It stretches me when he pushes it in, stinging a little. When he turns it own, I arch my hips and cry out wordlessly. Oh, God, the shameful pleasure of it.
He slowly pumps it into me until I’m on the precipice – and then pulls it back out. It’s pure torture – my body is so exquisitely sensitive that the brush of his fingertips down my thigh is pain now, not pleasure.
He waits a minute as I lie there, panting. Then he does it again, and again.
I’m drowning in a sea of self-loathing, and begging for release. Tears of need run down my cheeks. “Please let me come,” I beg him.
“Say you’ll never leave me again,” he commands. “Say it like you mean it.”
“I won’t,” I sob. “I’ll never leave you again.”
Because he’d catch my brother. My earlier rage and defiance has faded into hopelessness. He found James once, he’d do it again. And if he can find my brother, then he’d be able to find me, too.
I’m trapped forever in this cruel, loveless hell.
“Good girl.” He rams the vibrator back into me, hard, and fucks me with it, and this time, he lets me come. It’s a tortured orgasm, wracking wave after wave of agonized pleasure from me. I sob my way through it, my legs trembling violently. Finally, I sag with relief, and he slides the vibrator out. I’m wrung out, and limp.
But he’s not done punishing me. He goes to the drawer again – and returns with a ball gag. “You’re done speaking for tonight.” He shoves it into my mouth and then straps it onto my head. Then he starts using the vibrator again. He forces me to orgasm until it’s agony, until I’m weeping, slobbering around the ball gag. Incoherently, I try to beg him for mercy. There is none.
I lose track of how many times he forces me to come. I’m half passed out, in a daze, when he slides the ball gag out of my mouth.
Only then does he unzip his pants and take his cock in his hand. He’s fully dressed except for his enormous, exposed member. He jerks off in slow, hard strokes, staring at me the whole time. I watch him through slitted eyes, too weak to move. When he finally comes, he splatters it all over me my stinging, whipped breasts in thick, hot arcs.
I don’t even notice him leaving. When he returns, he’s showered, his hair wet and smelling of a pine forest, and he has a damp towel. He’s wearing a t-shirt and boxer shorts. He cleans me off quickly and efficiently.
I curl up in a ball as he lies down in bed with his back to me. My husband is six inches away from me, and I’ve never felt lonelier in my life.
Chapter Thirteen
Heather
I toss and turn all night, and finally fall into an exhausted dreamless sleep as the sun comes up. I wake up at noon, aching and sad and scared for my brother. My breasts sting and my muscles are sore.
Of course, Claudio’s not in bed with me.
I get dressed quickly, wincing as I put on my bra. My breasts are cris-crossed with red welts. Today is Monday, and I meet my father in two hours. I don’t know how I’m going to hide my horrible mood from him, but I’ll have to find a way.
Claudio’s upstairs in his office. When I knock, he doesn’t even bother to look up. “Lunch is in half an hour,” he says curtly. That won’t give me much time to get to the hospital, but I’ll eat fast, and maybe be just a little late. I assume Claudio is going to drive me, rather than let me take a cab. Or maybe he’ll have Carmelo take me.
It takes everything I have not to beg him to tell me how my brother is doing, but he doesn’t look as if he’s in the mood. So I drag myself downstairs and sit on the sofa, trying to read a book, but I’m too distracted.
Where did I go wrong with James? I can’t remember how many times I’ve tortured myself trying to figure that out. I tried to set a good example for him. I did homework with him every night in our unheated kitchen. I taught him to say please and thank you and to hold the door open for ladies. I talked about how much better life would be after he’d graduated from college, the great job he’d have, the nice house he’d live in.
And he was the sweetest little boy – up until around the time he turned fourteen. Suddenly, he started turning sullen, withdrawing, talking back. I don’t know if it was hormones, or pent up frustration from constantly being broke and wearing thrift-store clothes and freezing all winter long because we couldn’t pay our heating bill, or the bad example set by our father. Or maybe it was a combination of all three.
He coasted along for the next few years. I tried to reel him back in, tried to make him into a sweet little boy again. I failed. He dropped out of high
school when he was sixteen, which broke my heart, but to his credit, he got a full-time job. He started crashing at friend’s houses, and weeks would go by where I wouldn’t hear from him.
I really thought at the very least that he’d listened to me about not getting involved with the scary mob guys who worked at Capri, the bar two blocks from our house. I pounded that into his head since he was in grade school; I was so sure that he’d learned at least that one lesson. Shows what I know.
“Lunch,” Claudio barks at me, and I’m jerked back to the present.
I head into the kitchen. He’s already set a couple of dishes on the table.
“Thank you for making lunch,” I say, desperate to get things to a point where at least we’re civil with each other. “I’m sorry about what happened last night.”
He just points at a chair, next to his, and puts a portion of chicken saltimbocca on my plate. He doesn’t want me to sit on his lap. I would be relieved about that, if it wasn’t a sign of how angry he is at me.
I take my seat quickly, and glance up at the wall clock. “I see my father at two o’clock on Mondays,” I say to him. “I assume you already knew that. Will you be able to drive me? Or, one of your guys?”
“Visiting him is a privilege that you earn.” He isn’t even looking at me as he sits down.
Panic flares up in me. “What? But...all right, I’ll be right back. I need to go call him and tell him I’m not coming.” I start to push my chair back.
That earns me a brief, cold glare, so I sit down again.
“Who’s in charge here?”
My heart sinks. “You are,” I whisper.
He nods. “Some day you’ll actually say it and mean it. You touch that phone of yours, I’ll break it. Every day that you ask to visit him earns you another day locked in the house. Now eat.”
My father is going to think something happened to me. He’s a sick old man, and this is the last thing he needs. I’m so angry, I want to throw my entire plate of food in Claudio’s face, but God only knows what the punishment for that would be. If I ever want to leave this house again, I’ll have to go through the motions of being a good little wife.
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