by Raven Dark
When he was done, he shoved me to the floor and took me again with my legs bent up to my chest, his hands shackling my wrists to the floor. I screamed and took it all, losing myself in his crazed lust.
He was going to pay for this later when his head started pounding.
Later, lying in his bed, he wrapped his arms around me, nuzzling my hair.
“Be mine, Anika,” he rasped in my ear. “Always. Say you want this.”
“Go to sleep, Kane.”
He growled and spun me onto my back. “Anika.”
I forced a smug smile. “How’s your head? Is it pounding yet?”
“Not anymore.” His eyes flicked to the pill bottle on the night table.
“I thought pills were for wimps.”
“Don’t change the subject, girl. I want to keep you.”
“Keep me?” I cocked my head with a grin. “How romantic.”
“Stop hedging. Give yourself to me. For life. No contract. Never leave me.”
I heaved a sigh. “I can’t.”
“Why the hell not?”
“You know why.” I cradled his face in my hands, my love for him agonizing.
“I don’t want to lose you. I’ll do whatever I have to keep you.”
“Kane, be reasonable. How long do you think this can last, without my temper, or my mouth, getting you tied to cement blocks at the bottom of the Pacific? Besides, my father would kill you.”
“No, he wouldn’t. I’d make him accept it.”
A soft chuckle left me. “Oh? How? Are you going to bully him into giving me up?”
“If I have to.”
It bothered me more than a little that I didn’t hate him for that. Irritation swelled in me that he might do it, that he might still resort to strong-arm tactics after all we’d been through. But there was a part of me that loved the way he would do what he had to to keep me. Intimidation was part of who Kane was, and I accepted that. I might have been worried about my dad, but I could see it in his eyes, he wouldn’t hurt him. Not really. My father, on the other hand...
“You’d make him see reason? There is no logical reason for wanting me as your permanent sex toy.”
“Anika, stop it. It wouldn’t be like that.”
“Oh, and how would it be?”
“I don’t want to let you go.”
Impulse tugging at me, I sat up and pushed him onto his back, half surprised he let me. Then I straddled him and set my hands on his chest.
“What are you doing, woman? I thought this was against medical advice.” His eyes sparkled with approval.
But I had no intention of fucking him right now. I locked my eyes with his. Likely I’d lose him for this, but I had to say it. “Do you love me, Kane?”
“What does that have to do with anything? This isn’t about love.”
Oh God, I wanted to die. The tiny sliver of hope that had been trying to take root since he’d said he loved me at the accident died a fiery death. “It has everything to do with it. It does for me.”
“Do you love me?” he challenged.
With every piece of my heart, Davros. I looked away. He grabbed my chin and jerked my face to his.
“Things don’t work that way with me. They can’t.”
“Because love makes a man weak.”
‘Yes.” He sighed and pushed me off him, rolling off the bed to his feet. For an instant, I had the most fantastic view of his toned ass and wide, rippling back, framed by the glow of moonlight through his huge, full-length bedroom window. Then he snatched up his pants and threw them on, jerking them closed.
“You’ve seen what love does to the men in my family.” He walked to the window and put his huge palms on it, head down.
Throat tight, I closed my eyes in horror at the memory of Kane’s father stabbing that knife right through Ollie’s hand. “I know.”
“Oliver loves Danica with all that he has. My father, the mob, so many people in our lives know exactly how to use our emotions against us.” He turned to me, fists tight. “Love doesn’t just make a man weak; it makes him dead. And it makes women targets.”
“I know.” I stood, walking to him. “I get it. I do. But you deserve a woman who knows how to be what you need. Someone who can be like you. Ruthless. Cold. Utterly submissive.”
“I will teach you to be that way.”
“And then what would happen? Kane, I’d have to choose between you and my freedom. I wouldn’t be a sub. I’d be a slave, for real.”
“No, you wouldn’t.” The pleading in his voice almost undid me. Never had he sounded so vulnerable. He pulled me gently to him. “I wouldn’t do that to you.”
“Don’t you get it?” I rested my hands on his chest. “You wouldn’t have a choice. You’d break me. You’d have to, and you know it.”
“We’d find a way, Anika.”
I shook my head and turned away from him to the window. Looking out at a garden every bit as gorgeous and large as the one at his father’s mansion sent what his father had said to me flashing through my mind, vivid and sharp. I turned to him.
“Do you know what you’re father said to me before dinner when we were at his house?”
He shook his head, fingers tracing my chin. “Don’t worry about anything that psychotic says. He belongs in a straight jacket.”
“Kane. He said you’d break me, and if you didn’t, he’d make you. He said…” I paused, shuddering as I tried to get the words just right. “He told me to ask you how the slave thing with your family started, how the Davroses came to own slaves. And then he said…‘He will take what he needs from you, and then make you disappear. He will marry the woman on his arm, and then he will become the one true king of New York.’ ”
Kane put his head back. “Fucking bastard.”
“Does he really talk like that? He sounded utterly batshit.”
“He’s obsessed with making me a kingpin.”
“The slave thing, though. What was he talking about? He said there was a word for them.”
“Oh, for fuck sake.” Kane ran his hand through his hair. “He’s talking about Tamerik Davros. My great, great…I forget how many greats…grandfather. He was a human trafficker.”
I stared. “You’re joking.”
“No. But it was generations ago. After that business had been abolished, some of my family didn’t want to stop owning slaves. So they took it underground. No one sells them anymore, but some still own them, in secret. There are codes in place to make sure no one who would stop it knows what’s going on.”
“Like that sheer dress I wore. The pin Min put in my hair and the collar you offered me.”
“Yes. Typical of my father to try to make it sound like the actual sales are still going on. There're members of the Mafia who adopted our codes and sometimes sell women, but none of them are linked to us.”
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. He cradled my face in his hands.
“My father was trying to scare you. I will never take your freedom from you, Anika. I promise you that.”
“Yes, you will. There is no other role for me in your world when you’re a Boss. One day you’d have to break me, and you know it.”
“We can make this work.”
It was my turn to take his face in my hands. “Tell me you love me.”
He closed his eyes and spun away from me, facing the window. Shoulders tight, head bowed. When he spoke, his voice was barely a rasp. “I can’t.”
Eyes stinging, heart ready to shatter in my chest, I dropped my arms. “Then I can’t stay with you. Not beyond the contract.”
Kane let out a long sigh and nodded.
I took his shoulders and placed kisses on his bare back. I love you. So much it hurts. “I’m sorry.”
He said nothing, just stared out at the shadowed city of New York. The city that would one day be his.
“Come to bed.” I tugged on his hand.
“You go. I have some work to do.” He turned and walked across the
room to a chair, throwing on the shirt he’d left there.
“Kane, you need sleep.”
“Later.”
Damn it. I could feel it again, that chasm stretching between us. My chest tightened. “Kane.”
“Go to sleep, Anika. We have a busy day tomorrow.”
He left, closing the doors behind him.
I ran my hand down my face and cursed into the darkness.
11
“Tell me what you see.”
“What am I looking for?”
“Anything that looks like you should fix it. You have to learn to think like an assistant to the rich, Anika. Someone who can’t ever be seen to lift a finger for themselves.”
I sighed. “I don’t see anything. You look perfect.”
Gala dropped her arms, a gentle smile curling her perfectly glossed lips. “Don’t do that. You’re gorgeous.”
“Sure. Did I tell you I hate parties? I never know what to do with myself. How to walk, how to talk, how to act. Everyone at this event is going to look like princesses. How am I supposed to fit in with that?”
Two days since the argument with Kane, and I still had no idea how I was going to make it through this charity event without embarrassing Kane, and myself. And, now, since I would be apparently posing as an assistant to Gala as well as him, her too.
Here I stood in the middle of her huge living room of her New York mansion, the very last place I ever expected to be, trying desperately to figure out how to play my role. With five days to go until the event, I’d enlisted Gala’s help, since she knew what it entailed, playing a submissive role in the Family. In her case, to her father, but I thought enough of the same rules applied that she’d be able to help. An hour since she’d started trying to train me, and I still had no idea what I was doing.
It wasn’t that I cared what people thought about my looks. Or, I hadn’t cared weeks ago. I just didn’t want to leave Kane wishing he’d chosen someone a little less out of place. His family already tried to make his life miserable enough without my giving his parents reasons to stir trouble. I hated thinking I was jealous but looking at Gala, beautiful, confident, poised Gala, only made me feel more self-conscious.
Gala gave me an empathetic smile and went over to a couch. “Sit down.” Lifting the thick, sparkling skirts of her ball gown, she lowered herself onto the couch. She tucked one ankle behind the other, hands on her lap, just as we’d been practicing. Somehow, she managed to sit without looking the least bit uncomfortable, even though the corset of her dress looked tight enough to crush her tiny waist, and the skirts looked wide and heavy enough to feel like forty pounds of ruffle. She patted the cushion next to her when I hesitated.
“I’m sorry. I’m not this superficial. I just feel so awkward and out of place.”
“I get it. But do you think Kane sees you that way? Or that he cares?”
I tried to sit like her, the whole ankle tuck thing, but it felt too unnatural. She was so graceful; she even picked up her coffee mug delicately. She did it slowly, pinky finger out. I got the feeling this wasn’t how she acted normally at all. This was for my benefit, to show me how to behave at the ball. I copied her, and almost dropped my coffee to the expensive gray carpet.
“Jesus. See?” I set it down before I could wind up making a mess.
“We’ll get you there. Answer me, though. Do you think Kane cares that you don’t act like a rich debutante?”
“No. I guess not. He’s always telling me I’m perfect.”
“Then what’s the issue? The only one you have to worry about his him.”
“I know. I just don’t want to embarrass the hell out of him. His dad, and his mother, they’re both going to be there, waiting for me to mess this up.” I looked at her, pleading. “Can’t he just take you? You’re supposed to be his fiancé.”
She grinned. “Are you still jealous?”
“No.” I answered too quickly, pushing down the knot twisting in my gut at the thought that I’d never be able to have the life with Kane I wanted. My cheeks turned fire hot. Gala’s gorgeous, full lips twisted into a smirk and I pushed to my feet. “I’m not. Really.”
“Right. And if you were any redder, you’d match my drapes.” She nodded to the velvet scarlet drapes on the full living room window.
“I’m fulfilling a contract, nothing more. When it’s over, I’ll be gone.”
“Uh huh.” She sipped her coffee.
I sighed and dropped my shoulders. “Is it that obvious?”
“What, that you love him? No, not at all.”
“Damn it. Gala, how do you do it?”
“What?”
“I’m not supposed to love him. Caring for him is too dangerous. He said as much. But how do you pretend you don’t feel something, be something you aren’t, every day?”
Her eyes lowered, and she was silent for a long moment, seeming to consider how she answered. Pain and sadness flickered in her eyes when she looked at me.
“It isn’t easy, believe me. Don’t get me wrong, I love Kane. But like a brother. Pretending to be romantically involved with him is like…being an actress. Only the movie never ends. My whole life is an act, always having to be something I’m not. To watch what I say, how I act.”
Empathy for her tugged at me. “Is it scary?” I sat back down, closer to her this time. “With your dad, not knowing? Do you ever worry he’ll find out?”
“All the time. Every time I look at a girl, I think, do they know? Can people see what I am? When I’m with Holden, I know, if my dad ever saw us, he’d kill us both.”
I swallowed. “I can’t imagine what that must be like. I mean, with the Gavinis after my father and I, we always had to be cautious. Careful who we talked to, who we got close to, what we said and to who. But then there were long periods where we seemed to be safe, and we could relax. Sometimes life felt almost normal. It must be so much worse for you. You never get to relax completely.”
“Yes, I do. When I’m with Kane. I mean, not when we’re in public, and we have to play the part. But when it’s just him and me, hanging out. When I’m with Holden, it’s wonderful. She’s exciting and fun, but I always have to be worried about getting caught. With Kane, it’s like being by myself. Like being a twin.”
I couldn’t help smiling in wonder at the way she described being with him. That was a little like the way I felt with Fran. It was odd to think I’d once believed Gala and Kane were in love. “He feels the same way about you, you know.”
She set her coffee down and looked at me.
“Well, I don’t know about the twin part. Kane’s not exactly overflowing with emotion.”
She snorted. “You noticed.”
“Yeah, but I can tell, he adores you. In a way, you’ve gotten closer to him than I will ever be.”
“It’s because we were friends before his father changed him. Before Victor conditioned him to believe loving someone is a weakness. We’ve known each other since we were in diapers. Someday, it will change, though. He’ll realize he loves you too, and that he can love you without his world falling apart.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“I am.” She paused in thought again. “It isn’t easy, having to fake things. You remind yourself you do what you have to in order to survive. That applies to anything in the Family, not just hiding what you feel. You literally learn to be two people. You become the Teflon Don of emotion in public. In private, you enjoy every moment you have to be yourself, because it makes it easier to accept it when you can’t. And you make sure those who need it know you’re doing what you must to protect them.”
Slowly, I nodded, trying to absorb what she was saying. She made it sound so easy, turning one’s emotions on and off like a faucet. Like Kane did.
Gala stood up, and I followed suit. She opened her mouth like she was about to say something, closed it, and then broke the space between us. Her long hands rested on my shoulders. A few inches taller than my six feet, Gala was probably the only woman w
ho made me feel short. “Look, before we continue with training.”
“Yeah?”
“Here’s a tip. You’re beyond hot. I look good because I have an army of people to make me look that way. But you’re that, wake up in the morning, roll out of bed and look like an angel, hot.”
My cheeks burned again, and she grinned.
“Kane may not know it because he’s a guy, and he’s a doofus. But he loves you. Exactly as you are. Never try to be something you aren’t when you don’t have to. Play the part of the slave, the mistress, the mafia sub, because it keeps you alive. Do what you must to live. But don’t let anyone—Kane’s parents, Gavini, or anyone else—stop you from being the strong, kickass woman you are.”
I stared at her, a lump forming in my throat. For the first time, I understood exactly what Kane saw in her. I squeezed her arms, and she smiled.
“Ready?”
I nodded.
She stepped back. “Good. What do you see? Look at my dress.” Her eyes flicked down toward her feet.
“Oh!” I bent and straightened the wrinkles in her skirt. Then I noticed a few hairs sticking out at odd angles from her head and smoothed them down.
“Better. There’s something else, though.” When I gave her a blank look, she held up her hands.
“Oh, right. A lady’s hands are never idle. What would you like to drink, Miss Rossi?”
“See? We’re getting there. Now, let’s work on your curtsy.”
I blew out a breath and nodded. Perhaps I would get through this damned ball without humiliating anyone after all. Now if only Kane’s parents would find some reason not to be there, I’d have it made.
* * * * *
A couple of hours later, we were just getting ready for David to pick me up and take me to the hospital for my nine o’clock shift when my phone buzzed. My heart sped up a little. Since my dad’s attack, I’d leaped at every phone call, hoping it was Dr. Peters, calling with news he was awake. This time I fished out my phone from my pocket, refusing to let my hopes rise, only for them to be dashed.
Fran’s name flashed on the screen. Dread and guilt bit into me. Since I’d gotten back from Bel Air the week of the accident, we’d hardly talked. Even when she was casual, I could tell she wanted to ask about Kane. Part of me burned to tell her everything, the way a best friend should, but there was no way I could without putting her in danger. Or, setting off a slew of questions I couldn’t answer.