RIP ME: A Dark Romance

by Naomi West

  Grinning when she lets me do it. Instead of pushing away, she settles herself in.

  “So what does that have to do with the tattoo?” she asks my mother who is chuckling and wiping her eyes on a dishtowel.

  “Do you remember what the name is that's in the tattoo?” I ask.

  Her brows furrow. “Mary?”

  “Can you think of any famous Mary's?” my mom asks her.

  Alessia's eyes widen in shock as she puts the pieces together. “You made him get a tattoo of the Virgin Mary’s name?”

  “Well, I figured that if he couldn't be a virgin anymore, at least he’d carry one with him wherever he went. At least it taught him not to do it on top of my grandmother’s quilt.”

  “Oh. My. God!” Alessia says and throws her head back and laughs her ass off. I don't even care that she's laughing at me. I just want her to be happy like this all the time.

  The side door that leads into the kitchen flies open and my dad stomps through, kicking the snow off his boots.

  “Well doesn't that make a pretty picture,” he says, grinning at Alessia sitting on my lap. He nods at me as he swipes the coffee cup out of my hands and takes a deep drink. “Got your house ready for you, boy.”

  “Already? Jesus, Dad. It’s barely daybreak.”

  “It’s the God’s honest hour of eight o’ clock in the marn, boy. And if you’d bother to get out of bed at a reasonable hour, you’d know exactly how much a man can accomplish before noon.”

  I roll my eyes but it doesn’t really bother me. That kind of comment from my dad used to really irritate me, but I know by now that it’s habit from him. He doesn’t really believe I’m lazy. He’s proud of how hard I’ve worked in my life. He shed tears when I started my own security firm.

  “What house?” Alessia asks, turning on my lap to face me.

  “I own a cottage down the road. On the other end of my folk’s property. It’s not as big as this, but it’s fine. I figured we’d stay over there. Get out of my parents’ hair.”

  My parents would let us live here until the day we died. They supremely enjoy the company. That’s not the real reason that I want Alessia all to myself and they know it. My folks are gracious enough not to contradict me.

  “Can we go see it?” she asks, rising up off my lap.

  “You said it’s all opened up, Da?” I ask my dad and he nods.

  “I opened her up this morning. And I was over there a few weeks ago after we had a bad storm and fixed a few things up for you. Your mother went over and changed all the linens yesterday when you told us you were comin’. She’s as good as new.”

  “I’ll change and we’ll go,” I tell Alessia and a little flush comes to her cheeks. I think she’s just remembered that I’m pretty much naked right now. She hurries over to the sink to finish helping my mother with the potatoes.

  She’s still at it when I come back down the stairs, tugging one of my old wool sweaters over my head as I go.

  Alessia’s jammed her feet into a pair of my mom’s wellington boots and before we go my dad twirls a scarf around her neck and tucks her hair into one of his knitted caps. The sight of it kind of takes my breath away. My parents all cozy with the woman I love. It gives me a warm feeling. A family feeling. It makes Alessia feel like a part of my family. The way I want her to be.

  We step out into the crisp wintry air and head out across the field to my cottage. It has always been a little vacation spot for me. Where I go when I take a little time off here and there. But with Alessia by my side right now, it feels weirdly like I’m walking home.

  “My folks like you,” I say, looking down at her little bundled form.

  “I like them too.”

  “It’s really something, bringing home a girl to meet them.”

  She glances up at me. “You never have before?”

  “Hell no. Never was anybody to bring home. Not even Mary,” I tease her and she grins up at me for a second.

  “I guess you never had a girl who had so much trouble following her around that you had to hide her out here.”

  We break through a little line of shrubs and my cottage comes into view. One story, thatched roof, set about fifty feet back from a small cliff overlooking the ocean. The shrub roses grow up the side and all through the front yard. A clothesline strings along the side of the house and the linens my mother washed yesterday hang out and dance in the breeze. Alessia’s breath gasps as she takes it in.

  “I love it,” she whispers. I’m glad that I can bring her somewhere like this. Someplace she likes and feels safe. Still, I have to clear something up with her right away.

  I bound up onto the porch and pull her with me. “Alessia,” I say as I take her hands. Her fingers are cold and I wrap them up in my hands. “I would have brought you to meet them anyways, trouble or not.”

  Her eyes narrow and her head cocks to one side. “What do you mean?”

  I drop her hands and pace to one side of the porch and back to her. I throw my hands in the air in frustration. “What do you think I mean? I mean that I love you.”

  She freezes and stares at me as if she doesn’t understand what I’ve just said. “What did you just say?”

  “I said I love you.” I take a step closer to her and bring my hand to her cheek, so pink in the crisp air.

  Suddenly her eyes are snapping with anger and she slaps my hand away. “How could you say that to me? How could you even think that after what you accused me of? How could you possibly love the person you claim that I am?” A panic rises in my chest and I start to speak but she cuts me off, pointing a finger at me. “You said that I was deceitful. Selfish. You accused me of being two-faced. You said I treated you the same way I treated my father. That I hid parts of myself from everyone.” Angry tears fall down her cheeks and she dashes them away.

  “And you know what, Dare? The irony in that is absolutely laughable considering you’re the only person who’s ever seen the real me. You’re the only person I’ve never hidden from and the only person who’s ever bothered to look close enough. And even when I’ve never lied to you. When I’ve never deceived you. Never hidden who I really am from you, you still believe that I’ve done all those things. The Patrizzio curse, huh? Nobody ever knows when we’re lying but nobody ever knows when we’re telling the truth either.”

  I try to take her in my arms but she bats my hands away. “I know what you think you heard. But you don’t know shit. You have no idea that you heard me learning about that dumb ass plan at basically the same second that you did. You heard me learning that my own brothers set up my father so that he’d get arrested and sent to prison. You heard me learning that my brothers fucked that plan up and that one of them was severely concussed and the other one was missing. Is still missing, for all I know.” She drags her hands through her hair in a panicky motion. “And then you accused me, without waiting for answers. I watched my father get arrested on national television.”

  She paces back and forth in front of me. Too fired up to stop now. “And did I have the support of my boyfriend through all of this? A man I’ve come to trust and rely on? No. He’d turned away from me. Accused me of being just like my father. A lying, worthless mobster.”

  She rounds on me again and there’s fire in her eyes. “You know what I needed right then, Dare? I needed the man who held me and protected me. The one who looked at me like I was everything he ever needed. The one who listened and offered ideas and guidance. But instead I got the man that my father hired to watch over me. I got a great big black hole. Somebody who didn’t even act like he knew me.”

  She sags with her back against the front door and she slides down to sit on the porch. Like her legs can’t support her anymore. I instantly fall to my knees to be on her level.

  “You said you’d take care of my needs,” she says as she wipes her eyes on her sleeve. “Well, I needed you to support me after my father got arrested and my brother and my best friend disappeared. But you were gone. Just a shell. You had no
feeling for me.”

  She puts her head on her knees and it almost seems like she’s talking to herself. “And now you tell me you love me? It’s not fair. I don’t get it. And just when I think I can protect myself against the way you make me feel, your father calls you Adair.”

  “What?” I ask, confused for the first time in her whole speech.

  She looks up at me and I brush away some of the hair that’s gotten caught in the wetness from her tears.

  “I didn’t know your real name was Adair. Your parents call you that. And it’s so cute. And you look so good with your shirt off. And your father loves you so much. And you barely fit in that tiny bed last night. But you jammed yourself in it just to be next to me. And I don’t get it. I can’t hold all of this feeling at once. It’s breaking my heart.”

  As soon as the words are out of her mouth I gather her up in my arms and kick the door open. I can’t hear anymore. My heart is breaking too. I’ve never been more ashamed of myself in my life. I stride through the tiny kitchen and back into the only bedroom. The queen-sized bed is made with an old white and blue quilt and the curtains are drawn back to let in the cloudy sun and the breathtaking view of the ocean.

  I lay her down on the bed and tug her boots off and then my own. I lay myself down next to her and gather up her hands.

  “I’ve never loved someone like this before,” I say and her eyes snap up to mine for the first time in what feels like forever. “I don’t really know how. I feel like I’m walking blind out here. I made a mistake when I reacted like that. The worst mistake of my life.”

  I pull the hat off her head and stroke her hair. “My whole life I’ve been able to trust my instincts. To know what’s real and what’s not. It’s kept me alive through some of the most dangerous situations a person could be in.”

  I flop onto my back and am hugely relieved to see that she goes up onto an elbow, listening hard to what I’m saying. I haven’t lost her.

  “When I heard you talking to Dante, I was ready to believe the worst. Not because of what I knew about you. But because of what I know about the world. I’ve seen the bad in the world, Alessia. And I hate to say it, but a lot of that bad was when I was working with your father.”

  She winces, but doesn’t refute it. She knows I’m not trying to hurt her. I’m just trying to tell the truth.

  “You’re completely right that I shouldn’t have assumed the worst. I should have used what I know about you to try to understand. That you’re good. And kind. And honest. And I think I did know that, because I couldn’t stop caring about you. If you were anyone else, I would have automatically put you in a different category after hearing that phone conversation. I would have been wary of you. Stopped trusting you. Stopped caring about you.” I want to reach up and kiss her but I don’t quite yet. “But I couldn’t put you in a different category. You were firmly stuck where you were. In my heart. I couldn’t stop loving you.”

  I pull her in close and nuzzle my face against her neck for just a second. I can’t help myself. She’s just so warm. So soft. So Alessia. I bring my eyes back to her face and she freezes. I remember what she said once about my eyes. That they’re penetrating. That they have the power to hold her in place. I hope they do, for my sake.

  “I won’t stop loving you, Alessia.”

  She squeezes her eyes closed for a minute, shutting me out of her world. My gut tenses. If she opens her eyes and looks at me like I’m nothing to her, just some bodyguard, I don’t know what I’ll do.

  But her dark eyes come open and they’re not distant or neutral. They’re soft and vulnerable and looking right at me. She’s falling into my gaze, I can see it in the way she looks back and forth between my eyes. She looks so small, so lost. I realize in that moment what I have to do. I have to make this easy for her. No choices, no decisions, just pleasure. Just receiving. I have to turn her brain off for a little while, remind her what it feels like to be taken care of, to be adored. I have to anchor her. I have to tie her to me.

  I clench my jaw. I want to tell her that I love her, but that’s just me being selfish. But now I need her to know that I’ll never leave her again. That I’ll take care of her. That she’s mine.

  My gaze skips down her body, obscured by the sweater and scarf and baggy jeans. I’d thought she looked so cute standing in my mother’s kitchen an hour ago, but suddenly, I hate these clothes, obscuring my woman. I start ripping and dragging them away and her eyes heat further with each piece of clothing I toss to the floor.

  I stroke one hand up her side. “I can see you’re overwhelmed, Alessia. You’re lost. You’re confused.” I stand up and tug my sweater off over my head. “So I’m gonna make this real simple for you, gorgeous.” I shuck off one boot and then the other, never breaking eye contact. “You are a goddess. Plain and simple. You deserve love and worship and faith.” I undo my jeans. “And I’m gonna give all of that to you.”

  I kick off my jeans and gesture around to the cottage. “See this house? This is yours now. This is your home as much as it is mine. My parents? They’re your parents now too. And me?” I tuck my fingers in the waistband of my underwear. “I’m yours as much as you’re mine.”

  I step out of my underwear and crawl across the bed to her. Her eyes are wide and her entire body has started trembling. She’s overwhelmed. Thinking fast, I reach down to the side of the bed and drag my belt out of my pants.

  Gently, I take her arms up over her head and loop the belt through the rungs of the headboard. I fasten it around her wrists, anchoring them above her head. She gasps and tilts her hips up into me.

  I kiss her lips and gently drag my hand down her smooth side. “Gorgeous, if you want me to stop, you say the word. But otherwise, I’m about to tie you up and fuck you silly.”

  She reaches up to me with her mouth, shoving her tongue into my mouth and grabbing me around the waist with her legs. But that won’t do. I reach back and undo her legs from around me. I spread her thighs and drag each foot out to the corner of the bed. I use my sweater to tie one ankle down and my pants to tie the other. She could tug out of the loose knots if she wanted to, but I can tell she doesn’t want to. Her eyes are dark with lust as her breaths come out choppier and choppier. Her hips make small, insistent movements like she can’t help but grind against the air.

  I stand next to the bed and survey my work. My cock could pound nails watching her all spread out for me on the bed. Her body rises and falls with her breaths and her hair tumbles across the bed. The golden sun filters across her and then my eyes fall to her pussy, spread and wet for me.

  Her hips rock back and forth and her arms and legs work gently against the restraints. “I need you,” she murmurs. “Oh, God. I need you.”

  I’m on her in a second, caging her in with my arms and thrusting my cock deep inside her. Normally, I would have gone down on her or made her come with my hands first but this isn’t a normal occasion. No man could resist her begging like that. And she didn’t just need to come. She needed me. She needed me inside her.

  The second I’m inside her, Alessia’s body rises up off the bed, her eyes are wide and unseeing, her mouth making a perfect syllable. Her arms and legs pull at the restraints in her passion, but they hold and she remains completely spread for me.

  “Dare!” she screams and her body clenches me from the inside, so tight I see stars. I pull almost all the way out and thrust back all the way to the base. I need to see her. I rear back on my heels and tip up her hips to take me. I start up a punishing rhythm, gripping her ass and pounding into her. A flush works its way over her breasts and up her neck, her head whips from one side to the other. Suddenly, without warning, her back arches up off the bed and her entire body tenses. I burn the image into my brain. I want it to be the last thing I see before I die. It’s proof that I’ve done something right in this world.

  When her body goes lax, I fall down over her, nipping at her neck and ear. I nuzzle her back to life, holding myself still inside her. She moan
s, whipping her head from one side to the next and moving her hips against me as much as she can even though she’s tied up and pinned underneath me.

  Finally, I move, pressing into her and relishing the feel of our skin sliding against each other. I let some of my weight come down on her and I take her mouth in a kiss.

  ‘Yes,” she whispers into my mouth and her head falls back, her eyes rolling upward. I’m moving slowly, agonizingly slowly, but it’s allowing me to move deeper than I’ve ever been before. Her legs are spread and open for me. There is nothing between us. We’ve never been this close before.

  I start to gain speed as the urge rises in me and I can feel her tightening around me once again. I push and push into her, losing my mind in her soft, wet heat. She takes me, her moans and the creak of the bed underneath us filling the room. I’m close and so is she.