Matteo thanks them for coming and escorts them out, and I slump back in my chair, trying to hold on to the warm glow of their friendliness for a little while longer. It was surprisingly kind of Matteo to invite the women over to talk to me.
His kindness makes me wonder why he’s so harsh most of the time. Maybe it’s the way he was raised, and he just doesn’t know any other way to be.
And perhaps this is his way of apologizing without actually saying sorry, which is not something I could ever imagine him doing. He’s saying sorry with actions rather than words. He has let me out of my house-cleaning duties for the last couple of days, and he cares enough about my happiness to try to show me what my future could look like. He wants me to understand that Peredyshka marriages can be not just bearable, but wonderful. They are in loving families; they each have their roles and are happy in them.
He wants me to think that’s going to be us.
It makes me genuinely sad to know it’s never going to happen. That’s not our future. I’ll keep acting my little heart out and I will escape at the first opportunity. And instead of eating the delicious meals that I prepare for him, he’ll be choking down prison food when he’s convicted of kidnapping me.
I force a smile onto my face for him, though, when he returns.
Chapter 14
Natasha
He leads me by the hand up the stairs. A door opens and Concetta steps out – and then sees us, and the look on her face could curdle milk. She vanishes back into her room, shutting the door. It’s like cold water being dumped on my head, and I tense up and look away.
“Forget her,” Matteo says to me. “Only think of me.”
“I’m trying.” My voice quavers a little, because every time I see her it hurts my heart, but instead of getting mad, he squeezes my hand gently.
He leads me into his bedroom and shuts the door firmly. “The women really liked you,” he says to me. “You’ll fit right in here. You can see how happy they are, can’t you?”
“Yes. And they were very nice,” I murmur. I glance up at him. “Thank you for inviting them. I really appreciate you doing that for me.”
“My friends said that you cook like a native.” He beams at me, and I’m so happy that I made him proud. “After the wedding, you’re welcome to invite them over whenever you like.” I could focus on the fact that apparently I am not allowed to go over to their houses, that I am still a prisoner, no matter how lovely my cage. But I don’t.
This has been a such a nice evening, the best one since I’ve been here. I just want to enjoy what little happiness I can, for what little time I can, before I go back to being an exhausted house-cleaning slave who disappoints Matteo every night.
House-cleaning – I remember what I told the women earlier, and my stomach clenches with worry.
“I should tell you something. One of the women asked me about the rash on my arm, and I told her it came from a cleaning product that splashed on me when I was cleaning. She looked very surprised.”
I see him wince.
“In fact they all were pretty surprised by the fact that I am the one who cleans the house. Should I not have told them?”
I brace myself for his response. He hesitates for a long moment. “This is an unusual time, and you are just getting used to the rules. It’s fine.” He looks at me again. “You had a nice time?” There is actually a note of hopefulness in his voice. This is one of the few times when he has indicated that he cares at all what I think or feel or want.
“I had a very nice time. Thank you”
“I wanted to reward you for how hard you are working and how quickly you are coming around.” He raises his voice a little when he says it, even though there’s no one there with us.
“I am trying as hard as I can. I know I don’t always succeed.” I am not lying when I say that I’m trying as hard as I can. If I don’t, that means that I am spanked, whipped, suffocated, or shocked with electricity.
He swings his arm around my shoulders and pulls me up against him, and it feels so natural. So normal. When he’s like this, he doesn’t have to force anything – I actually want to be right here, in his arms, more than anywhere else on Earth. I relax into his embrace, resting my head on his shoulder, eyes closed. This is Heaven, wrapped in his warmth, supported by his strength, and breathing in his clean, masculine scent.
We are silent for a while, our breaths falling into a rhythm, until my thoughts inevitably drift back to my family and what they must be going through right now.
“What are you thinking?” he asks softly. He must have felt my body start to tense. It’s impossible to get anything past him, which is very frightening.
I give him a version of the truth, because I can’t tell him how worried I am about my parents. “I’m thinking how different our two families are. I mean my adoptive family and your family.”
“Not so different, from what I’ve seen,” he says. “They’re both dedicated to a greater good. The individual is not as important as the whole. They enjoy many privileges, but also make many sacrifices for a cause larger than themselves.”
“I never looked at it that way before.” I don’t say aloud what I’m thinking. What I’m thinking is that being in service to my father’s political ambitions at least meant I was in the service of something good and positive.
My father – I will always think of him that way, despite the cruel truth of my birth – does everything he can to make our district a better place. He helps to pass laws that increase the penalty for violent crime. He drafts legislation that encourage business to come to our state. What do the Rossis do? Shady, illegal things – some kind of illegal transportation of contraband – and they kidnap babies.
I am growing gloomy again, my mind going to a dark place. He seems to sense it, but he doesn’t chastise me.
Matteo looks at me. “I know what our family does may feel different to you,” he says. It’s as if he’s in tune with my feelings. As if we’re really a couple.
“Well, somewhat,” I say cautiously.
“Your adoptive family is all about law and order. So is mine, in our own way. The movement of, shall we say, unsanctioned goods across borders will never cease. It’s as old as cities and laws. We regulate it. We ensure that violence doesn’t spill out into the streets. We keep it within the families, and the only people who are harmed are those who try to steal from or cheat us. We police our territories, we drive out burglars and drug-dealers. Crime is actually lower everywhere we operate.” When he puts it like that, it sounds…well, not exactly noble, but understandable.
He glances down at the rash on my arm. “You should wear long sleeves.”
Resentment starts to fizzle inside me again. “I get too hot.”
The look that crosses his face is very strange. Conflicted. “I’ll turn up the air conditioning,” he says finally. Then he gives me a fond smile.
“Hey,” he says. “I think you’re pretty terrific. I’m glad you’re my Peredyshka.”
“Are you?” I say, a little wistfully. “I’m not good at the things you want me to be good at. Wouldn’t you have picked someone else if you could?”
“Oh no,” he says fervently. “The second I saw your picture, it was like a lightning bolt hit me. I thought, that’s the one.”
I’ve never been special to anyone before. Useful, yes, but not special. It’s not that I wanted to be kidnapped and taken prisoner, but the fact that he chose me still feels good. “Oh. That’s very sweet.”
“And very true.”
He bends down and kisses me, and I return it with more hunger and fervor that I have since the day I first arrived.
When we finish, I looked up at him shyly. I want to be good for him. I want to keep feeling like this, bathed in his love and approval – up until the day I escape. “What is something I could do that would please you right now?” I ask, and I mean it, a hundred percent. I’m not acting. I want to make him come; I want to be his good little girl.
He grins at me. “Well, asking me that question is an excellent start. Something that turns me on, as a man with sadistic tendencies, is to see my woman endure pain simply because she knows it gives me pleasure.”
“All right,” I say with a quaver in my voice. “Do anything you want to me. I won’t complain and I won’t beg you to stop.”
“I wouldn’t stop anyway.” His voice has turned cruel and there is that gleam in his eyes. “But watching you struggle not to cry out in pain will excite me and please me a great deal.”
He caresses my cheek with his thumb. I close my eyes and I can’t suppress a shiver of fear. What have I just done?
He pulls my dress off over my head, then strips off my panties and bra as I stand there shivering.
“Lie face down on the bed.”
I obey him quickly.
“Have I ever told you what a beautiful ass you have?” He bends down and bites it, and I give a little yelp of pain – but it’s pleasure-pain. He does it again, and I clutch the bedspread, letting out a moan. He’s right. Enduring the pain to give him pleasure feels good. Sort of like the endorphin rush of exercise.
Then he spreads open my cheeks with his hand and traces his finger down the juncture between my buttocks, stopping when he reaches my rear entrance.
When his finger probes it, I start. “You’re not going to…?”
His voice is coated with cruelty and glee. “Oh, I most certainly am.”
I instantly forget my earlier promise not to beg. “Please don’t! You’re huge – you’ll tear me open!”
He leans over to the nightstand and rummages in there and pulls out a large plug with a flared base. “That’s why I’m going to stretch you out first.”
Panic blooms inside me, but also a strange acceptance. I have no choice. That makes it easier.
He takes a bottle of lubricant from the drawer and drips it on my rectum.
“Amaretto flavor,” he says, then to my shock he leans down and licks me there. I suck in a breath of surprise. I’m extremely sensitive back there, and that gentle touch sends pulses of pleasure throbbing through my body.
He opens my legs and strokes me with his tongue from behind, moving his fingers so he’s pressing his thumb against my clit as well. One finger slides inside my heated sex, and he strokes my inner wall.
“Oh God,” I gasp aloud. He knows exactly where to touch, how much pressure to apply, how fast to move. He’s like a conductor, and my body is his symphony. My flesh grows more and more sensitive as he laps at me and strokes, and I clench the comforter with my fists, helpless beneath his tongue.
He senses my impending climax and slows, which makes me utter a strangled cry of protest.
“Matteo, please!” I beg. “Please let me come!” I’m burning up from the inside out, so desperate for release that I’m not even embarrassed to say the words.
He laughs, and I feel his hot breath fan the wet folds of my…my pussy. “I love hearing you beg.” And, deliberately, he lightens the pressure and slows down even more as he strokes me.
“You’re such a bastard!” Need makes me bold. And he laughs again – a rich, warm sound.
“Yes, I am. But I’m your bastard, princess. All yours.” And he goes fast and then slow and then fast, drawing it out until I’m begging and crying, the pleasure so intense it hurts. And finally he lets me come, stroking and licking until a tidal wave of pleasure crashes down on me and I’m sobbing into the crook of my arm with agonized relief.
All too soon, he’s spreading my cheeks open, lubing me up again, and this time forcing his finger past my clenching rear hole. One finger, two, three.
I whimper as he probes me with lubricated fingers. When he spreads them out, it hurts, and fear blooms inside my chest. That’s just his fingers; what’s it going to feel like when his thick manhood is inside me?
“Relax, or it will hurt more.” The cruel glee in his voice makes me shudder, and I know that whatever comes next, no matter how painful, I won’t be able to stop it.
He withdraws his fingers, then the tip of the rubber plug presses against me. He forces it past the tight ring of muscle, overcoming all resistance, until it’s inside me, stretching me out. It really hurts; it burns, and I squirm on the bed as he strokes the small of my back.
Then he just sits there, in silence, watching me. The seconds drag on, and I can’t concentrate on anything else. “It’s hurting me,” I say tearfully.
“Yes, I would imagine. For complaining, you can get up and walk back and forth across the room three times.”
Tears spill down my cheeks as I obey. It’s horribly awkward walking with that foreign thing up inside me, and I limp with every step. Matteo sits on the bed and watches me, his lips curved in a cruel smile. There’s something both terrifying and thrilling about the change that comes over him when he’s like this. Nothing I say will reach him; nothing will make the pain stop.
But I’m enduring it. I’m stronger than I ever realized before, and I’m proud of myself. And the pain is starting to fade, I realize. He can see it on my face.
“Lie down again.”
His voice has seized control of me, and like a puppet, I obey. I’m terrified of what’s going to come next, and when he slides the plug out of me, I can’t stop myself from tensing up again. This time it’s the head of his cock nudging up against my entrance, and pain flares again as he forces himself inside me with one brutal thrust.
“No!” I choke out, but he grabs my hips and thrusts, and he’s halfway in, and my inner tunnel is on fire.
“Matteo, please!”
A few more hard pumps, and he’s all the way inside me, his pubic hair tickling my buttocks, and my inner tunnel is on fire.
“Oh God, it hurts,” I moan.
“And?” he sneers, and he pulls halfway out and then slams into me. “Do you want me to stop? Is that what you want? Are you too weak?”
“No. I can take it.” I choke on the words. “For you.”
My breaths come out in sobs, and tears are running down my cheeks. I can do this, I can do this. My pain tolerance is increasing because of all his punishments. I’m learning to ride the waves of pain, to somehow surf along the red haze of agony, knowing that it will eventually ease.
Matteo’s groans of arousal as he pumps into me are starting to turn me on as well. Every thrust is painful and yet, impossibly, pleasure is starting to flow through me again.
“I love fucking your ass, baby.” His harsh voice strokes hidden inner flames. “So tight. It feels so good. I can’t wait to fuck your pussy on our wedding night, to make you mine.”
“Yes, Matteo,” I gasp. I struggle to make myself to relax, I concentrate on loosening my muscles, and it helps a tiny bit.
“Good girl,” he grunts, pistoning into me. “You’re being so good for me.”
He slides his hand around to stroke me, and I gasp. The pleasure is distracting me from the pain, overwhelming it, and soon all I can do is lie there and moan as he pumps harder and harder and never stops moving his finger on my little pink button.
My orgasm sneaks up on me and rolls through my body, sending liquid waves of pleasure washing through every part of me. My sobs now are not from pain but from helpless pleasure, too much sensation – I’m crying and crying as Matteo enters me with a final thrust and finally explodes. I can feel his hot seed filling my rear tunnel, running out, as he comes and comes.
When he slides out of me, I moan with relief. There’s an ache back there that I’ll be feeling all night long. But oh God, who knew that pain could feel so good? He told me, once, that he could make it pleasurable, and he was telling the truth.
He pulls me into his arms, and we’re both slick with sweat and panting from exertion. I lie there in his arms and I never want him to let me go.
Chapter 15
Matteo
That night with Natasha was so good, I wish I could go back in time and just live it again and again.
Because today is pissing me off.
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br /> For the last week, Natasha’s been back on her cleaning schedule, and I know it infuriates her. I am unsettled when I see the look on her face – the perfect smile, the resentment simmering in her beautiful eyes. She has opened herself up to me; I won’t let that end. I do everything I can to support her in every other way. I’ve threatened Concetta with a permanently scarred face if she leaves so much as a hair out of place, and Concetta has obeyed me to the letter. She straightens rugs, she puts pillows back in place on the sofa – she even offered to help Natasha clear the table and wash dishes, although Natasha politely declined.
And I let Natasha know, every day, how proud I am of her and how much I adore her. I talk about the wedding and the all the things I plan to do to her on our honeymoon, which will be two weeks long. I say everything I possibly can to her…without saying the things that I cannot say.
We’re so close. We’re almost there – two weeks to the wedding. Fourteen days. She can survive fourteen days. I will make sure of it. I’m forcing myself to try to see things from her viewpoint, swallowing a lot of pride, accepting that she’s collapsing in her own bed every night not because she doesn’t want to be with me but because she’s bone-tired. So my punishments are light and quick, and I always follow them with praise and comfort. She craves my soft touches and tender words. No matter how achingly exhausted she is, she’s never too tired for that. I know that, because I know her from the inside out. Her soul is mine. If only I could fully share my soul with her.
Being near Natasha but not having her in my bed is awakening a raging fever in me, a swelling and a longing inside that are so intense it hurts.
On top of that, we lost another shipment, and two of the Russians’ warehouses were raided. Normally, their misfortune would put a huge smile on my face, but these problems are getting to the level where we’ll have to consult the Council soon.
And there are all kinds of risks that come with that. They might unseat our families completely if they don’t think we can handle our own shit. This shouldn’t be happening in my wedding month; I’m already strung as tight as a bow just trying to make sure we actually make it to our wedding day.
Matteo: A Dark Mafia Hate Story Page 12