The Fall of Sin

by Bella J

  I locked the bathroom door behind me and turned to lean against it. Exhaustion had slithered its way into my body, my mind, and I wanted to run and hide from everyone just so I could get some rest. Every part of me ached, and I had never felt so confused, so scared in my life.

  A tear slipped from the corner of my eye, and I quickly wiped it away. There was no time for tears, no time for a pity-party. I needed to keep my shit together if I wanted to survive the chaos that surrounded me.

  I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror. The woman who stared back at me looked like shit, as if the devil himself had dragged her through hell. Dark circles framed my eyes, and my hair was a wild mess of curls that hung in disarray around my shoulders. It had only been a few hours, yet it felt like I haven’t slept in weeks.

  “Mila.” Raphael knocked on the door. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lose my temper.”

  I closed my eyes, biting back more tears.

  “This is all just too overwhelming. For both of us. I had plans. This deal with Mr. Russo is an opportunity I’ve waited for ever since Father died. My father—our father wasn’t what you would call supportive of me and who I am.” He paused for a moment, and a heavy silence settled. “I’m gay, Mila.”

  I opened my eyes, surprised by this very personal revelation.

  “I’m gay, and it’s something Father never accepted. My partner and I, we’ve been trying to start our own art gallery for the last two years. He refused to help financially, and since he had so much influence in this city, he made sure I didn’t get help from anyone else.”

  “Why?” I slipped my back down the door to sit on the tiled floor. “Why did he have trouble accepting you’re gay?”

  “I was his only son, Mila. And up until a few hours ago, I was his only child. Being gay means I won’t continue the Torres bloodline. The legacy.”

  “That’s bullshit.”

  “Not to him, it wasn’t.”

  I leaned my head back against the door. “Arranged marriages. Family debts. Bloodlines and legacies. God, am I the only one here who’s currently living in the twenty-first century?”

  Raphael snickered. “It all does seem rather odd, doesn’t it?”

  “I would say fucked up. But yeah, we can go with odd.” I smiled, and Raphael laughed. The moment shined a little light on our dark conversation, and I managed to take a deep breath. Raphael had given me a glimpse of who he was, of his life, and instead of pitying myself, I sympathized with him. “I screwed it up for you, didn’t I?”

  Silence.

  “We can work it out,” he replied, and I didn’t need to see his face to know he felt skeptical about it all. “I’m going to order some room service. You want something?”

  I looked up at the white ceiling. “Cake. I want chocolate cake.”

  “Cake?”

  “Cake always makes everything better.”

  He chuckled. “Chocolate cake it is, then.”

  I heard his heavy footsteps as he walked away from the door and pulled my legs up to my chest. My thoughts were a minefield of mayhem. Nothing in my head made sense. Every emotion known to man stormed inside me, and I was drowning in it. Drowning in everything I felt.

  Fear.

  Uncertainty.

  Heartbreak.

  Hate.

  Sympathy.

  Pity.

  It was all there, squeezed together in the center of my soul, and it was threatening to erupt unless I managed to get a handle on it. I had to pull my shit together if I didn’t want to break into pieces that would never be mended back together.

  I pushed myself off the floor, straightened my pencil skirt, and fluffed my fingers through my hair. With balls of cotton wool stashed in a glass container on the cabinet, I cleaned the mascara stains around my eyes.

  A Russo wife always looks her best.

  I took a final glance at my reflection after doing some damage control. I still looked like shit, but at least my hair was behaving.

  The lock clicked as I turned the doorknob before I walked back to the living room part of the suite. “Please tell me you got the cake?”

  “I’m sorry, wife.” The familiar voice brought me to a halt, and my gaze crashed with his. “I’ll make sure to get you some cake on our way back home.”

  “Saint. Jesus.”

  “No. Just me.”

  My heart leaped from my chest, and my every muscle pulled taut. My body froze, the blood in my veins cold as the look in his eyes.

  “What are you doing here?” I could hardly get the words out.

  “I’m here to get my wife, of course.”

  Raphael stepped up to him. “She’s not going anywhere with—”

  Saint pulled out a gun and aimed it at Raphael’s head. My breath got caught in my throat as I gasped. “Saint, no!” But he didn’t even glance my way as he glared at Raphael.

  “I won’t think twice about pulling this trigger,” he warned.

  “You’re not taking my sister.”

  Saint straightened his arm, the muzzle of his gun biting into Raphael’s forehead. “And who is going to stop me? You?”

  I rushed toward them and almost tripped over my own two feet. “Don’t hurt him.”

  “And if I really, really want to?” Saint’s jaw ticked, the hatred in his eyes almost as deadly as the weapon in his hand.

  “Saint, please.”

  James entered the suite carrying a man over his shoulders. It was only when he dropped the man on the tiled floor that I realized he was dead, throat slit and blood oozing from the cut.

  “Jesus Christ.” My palm hit my mouth as I gasped, nausea forcing bile up my throat. “What the fuck?” I looked at Saint and noticed a streak of blood on his hand holding the gun. “Who is that?”

  Saint snarled. “A security measure my father put in place in case you decided to run.”

  “What?”

  “James, please escort Mrs. Russo to the car. I’d like to have a very brief and private conversation with Mr. Torres.”

  “Saint, no!” I pleaded, knowing all too well what he was capable of. The memory of Brad’s dead body and the sight of another lifeless man bleeding on the tiles reminded me exactly how cruel and callous Saint really was. There was no doubt in my mind that he would kill Raphael without even blinking.

  “Saint,” I slowly approached him, “I’ll go with you, but please don’t hurt my brother.”

  “Brother?” Saint mocked and leaned his head to the side as he glared at Raphael. “You had her for two hours, and already you brainwashed her into thinking you cared?”

  “I do care,” Raphael bit out.

  “Bullshit. All you care about is money and ass.”

  “Fuck you!”

  Saint pressed the gun harder against Raphael’s head, and a scream got lodged in my throat as flashes of blood and dead bodies bombarded my thoughts. I cringed, expecting the sound of a gunshot to crack through the air at any moment, but Saint’s finger merely rested on the trigger.

  “Be careful, boy,” he snarled. “I’ve killed people for far less than uttering a few curse words at me.”

  My heart was on the verge of exploding, and I couldn’t feel my legs through the panic. The look on Saint’s hardened face was that of sheer determination, and I knew the only way for me to keep him from killing Raphael was to do what he said.

  “Please. I’ll go with you. You don’t have to kill anyone else.”

  Saint’s top lip curled up as he stared at Raphael with nothing but disdain and contempt. “If you ever take her away from me again, I will kill you. And I don’t care how much she begs for me to spare your life, I won’t.” Saint dropped his arm and secured the gun behind his back.

  I let out a breath, and I could hardly stand up straight. In that moment, I was back at the penthouse in New York, watching my friend bleed out on the carpet. I relived it as it replayed over and over inside my head. It brought tears to my eyes together with the bone-chilling terror of Saint killing my brother
in front of me. I wanted to sag to the ground and let the fear swallow me whole.

  Saint wrapped his fingers around my elbow, his touch scorching my skin. “Consider this a gesture of goodwill, Raphael. The fact that you’re still breathing. You should remember to thank your sister for that one day.”

  He pulled me toward the door, and I balked. “My shoes. Let me just grab—”

  “Leave them.”

  Saint dragged me out of the hotel room, and I didn’t fight him. I was too afraid he might change his mind and go back to kill Raphael.

  Thankfully, Raphael didn’t follow us. It seemed he knew Saint as well as I did, knowing the man had no trouble spilling blood and taking lives. It was naïve and stupid of me to think I could run from Saint. After everything he did to get to me in the first place, and knowing what he wanted from me, how could I have thought it was possible to get away from him?

  All of this, everything that had happened up until this point only proved one thing.

  There was no getting away from my husband…ever.

  3

  Saint

  I wanted to pull the trigger. I wanted to see the fucker’s face splattered all over the goddamn hotel suite. It was all I thought about since the moment Mila got in the car with him, driving away from me. He had no right to take her. He had no right to interfere. The fucker was nothing but a tiny stone in my path to vengeance. One I didn’t even need to take out of the way. I could just walk right over him and not even notice he was there. But the second he opened his car door for Mila with the intention of taking her away from me, he became a mole in my back yard whose head I wanted to hack off with a fucking shovel. I’d be sure to remind him to thank his sister one day because she just saved him from getting his face blown off.

  “Saint, you’re hurting me.” Her voice shook as I tightened my grip around her elbow, dragging her out of the hotel. Unlike our swift and well-planned exit in New York, I didn’t give a flying fuck who saw her and who didn’t. I didn’t care if anyone saw her face, saw her fear. All I cared about was getting her out of there and back on the Empress within the hour.

  Once in the underground parking of the hotel, I stomped toward my black Maserati Quattroporte.

  Mila paused as she was about to get into the passenger seat, surveying the car from front to back. “You can feed an entire village with the price tag on this car. You know that, right?”

  I grabbed her wrist and yanked her closer, my fingers biting into her jaw as I held her face close to mine. “Two minutes ago, I was one breath away from blowing your brother’s head off, yet you still seem to think you have the balls to fuck with me.”

  “It was a mere observation,” she bit out as my grip on her jaw puckered her lips.

  I brought my mouth close to hers so she could feel the angered heat in my breath. “Do not fuck with me right now, Milana.”

  Green eyes stared at me, unblinking, but I saw it. I saw the fear swirl in her irises, the glimmer of unshed tears she was desperate to keep from escaping.

  “Now, get in the goddamn car and shut that pretty little mouth of yours.” I let go of her arm and watched as she got into the car. “And, Mila. Try to run, and I’ll kill your brother, no matter how hard you beg me not to.”

  I shut the door and rounded the car, getting in behind the wheel. The engine roared and tires screeched as I drove from the underground parking. The anger in me simmered, and I barely held on to the last shred of control I had. My knuckles turned white as I gripped the steering wheel, speeding up the ramp and swerving onto the road.

  Mila grabbed the door handle. “Jesus, Saint. Do you want to kill us?”

  I bit the corner of my mouth, my tongue nothing but flames of unspoken curses. Images of her running from me, the frenzy of panic and alarm I felt while I watched her get into that car, it ignited both fear and rage inside me—a toxic mix of emotions for a hardened man like me. It took me to the edge where I wanted to kill her own brother right in front of her, not caring if she watched. I didn’t give a fuck whether my actions ruined her beyond repair. All I cared about was getting rid of the utter helplessness I felt for the last few hours while I searched for her.

  “How did you find me?”

  I snickered at her foolish question. “This is a hundred-thousand-dollar car. My yacht has a sixteen-million-dollar price tag. And my private jet cost me a few million more than that. Right now, you are worth far more to me than any of those things, so imagine to what lengths I’m willing to go to make sure no one takes you from me.” I glanced at her, her expression unreadable. “I had you tracked.”

  “What? Where? How?” She rushed her palms up her arms, searched under the collar of her blouse, and touched her gold earrings. “How did you—” Her gaze fell to her bare feet. “My shoes,” she mumbled before looking my way. “That’s why you told me to leave my shoes behind. You bugged my fucking shoes?”

  I smirked, surprisingly amused at how quickly she figured it out.

  She sagged back into her seat. “I can’t believe you fucking tracked me.”

  “Seriously, Mila. Tell me you’re not that naïve.”

  She stared out the passenger side window. “I guess I am.”

  I rubbed two fingers across the stubble of beard on my chin. “Did you enjoy getting acquainted with your younger brother?” There was no hiding the sneer in my tone.

  “Not as much as I enjoyed getting acquainted with your father.”

  I looked her way. “You what?”

  “Yeah. Your father is a real treat. His bullshit is almost as easy to see-through as yours.”

  “Jesus Christ.” I glanced in the rear-view mirror before making a sharp turn to the left, speeding through the back streets of Rome. The thought of her in the same room as my father without me being there had the flames of hell burning up my spine.

  “Saint, slow down,” she urged, her voice laced with panic. “You’re going too fast.”

  Her words fell on the ears of a man who could hear nothing but the angered beat of his own heart. A few more glances in my side and rear-view mirror, and I was sure we weren’t followed.

  I pulled up on the side of a quiet road. There wasn’t a second wasted as I got out of the car and rushed around the front, only to catch Mila as she leapt from her seat and tried to run in the other direction. But I caught her arm, gripped it tight, and dragged her behind me as I stomped toward one of the stone pine trees. Branches snapped and crunched under my feet, and Mila cursed as she walked barefoot over the grueling terrain.

  With a flick of my wrist, I twisted her arm and forced her back first against the tree. “What did you tell him?”

  “You’re hurting me.”

  “I asked you a motherfucking question. What did you tell him?” The hard tenor of my voice echoed below the tall trees, and I immediately saw the fear in her eyes.

  “Nothing. I told him nothing.”

  “And what did my father offer you?”

  “What makes you think he offered me anything?”

  I smiled coldly and brought my hand up to her throat. “No one knows my father as well as I do. He puts a price on everything. So, tell me, Mila. What. Did he. Offer you?”

  Her chest rose and fell as she took one labored breath after the other, and I could feel her wildly beating pulse against my fingertips wrapped around her neck.

  “He told me he could get our marriage annulled, and if I made an official statement that you forced me to marry you, he could get me my shares back.”

  I tightened my grip on her wrist and throat, forcing her chin up toward me. “Did you do it?”

  She reached for the hand I had around her neck. “Yes.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’m not lying. I told him everything. I told him how you killed Brad, kidnapped me, and forced me to marry you. I told him fucking everything.”

  I leaned down and brought my lips close to hers, her pulse rising with her rapid breaths. “You’re lying, Mila,” I whispered and brought my
thumb up to her bottom lip. “You didn’t tell him shit.”

  “Oh, yes, I did. When he offered me an annulment by sundown, I sang like a fucking bird.”

  I gripped her throat tighter, forcing her to crane her neck. “You’re a bad liar.”

  “I’m not lying.”

  She yanked at my arm, but I didn’t move a muscle. “You want to play this game, Mila? Fine.” I took a step forward and crowded her between my body and the tree as I let go of her wrist, slipping my hand down her side. “When you ran from me, I felt nothing. When you stood on the other side of the road, turning toward me, your eyes gleaming with tears, it did nothing to thaw the hate in my veins.” My fingers curled under the seam of her skirt, and I yanked it up her thigh, snaking my fingers under the fabric. “When I watched you get into that car with Raphael, being taken farther and farther away from me, I didn’t feel a sense of loss, helplessness.” I leaned down and brushed my lips against her jaw as I cupped her ass in my palm, the sound of her breath hitching filling my ear and slamming against the tip of my cock. “I felt nothing when I spent two fucking hours not knowing whether you were safe or not. Absolutely fucking nothing.”

  Her skirt bunched up around her waist, black panties covering her sweet cunt, yet it posed no resistance when I tore my fingers through it so easily.

  The scent of her floral perfume and the feel of her soft curls against my cheek made the world around me spin out of control, my cock hard and desperate to slip inside her.

  Her grip around my arm loosened, her rigid body going lax against mine with every passing second.

  I lifted my head and looked her in the eyes. “Now, tell me, Mila. Am I telling the truth? Or was everything I just said a fucking lie?” With a gentle touch, I eased my hand around her hip and down between her legs. I dragged a leisurely stroke of my finger through her pussy lips which greeted me with slick arousal. Her eyes rolled closed, and I abruptly plunged a finger inside her. “Look at me,” I demanded. “Look me in the fucking eye and tell me whether I’m lying.”

  Her emerald gaze locked onto mine, and her lips parted as warm breaths wafted from her lungs. There was nothing or no one, only us in that moment. The entire goddamn world disappeared, and I wanted her to see every lie that just came out of my mouth. I wanted this woman to look deep into my soul and see how her running from me fucked with my head in ways I never experienced before. There were no words to describe the emotions that torpedoed inside me during the two hours she was gone—that was why I needed her to see it, because there was no way I’d be able to explain it.