by Selena
Some other part of me, somewhere that doesn’t care about signatures and official documents, the real Eliza, inside my heart, knows. It knows that once he’s been inside me, he owns me. There’s no going back from that, no getting out of it. Once it’s done, King will control me. He’ll have all the power. And maybe that’s an illusion, but it’s all I have to hold onto. The only bit of control left to me. My own body.
Because I can’t control where I’ve been forced to move or live, who I live with. My whole life uprooted from the bedroom at Daddy’s I’ve slept in since I was a baby, when Mom went through an artistic phase and painted giraffes and lions and safari animals on the walls.
The same room where I got my first period, and Mom wasn’t there to ask, and I didn’t want to ask Daddy, so I just lay there in bed bleeding all night, thinking I was dying, that something in my belly had ruptured and that’s why my abdomen hurt so bad. The next day, the housekeeper found my bloody sheets and had to tell me about periods because that wasn’t the sort of thing I learned about in Catholic school. Then she told the whole staff, and everyone knew, and shame burned in my cheeks every time I passed them, as if they could see what they hadn’t before, that I was unclean.
But at least the nanny asked if maybe it was time we painted over the babyish safari animals still on my walls. It wasn’t the kind of thing my father would notice or think to ask, and I was grateful when she offered me buckets of pink paint with a hopeful smile that I thought was about me and not her bid to ride the Anthony Express. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I didn’t even like pink.
Back then, I hadn’t understood Mom like I do now. I’d been angry. But those animals had made me feel like maybe one day things would be right. As if knowing she’d once cared enough to hand paint each stripe and spot on every zebra and giraffe proved that she somehow loved me, even though she hadn’t contacted us once in the two years since she left.
But now that I was a woman, as the housekeeper informed me, I had to accept the truth. I had my dad and the nanny parade, and that was all the family I’d ever have. My brother was dead, and my mother was dead to me. I told the nanny I loved the paint, even though it was hideously bright and looked like something an eight-year-old would pick. I even asked if I could help. I relished each stroke as I rolled the garish paint in wide stripes over the beautiful animals my mother had painted with love and care. It felt positively criminal—and I loved it.
I halfway expected her to walk in as we were doing it and scream at us for ruining her hard work. Or to call the very next day and casually ask, and I’d have to admit what I’d done, slathering on the pink paint so thick it ran like Barbie blood down the walls.
I didn’t understand then. Now I get it. Now I know why she left, what was worth so much that she’d disappear from her own daughter’s life forever, not even showing up at her wedding, what people say is the most important day of her life. Mom knew. She had one when she was eighteen, too. She knew this day isn’t something to celebrate. It’s something to dread.
“If you don’t fuck that man tonight, I will,” Lizzie purrs, swaying her hips in a seductive slow dance as she twirls at the edge of the water, her hands twining into the breeze above her head like silk scarves. I wonder if she’s dancing for my husband, if he’s watching her, wishing he could fuck her instead of the frigid little bitch he ended up with. An ugly streak of jealousy darts through me, but I push it away. I don’t want his eyes on me. If he’s watching her, wanting her, he can have her. I hope he goes to bed, and she sneaks into his room and fucks him for me.
I glance at the bay windows overlooking the beach, but I don’t see him there. I turn back to my friends, enemies, and competition.
“Like you’d bleed,” I scoff at Lizzie, and the other girls break into a chorus of giggles.
“Oh, I’ll bleed for my husband,” Lizzie says. “You just have to know what you’re doing. Let him rough you up a little when you’re still dry, and you can bleed any time you want.”
“Really?” Bianca asks, gaping at the other mafia daughter.
I’ve never met someone as in love with herself, with pleasure, as Lizzie Salvatore. I hate her out of envy as much as anything. She said a big fuck you to tradition and had sex when she wanted to, consequences be damned. And she never looked back. The rest of us are simultaneously in awe of her and disgusted by her, but I’m sure the other girls are as envious as I am. For all our talk about carving our own paths and making our lives, Lizzie has really done it, in her own way. Maybe she only owns her sexuality, but it’s something.
“Sure,” Lizzie says, giggling. “It’s not exactly pleasant, but it gets the job done if anyone wants proof on your wedding night.”
“You should have told me that years ago. I would have slutted it up like you,” I lie.
“Hey,” she protests.
“Like any guy will think you’re a virgin,” Bianca says, linking her arm with Lizzie’s on the other side. “Everyone knows you spent half of high school on your back.”
“I probably won’t get lucky enough to marry a guy as young as Eliza’s King,” Lizzie says. “So it won’t matter. No one past high school knows about my rep.”
“I wouldn’t count on that,” Gianna says quietly. “I know my family keeps tabs on me everywhere.”
“Oh, who the hell cares?” Lizzie says, the liquor making her braver than she is. We all care what our families think. They might love us, but that doesn’t erase what they’re capable of.
“To not caring,” I yell, kicking at the little waves washing up at the edge of the water.
“Hell, yeah,” Bianca squeals, thrusting a fist at the sky. “Fuck caring!”
The other girls link arms, and we kick at the waves together like some kind of chorus line, our drunken laughter carrying up the beach to the house and over the water to the houseboat bobbing expectantly before us. I’ve avoided looking at it all night, the place I’m supposed to spend my wedding night with a stranger. Sylvia and some of the other women in the family spent hours setting it up, so we’d have privacy and not have to stay in my father’s beachfront mansion with the rest of the family. The thought makes me nauseous—or maybe it’s all the champagne and tequila churning in my belly.
When I finally look up, I see a figure standing alone at the railing Sylvia twined with twinkling fairy lights. He’s watching us.
My heart flips, and I swallow hard. I don’t know when he went across to the boat, but then, it’s three o’clock in the morning and most of the guests are long gone. Maybe if I stay long enough, if I put it off until it’s no longer tonight, he’ll fall asleep on the deck, and I can crawl into bed alone at dawn, as is the norm on party nights. And this isn’t just a regular party night. It’s the biggest party of my life. It’s supposed to be the best day of my life. I tried my best to make that happen, even though the dread of tonight sat heavy in my stomach like a threat. I could still revel in the attention, feel beautiful, and have fun being young and dancing with my friends.
That’s all I want.
But I know that’s not all I’ll get. King will want to make me pay for the sins of my family, and he’ll extract the debt he thinks we owe one punishment at a time. He’s already threatened. If he’s unhappy with my performance today, there will be consequences.
It doesn’t matter how gorgeous the guy is. His eyes are cold and terrifyingly cruel, making my blood shrink away instead of longing for his touch. Mafia men are violent by nature. Sometimes it carries over into their marriages and sometimes it doesn’t. Not two minutes after saying “I do,” I had my answer to which one of those categories King falls into.
I can feel his watchful eyes on me from across the water, and I know I’ll be in trouble when I get there. That doesn’t make me want to rush over and apologize. It makes me want to stay out longer, to milk every drop from this night, the last night that’s mine. Yes, we’re married now. I’m his, as he so bluntly pointed out. But everyone knows a wedding is for the bride. It
’s my party, and fuck crying if I want to. I’m going to party if I want to. I don’t care that the salt is ruining my dress, that the edges are already stained and bedraggled from the water and sand. I just don’t want it to end. When tonight ends, reality sets in. When tonight ends, so does my freedom.
So I stay a little longer, drinking in the night, running in the foamy salt spray of the waves, dancing at the bonfire, throwing down more shots. At last, light creeps into the sky, and I’m too tired and worn out to go on. I collapse onto the sand next to the embers in the firepit and lay back against Tommy Fatone, who passed out hours ago. A couple fresh bodyguards sit off toward the house, drinking coffee and not speaking in the silence of the morning. Vince is not among them. My chastity is no longer in danger.
I rest my head on Tommy’s belly and close my eyes. This is a victory. One more night until I’ll be tortured by a sadistic Valenti. I sigh and fold my hands on the bodice of my ruined dress. My stomach is sour and churning, the world is spinning, and my head is already pounding, but I made it to sunrise without giving in to the enemy. I smile to myself. He must have fallen asleep hours ago, waiting for me. The thought of him lying there waiting fills me with smug satisfaction. I know there will be countless nights ahead where the roles are reversed, where I wait for him to come home from doing a job or visiting a woman who isn’t me, where I wait in terror for the sound of the door opening and my husband returning to brutalize me.
For this one night, I got to make him wait. It’s not much, only one night out of the thousands to come, but I take what I can get, as tiny as it is. I’m lulled by the morning, the alcohol and exhaustion, the rise and fall of Tommy’s belly under my head. The only sounds are the rush of the waves at the edge of the beach and the sighs of a handful of people sleeping on the sand around the dead fire.
Suddenly, strong hands grip my wrists, pulling me up in one swift motion.
“Who the fuck is that?” King asks, glaring down at me.
For a second, I don’t know what he’s talking about. Then I realize he’s talking about Tommy. “No one,” I say, trying to wrest my hands from his punishing grasp.
“That’s right,” he says slowly. “That’s no one. And I’m your husband.”
He releases one of my hands and drags me to a little rowboat rimmed with roses, the one in which Sylvia thought my groom would romantically row me out to the houseboat. I stumble along after him, tugging at my arm. He stops after a few steps, scoops me into his arms, and carries me to the boat like a conqueror capturing his unwilling bride. That’s what carrying a woman across the threshold represents, after all.
King dumps me into the rowboat, gets in, and starts rowing us across the water.
This is it. I’m about to become his wife in the last way I want to. I grip the side of the boat, considering if I should jump. I might drown in my drunken state. Maybe that would be better. Anything would be better than what’s about to happen.
A wave bumps against the little boat, and the rocking motion is the last straw. My alcohol-infused stomach rebels, and I lean over and vomit out the side of the vessel.
We reach the boat, and King ties up the little rowboat and drags me onto the deck of the houseboat. I steel myself, ready for his words, his violence, his touch. Instead, he just looks at me. He doesn’t even look angry. He looks tired and a little disgusted. “Are you done?” he asks, his voice icy.
I nod, feeling suddenly vulnerable standing in front of him. We’re alone. No one to save me. No bodyguards, no scary father. I’m on my own. It doesn’t feel good or freeing. I feel like a scolded child. He’s blurry to my vision, as if I’m seeing him through water, a bad girl being punished at the bottom of the tub when she didn’t obey.
His lips tighten into a line, and he takes my hand and pulls me down a small set of steps. We turn and enter the bedroom, all decorated with flowers and candles, with a bucket of ice beside the bed where a bottle of champagne sits untouched. Rose petals are strewn across the white bedspread. My heart lurches into my chest, and I’m so lightheaded I barely keep my feet. I wish I hadn’t been sick already. I want to puke again, but my stomach is empty.
“You should get some sleep,” King says, turning away.
“Aren’t you going to collect your prize?” I ask, cringing at how childish and scared I sound even as I try for a taunting edge to my voice.
King lets out a quiet scoff. “Believe it or not, the last thing I’m interested in right now is your cunt.”
I wince at his harsh tone and crude words, even as a swell of euphoric relief rises inside me. “You’re not going to punish me?”
King doesn’t speak for a minute. He loosens his tie and slowly pulls it free of his collar. “You think sex is a punishment?” he asks at last, not bothering to watch my response as he folds his tie in fourths.
“For a girl,” I answer honestly.
He shakes his head but doesn’t speak as he slides out of his jacket, turning his back to hang it over the back of a chair before he begins undoing his cufflinks. “You really are a virgin, aren’t you?” he says, watching me in the mirror.
“I am, but…” My eyes catch on the gun tucked in the waistband of his slacks, and I swallow hard. He might be new to the Life, a lowly soldier, but he’ll deal with things the way mafia men do. And he’ll treat me the way mafia men treat their wives. He’s my husband now, after all. He might spare me tonight, but no matter what I do or say, he’s not going to spare me forever. Our families will expect a baby to cement this union. He’s going to force me to do what good wives do no matter what I say. So why even try to explain my fears?
“What?” he asks, his hands going still. He stares at me in the mirror, and I sink onto the edge of the bed, avoiding his gaze.
He’s a ruthless Valenti. The most mercy I can hope for is that he’ll find a mistress soon, like my father did after marrying my mother.
“Nothing,” I say. “Don’t worry. You got what you paid for. I’m as pure as freshly fallen snow. Go ahead and ruin me.”
He moves to the bed and sits down beside me, and I tense. He watches me for a long minute, then reaches to gather my hair and drape it over my shoulder. Without a word, he slowly begins to unbutton the long row of buttons down my back, his fingers gentle. But I know what they’re capable of.
“You’re shaking,” he says quietly.
“No shit,” I say. “You would be, too, if you were the sacrifice to pay for all the murders your family had committed.”
“I don’t want to hurt you, Eliza,” he says, his voice gentle but firm. “Whatever our families have done to each other, that’s on them, not on us. I don’t know about you, but I have enough sins of my own to pay for without paying for the sins of our fathers.”
I don’t answer. I can’t absolve him of this. His family destroyed mine. If my brother had lived, everything would have been different. He could have saved us all if he’d lived past sixteen.
But he didn’t have the chance—because of this man’s family. How can I forgive him for that? And how do I know he’s not lying through his teeth, getting me to let my guard down so he can hurt me even worse than when I’m expecting it?
King’s fingers stop unbuttoning at my lower back. Their tips brush across the bare skin beneath my dress, and I freeze, a little hiccup of fear racing through me even as warmth shimmers through me. The conflicting sensations, my body getting pleasure while my mind screams no, paralyzes me. I feel like I’m floating above, watching this and wanting to become a giant like Godzilla, to rip King away and crush him in my fist and hurl him across the ocean.
“Eliza?” he whispers. When I don’t answer, he takes my chin gently and turns my face toward him. His dark eyes search mine, but I can’t look. I squeeze my lids closed, my throat suddenly aching and tears stinging the backs of my eyes. “Are you okay?”
I shake my head.
He slowly reaches up with his other hand, brushing his thumb along the fringe of my lashes. Shame burns through me. He kn
ows I’m crying. He knows I’m weak, and broken, and all the things I try so hard to pretend I’m not. “What’s wrong?” he asks, his knuckles stroking my cheek.
I take a shaky breath. “I just… I’m not ready, if that’s okay.”
He doesn’t say anything for a long minute. So long that I have to know what’s going through his mind, or at least a glimpse. I open my eyes, blinking away the tears. His brow is creased with a frown, but it’s not an angry one. It’s more… Confused. And that’s worse.
“I did what you asked,” I say. “I stayed by your side and acted like your wife, like I was happy. You said I could choose my reward.”
“For your reward, you want me not to touch you?” he asks.
“I’ve just never had any desire,” I say, trying to make him stop studying me like he wants to cut me open and expose all my feelings. “I think there’s something wrong with me. It’s like that part of me is frozen. I never developed those feelings.”
“What feelings?” he asks, gently tugging the dress down over my shoulders.
“You know,” I say, clutching the material to my chest and casting my eyes down. “Sexual feelings.”
His hand falters only a moment. “Oh,” he says. “Is that why you got hammered tonight? You think it’ll make sex better? Because I assure you, it won’t.”
Is this self-righteous asshole really going down that road? I drank to escape his dumb ass. And what right does he have to judge me? I’ve dealt with more in my life than he’s even imagined.
But I only nod, because this is going so much better than I could have hoped when he grabbed me off the beach. I don’t think he’s even going to rape me tonight. I’m not about to run my mouth and make him change his mind.
“Can we just… Wait?” I whisper.
“Okay,” King says with a defeated sigh. “We’ll wait as long as you need.”