by Sunniva Dee
Never.
“Does this feel amazing?”
He opens his eyes, a small wrinkle appearing between his brows.
“Yes.” He hisses it out. I keep working, my arm turning leaden.
He tenses suddenly, grabs my arms, and for one terrible moment, I think this is it, that he’s dragging me down to him, that he’s going to take me, and it will be worse than anything, than being beaten, than having every crevice invaded by him as he scrubbed me clean.
I pump him faster. Harder. Fiercely.
I’m desperate.
Cursing, he lets out a guttural groan. Nails digging into my arms, he isn’t trying to pull me down anymore. He’s riding his orgasm—that’s what he’s doing—until globs of warm liquid jet from my hand, fly past his stomach, and land beneath his collarbone.
A deep sigh shudders out of him. I’m not sure if it’s exhaustion or relief that makes my hands shake as I let go and pat his harmless beast. I watch it shrivel so much quicker than it grew. The way it rests in a mass of sticky hair brings my nausea back.
John’s eyes are closed. His breathing takes a moment to slow down, chest heaving with the impact of the last minutes. I’m disgusted by him, and I am scared of him. But my nausea retreats at his expression, at the slackness of formerly taut muscle that starts at his neck and extends down his legs. It’s biology’s fault. It craves me, now, wants me included in some perverse, post-coital closeness, and all because I’ve given him what lovers give lovers.
“You tricked me,” he breathes.
Uneasy, I wait while his eyelids lift. They take a moment to respond.
“What do you mean?”
A smile curls his lips, and it’s beautiful in its faintness. “I’m saying you tricked me. I was going to make love to you, but you made me feel too good. I’m sorry, my pet. I couldn’t hold it any longer. It’s been a long time.”
I want to sob with relief.
“Come here,” he whispers, and now his eyes are molten with love for me. There is no urge to hurt me. No need to make me submit to him. What I see is him wanting me at his side. It’s messed up when I want it. It’s messed up when I lower myself on his arm and he nuzzles me like a true love.
“Let me make it up to you.” A gentle hand moves over my hip, dipping forward while he kisses my cheek. “I’ll give you an orgasm now. It’s only fair.”
No.
“Didn’t you notice?” I say in my softest voice.
“Notice what, my pet?”
“I came while you came. I couldn’t take it any longer.”
His eyes widen. “You came without being touched?”
“Yes, you were too hot to watch.” Discreetly, I run my oiled hand over my seam. Survival makes me bring his hand down there next. “Feel this.”
There’s wonder in his gaze when it meets mine. “Wow, you came a lot, huh?”
“Totally.”
“Not as much as me, though. I’ve got shit everywhere.” He chuckles quietly. “You know how many babies this could’ve been?”
I swallow another ripple of nausea. “Tons of babies.”
“I’ll give them to you later. Come here. Come sleep next to your boyfriend.”
He does what he did the other night. He shifts my back to his front, ladling me sideways against him, and I know that for now I have calmed the monster. Tonight, there’s no more fear.
26. PEARLS AND PLANTS
GIOELE
“The Himmel house is in the Markavi district, on the north side of the park. The address was purposely scrambled so GPS would’ve led us to a different house. Because of that, it was attached to the wrong name. They’ve actually taken their own, private street name for it, Crescent Moon Drive,” Isaias says.
“You’re kidding. They took the Santa Colombini symbol as their street name? Fucking imbeciles. How many houses are there on that street?”
“Three. All three are theirs. We finally have air shots of them, and they’re in a compound of sorts. The planetarium has a separate street number, as does what looks like a bungalow that could be a guesthouse. Then, there’s the main house, which is southern plantation style, built a couple of decades ago.”
“Cool. Now, shoot me the address.”
“We’re almost there, fratello. Half hour, and we’re at Vernal Heights,” he says.
“Really, so let me guess: you’re not giving me the damn address ’cause you’re afraid I’ll blow it before you get here?”
“Will you?”
“I don’t know, man. I’m going to just fucking— Give it to me, all right?”
“Half an hour and we’ll raid that place together. Tatiana’s busy in L.A. Gotta take into consideration what’s happening down there too. It’s fucking mayhem.”
I’m trotting ahead of the guys toward Bully’s car. I slosh through puddles of streaked rainbows, the oil floating at the top, craving action. Fritz’ all-business façade falters as he looks at me.
“What’s going on in L.A.?” I ask. “Everyone was safe last I heard. What’s happening?”
Isaias turns the car stereo down. He was playing Slipknot again. Some of those songs are murder on a guy’s stress levels.
“Everyone’s still accounted for.” Before I can ask him to spell out their names, he does, mentioning everyone, with the exception of the Nascimbeni associates, Il Lince, and his closest men. Isaias has dispatched a butt load of Felix’ guys to the parts of la famiglia trying to live a calm, legal life in Oceanside and Santa Barbara.
“So for now, people are fine. But Il Lince’s going rogue.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s getting revenge. This won’t be over until every Santa Colombini in Los Angeles is six feet under. Wives, daughters, sons, babies. Ma’s crying. She knows, but she can’t stop him. I’ve never seen him like this. ‘Rip them up with the root and toss them on the fire. It’s the only way. Bruciali.’”
“Burn them? He said that?”
“Yeah. He’s been saying it for days. He’s not okay with Zio Cosimo’s death. He’s not okay with Silvina’s disappearance, and he’s not okay with what they did to Gabriela.”
“I’m fine with them suffering—I’ll be destroying John myself—but the families?”
A seagull wails murder above my head, and the stench of rotting fish finds my nostrils again. I need to get out of here. There’s the SUV, now. Holy shit, that took forever. I jut my chin at Fritz, who unlocks it with a beep. I get into the passenger seat.
“He needs to be stopped. You know that, right?” I say before the others get in.
“Brother.” Isaias sighs against the receiver.
“No, seriously, man. We can’t let him go on a rampage killing fucking kids and chicks who’ve never done anything wrong. It’s not their fault that the Santa Colombini are monsters.”
“I know, fratello, but give it a rest for now.”
“Yeah, really?” I shout, and it’s like my chest is blowing up. “Those people are the Silvinas of the Santa Colombini, only they don’t stand a chance against Il Lince!”
“Let it go, all right? We’re about to raid San Francisco to get Silvina back. Why don’t we focus on that first?”
My hand flies up, clawing around my forehead. My nails dig into my temples, and— Hell, I need the pain to keep me from exploding.
Fritz spins the engine. Frustrated, I press my hand over my other ear, blocking out the sound. A buzz on my ear. Another call? I pull my phone away, staring at the screen. It’s John Ulrich Himmel.
“Gioele di Nascimbeni,” I snap.
“Gioele?” My name is the sweetest sigh at my ear.
“Ina mia! How are you? Where!” I cup the phone, pressing my mouth against the receiver. I close my eyes so I can hear every dip of her voice.
“I’m good. Very good. We… John and I
want to see you. Are you available today?”
John and I.
“Any time. I miss you, baby. I love you so much. Please, where are you?”
She quiets. I press my ear against the phone, harder, deeper. I want to be there with her, on the other side. I want to see her face, interpret the slants of her syllables, hear the slips when her breathing becomes erratic with emotion.
He took her.
“Can you go back to Harmony Femme’s offices? We’d love a video call.”
My heart tumbles, dropping rock-heavy into a ravine. “I’ll meet you anywhere.” I close my eyes, focusing on her. Focusing, focusing, while Fritz hobbles us through potholes and stops at traffic lights.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“Totally!” Her pitch is too high. “I’m dandy like pearls and plants.”
“Like pearls and plants?”
“Yes, so how about in an hour? Can you make it at one?”
SILVINA
John jerks my arm to my back, jacking it upward to the point of red-hot pain. It bolts through my bones, making me howl in anguish.
“‘Pearls and plants?’ What’s that supposed to mean? Oh, hell, forget it. We’re not meeting up with him today. You were tricking me the whole time, weren’t you, slut? You tricked me last night. You really fucking did, and I believed you like an idiot.”
“No!” I shout. “Please, stop. Don’t do this, John.” I’m on my knees on the floor, my arm wrenched high behind me. One yank, and he’s got me. My arm will snap like a twig.
He stills. With his foot pressed against the small of my back, he keeps my elbow high while he thinks.
“Please. Let me explain.” My heartbeats drum through my plea.
“You have ten seconds.”
“When we were little, Gioele and I had a fish tank at our grandparents’ house in Lake Como. We had some fish in there, but there was nothing else until my grandpa came home from the city with a couple of gifts for us. It was a fake oyster with a pearl in it, and some aquatic plants.”
“Get to the point.” He jerks my arm up, sending my head against the floor. It’s my desperate attempt to save my shoulder.
“The fish didn’t look happy to me in that tank. It was like they were alone in a building without furniture. But once we draped the plants along the back wall and the oyster stood at the center, it became a home. ‘Like pearls and plants’ to my cousin and me means that we’re home.”
My chest heaves with fear. What happens when people break their shoulder? How many bones need to be reset? Surgery. John would never take me to a doctor. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t.
I want to die.
I want him dead.
The lock on my arm loosens. Then, it disappears all together. My head dips toward the parquet. I can’t look up. Can’t bear the sight of him, that odious, awful lack of respect for humanity.
Behind me, a hum grows. It’s low, deep, could’ve been sweet but isn’t. Tender hands knead in warm strokes up the arm he just tortured, then tend to the joints of my shoulder.
“Oh, pretty Silvina. I knew it. Ever since that first lunch, I’ve known it; I can make you happy, and you know what?”
He stops, waiting for me to answer. I can only play my role. I swallow the terror forming gravel in my throat and whisper, “What?”
He lets my arm sink. I pull it in front of me, cradling it into shelter under my hunched-over body. John shifts around me. His footfalls are soft, but the sound still tears into me.
I see his knees without trying. They’re in front of me, jeans-clad. I know I’m supposed to look up, but my face has no dignity.
A shadow of a shift when his legs bend. I focus on his sneakers until gentle fingers cup my face and pull my attention upward. “You can make me happy too.”
GIOELE
I need to see her now. It took us twenty minutes to get to Harmony Femme, and— Fuck time! Fuck waiting while he’s destroying her.
“Wait here,” I tell Fritz. He’s got an elbow in the car window and nods at me. Bully’s nervously cracking peanuts again, making a mess in the backseat.
My phone buzzes.
“Entering Harmony Femme,” I clip out to the group call. “He let Silvina call me.”
“Yeah? I’m literally breaching S.F. city limits,” Isaias says.
“Good.” Ah, and I mean that so much. I have no idea what that monster is doing to her.
“How did she sound?”
“Chipper.”
“Chipper?” His tone tells me he knows there’s more.
“Yeah. Said she was like pearls and plants.”
Silence on the other end.
“You remember, right?”
“The fish tank in Lake Como,” he says.
“A fish tank?” Tatiana asks.
“Yeah. Silvina hated how bare it was, so our grandfather came home with tons of plants and a ceramic oyster with a pearl in the middle. Silvina loved that pearl.”
I push out a breath.
“She chattered about it nonstop. We both thought it was possible to glean that fake pearl from the oyster and put it in a ring. When we went back the next summer, we were excited to see the fish tank again.”
“And?” Tatiana asks.
“The plants had taken over the whole thing. They sucked the oxygen out of the water. We’d originally had five fish, but by the time we returned, only one was still alive.
“As for the pearl…” I huff through a smirk, pressing the Harmony Femme intercom. “The plants had chewed off the pink enamel of the pearl. All that was left was gnarled, grey ceramic. Silvina cried her eyes out over it, to the point of our grandfather going back to the pet store to find an identical piece.”
“Did that make her happy?” Tatiana asks.
“It might have,” Isaias replies, “only they didn’t carry it anymore. He brought back a castle or something instead, right?”
“Yeah. It wasn’t the same.”
“So pearls and plants.” Tatiana’s voice holds too much compassion.
“Yeah.” Mine cracks. I press my fingers against my eyes so I don’t end up going in broken. I’m not giving him what he wants.
I’m ready when Keegan receives me in his office. I’m prepared for this farce. I’ll be an actor in John’s play, and he’ll want to feed off of how I react. But I’ll be careful this time. I’ll do nothing that can make it worse for her.
Isaias is close, a crumb I keep at the front of my brain. While I’m at Harmony, he’s meeting with Felix. It’s only a matter of time before we find John, and when we do, I’m paying him back tenfold for every disrespect he’s shown Silvina.
Keegan is a grey version of himself. He forgets to offer me something to drink. I plop into the same seat as the last time, steeled and afraid of nothing but the pain of the girl I love beyond reason.
As Keegan turns his flat-screen on, a muffled scream sieves up through the floor vent.
“What the hell?”
“Excuse me?” Keegan sends me a short side-glance.
“You’re joking,” I say. “Someone just screamed.”
“Oh, right, the soundtrack for Dolls from Beggar’s Hole. They’re screening the audio downstairs. It’s gonna be a good movie, for sure. Too bad you’re not in it.”
“Yeah? Female-friendly horror, is that the new direction of Harmony Femme?”
The screen lights up, and my chest expands with relief. There she is, my darling, every one of my heart strings, and she’s dressed like white innocence, in something gossamer-like that’s open down to the middle of her chest.
I’m storing her on my membrane, drinking her in, making sure I have her for eternity. Her leg, slightly bent, the knee poking against the fabric, a slit on the side of her thigh showing all the skin I worship up to the highest point of her leg.
“Baby,” I choke out.
“Hey,” she says. She doesn’t use my name. I can’t avoid it any longer, how she sits, how she’s draped over John Ulrich Himmel’s lap.
He’s holding her tight against him.
He keeps her leaned against him.
One sated hand he’s got dipping under the dress at her thigh. With the other, he holds her neck. It’s not a violent hold. It’s not at all how it was the last time. She leans against him in an illusion of home.
Pearls and plants.
“Where are you?” I ask, running my stare over her face. It’s pockmarked, black, blue, punctured. Her lip is cleaved slightly to the left. One eye looks fine. She’s painted it how she does when she goes clubbing. The other doesn’t need makeup, because it’s full of color already. I don’t know if she can see through that slit.
“We’re the same place as last time,” she whispers. “How are you?”
She has bruises around her neck.
Bruises on her soft, soft breasts.
No! Please.
When. I. Catch. Him.
27. GREY MATTER
GIOELE
“All right, good to see you, man. Let’s get this festa started, shall we?” John’s a lazy cat, sprawled in his chair beneath her. Black lacquer shoes and dark dress pants. In a white shirt, he’s matching her starkly.
I keep my voice low when I answer. “There’s no festa. There’s just you holding my girl hostage. What do you want from me?”
“Funny you should say that.” He let’s go of her to tap his chin in thought. “You’ve got a few things wrong, Nascimbeni. Anyway, Silvina and I are here today to ask for your permission. We wanted to do this the right way.
“Now, her father is a bit—how to put it—incapacitated, and we couldn’t very well ask Il Lince for permission to share lives, so that leaves you as the closest kin. It’s sort of poetic too, since you’ve been known to love my pretty Silvina so very, very much.” His nostrils flare with contentment as he accommodates her on top of himself.
“What are you talking about!” I want to barge through the screen to get her off his crotch. Keegan’s hand touches my shoulder. In the slight move, I sense his understanding.