7. Delerium
Chapter seven
Delerium
(Nico)
L ike a madman, I’m running through the forest, the darkness wrapping around me like a suffocating mantel.
The ground beneath my feet is uneven, roots and rocks conspiring to trip me up.
But I push on, running, running.
I don't know what’s chasing me, but I hear it—heavy footsteps crashing through the underbrush, a low growl that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
I don’t dare look back.
The growls are closer now, almost at my heels.
Panic rises in my throat.
I try to scream, but no sound comes out.
The silence is deafening, oppressive.
I’m not going to make it, I—
I wake up before the beast catches me.
Cold sweat clings to me like a second skin. My breath is rapid and unsteady; it burns in my throat.
Cazzo. It was just a nightmare.
Just a dream.
The damn forest one again.
I hate that one.
That place is so creepy, so dark.
But as my real surroundings blur into focus in the warm orange light of the cabin, I remember that my nightmare isn’t contained to my dreamworld.
My waking life is a scene straight from Stephen King’s Misery , and my own personal Kathy Bates still has my dick in a cage and my legs tied to the bed on this secluded island like I’m not the heir to the Ricci dynasty. Like I’m some common lowlife thug instead of a prince.
I don’t know how long I’ve been here.
My world has been reduced to running through a dark forest and waking up in pain, my shoulder throbbing angrily.
The sound of the rain crashing on the roof seems endless, drowning out reality.
I try to move, even just my hand, but my body isn’t my own; it no longer obeys me.
All I feel is pain, a hazy pain that stains my reality with its black liquid, threatening to drown me for good.
The innkeeper is usually there when I wake up, but she doesn’t speak much.
That worried look in her eyes tells me all I need to know as I tether on the edge of reality, ready to plummet into the abyss at any moment.
She wipes my face with a cold cloth sometimes, but perhaps that’s also part of my dreams. I can’t imagine her giving enough of a fuck to do something like that.
All I know is that I don’t want to die.
Not like this.
Not without clearing my name, claiming my throne.
But I’m not strong enough to fight yet. I’ll have to bide my time.
My dreams aren’t all running through the forest.
Sometimes, real memories haunt me, muddying my shitty present with my shitty past.
Faces come back to me, conversations. Things could have been so different. But with parents like mine, every possible reality would’ve been fucked up either way—that much I’m certain of.
When I was younger, I let myself believe it could be different, that I had some control over my own life.
But what I wanted never mattered.
I was but a pawn in my parents’ twisted game.
When I met Annika, I thought I could finally have a normal life. That we could get away from it all.
It’s been three years since her death, but every little detail of our tragic love story will forever be burned into my memory like a permanent record.
The happy memories hurt as much as the reminder of her painful demise.
Annika didn’t care about my violent tendencies; she didn’t need my empathy. Born into the Russian mob, my dark-haired princess was well-accustomed to our nefarious life and its dangers. A Bonnie to my Clyde, we were going to set the world on fire; we were going to have it all.
Despite my displeased parents, we were married within a month.
“Too young ,” everyone said, but I was done letting them control my life like they did my childhood.
However, Mommy dearest already had my perfect match all set up for me. “ Don’t be silly, Dom. You can’t marry into the Russian mob.”
She laughed when I told them I was engaged. They had Don Greco’s niece lined up for me, “ a harmonious merger of families ,” my father called it.
I always blamed myself for Annika’s death.
We had two happy years of beautiful chaos that set my skin on fire and left me in a permanent state of arousal.
Once, I fucked her right there in a pool of someone’s blood, someone she had just stabbed. It was beautiful.
And then it was over.
I found her body dangling from the ceiling beam in our bedroom, a suicide note neatly stashed in an envelope.
The guilt tore me apart.
It was all my fault.
Until the day I learned that it wasn’t…
It wasn’t my fault at all.
My life is divided into two distinct periods: Before Anikka and After Annika.
The latter era became a cruel joke of pointless days and painful nightmares.
The only thing that took the edge off was breaking someone open until blood red spilled over stone.
That and a boatload of alcohol.
I knew I was toxic; I couldn’t get close to anyone again. They would inevitably end up dead.
No, it was better I focused on work—much to my parents’ relief.
And then that heartless cunt that called himself my father got a bit too liberal with his words one drunken evening, a bit too free. He let something slip that I couldn’t let go.
I tugged and tugged on the thread until the entire nasty mess untangled before me.
The part where my father raped my bride and had her killed shouldn’t have been a surprise to me.
But the part where he boasted about Annika accepting the generous cash bribe to leave me, that part stung.
The betrayal was unbearable…on all sides.
It didn’t matter that she changed her mind and wanted to give the cash back—the whole reason my father took care of her and wiped her off the face of the planet.
The fact that she could even consider his offer was too painful to bear.
The day he told me, rage ripped through my body as I stared at my inappropriately cheerful father. The asshole was proud of his sins.
My hands had clenched and unclenched with such might that I could hear every knuckle crack individually.
But I didn’t kill him then.
No, I bided my time.
I wanted him to have a slow and painful death—poison.
It was already planned, ready.
I had the perfect alibi lined up.
But things didn’t work out that way.
It all went wrong.
Someone beat me to it.
Someone who wanted me to take the fall for the crime.
When I woke up next to his lifeless body, I knew I had to get out of there before my brother buried me next to our father without giving me a second to explain.
Nobody on the payroll could help me; I wasn’t stupid.
So, I grabbed the duffel full of cash I kept stashed where my car’s spare wheel should be and found the closest private airstrip.
Always have an exit strategy.
Always.
Some nights, I wake up from these nightmares convinced that I’m back at home instead of the island, stuck in the world my parents have created for me.
No friends, no real school, “ no leaving the house without your guards, Domenico” . I was a prisoner in my own home.
“The future Don needs to be safe at all times” —the tune my mother recited ad nauseam until her dying day.
But I was never safe.
Not then.
And definitely not now.
I’ve simply traded one hell for another. One where the busty innkeeper with muscle arms like Madonna feeds me lukewarm thin soup like I’m a baby, feeling my forehead with the back of her hand repeatedly.
The delirium refuses to leave me as my present, past, and dream worlds conspire to keep me caged in painful misery.
The loop keeps repeating.
More soup.
More pills.
More running through the dark forest with the faceless beast in pursuit.
I don’t know why Kiah doesn’t just finish what she started and just kill me, but she seems to be taking care of me.
She must have some ulterior motive…
At some point, the haze starts to lift slightly.
I’m almost convinced I hear birds chirping outside, but I know it can’t be—the storm is endless.
Except it isn’t…
One day, I wake up to the welcoming warmth of the sun on my face, stray rays sneaking in through the window.
After this, the fuzziness starts to dissipate slowly.
I’m fully present as the innkeeper with the soft hands and concerned eyes washes my body with a cloth, trailing it over my skin, my caged cock, like a real nurse.
I keep my eyes closed, pretending to be asleep. But it’s difficult not to moan, especially when she lifts my balls and strokes the cloth over them.
There is nothing sensual about her movements; they are clinical, precise…but my dick doesn’t know the difference.
Only when she turns the lights off and the warm glow switches to darkness do I open my eyes.
The moon is but a slither outside, offering no illumination; the only light in the room comes from the microwave’s number dials, a neon green glow that casts more shadows than light.
If I keep absolutely still, I can hear Kiah’s hurried breaths in the darkness, the soft hum of electricity radiating from the futon by the window—a vibrator.
Eyes glued to the scene, I try to imagine the innkeeper’s face as she masturbates, trying to muffle those cries of pleasure she thinks nobody can hear.
Such pretty little sounds. I’m sure she’d sound amazing at full volume.
My dick is uncomfortably hard in the confines of its metal cage that feels cold against my sensitive skin.
With my good arm, I reach down, trying to slip one of my too-thick fingers into the space between the metal bars, but it’s no use.
But my balls are so sensitive, just like the flesh protruding from the cage, uncontained. Wherever I touch, need burns my skin with its familiar urgency.
In no time, my orgasm builds to the edge, pent up for too long.
Who knows how long I’ve been here, how long I’ve been in this cage without a release?
But it’s no use.
As a muffled howl of pleasure floats from the futon, I have to content myself with the ruined orgasm that drips from the top of my inescapable chastity cage. Unsatisfied.
For fuck’s sake!
There is no relief, just frustration, and it takes every ounce of self-control I have not to express my displeasure out loud.
It’s in my best interest that Kiah doesn’t know I’m getting stronger yet.
If I move too soon, I’ll ruin my only chance of escaping.
Fucking whore!
Why does she get to have a climax, but I don’t?
Just wait until I get out of this cage. She’s going to pay.
Just wait…