Chapter 19
GIANA
“ A urelio. What are you doing here?”
A smile spreads across his mouth, and it’s not exactly friendly. It’s an ugly smile with too many teeth and unsavory intent. “To see you, of course, my beautiful fiancée.”
I cringe. “I made it clear we’re to wait until the divorce is final.”
He slips his hands into his pants pockets. “You moved back in with your daddy. I think gossip’s already buzzing about how you chose the better man. Besides, I want to spend some quality time with you.” His gaze slithers from my face to my toes. “And you dressed for the occasion. Do you like it? I chose it just for you.”
My head spins. “You sent me the dress?”
“Who else?” He frowns. “Unless…you thought it was your ex-husband.”
“Not yet.”
“But soon.” He looks at me like I’m a piece of meat he’s about to tear into—his eyes cold, flickering with a mix of satisfaction and cruelty. I’m suddenly hyperaware of all the skin this dress isn’t covering.
“You need to leave,” I say. “I don’t want gossip spreading like wildfire around town.”
He smirks. “Baby doll, you’re all dressed up for getting to know me on a personal, sexy level. Since you’re used goods, I was thinking of a taste, a little sample. As a woman who’s been around the block, I don’t think you’ll mind.”
“Screw you,” I grit.
He comes up, and I take a step back. “I don’t know what they taught you in the Del Rossa house, but in my world, wives respect their husbands.”
“I’m not your wife yet.”
“Never too early to learn the right ways. My way.”
A shiver moves down my body as his gaze drops to my cleavage, and he sucks on his bottom lip, leaning his head to the side, and reaches up. But I move back just as he’s about to touch my breast. “Don’t touch me.”
“Oh, sweetheart, don't be coy.” Aurelio comes in closer, forcing me against the wall, and takes a lock of my hair, breathing it in. “Next time, perfume it. Your shampoo is nice, but I like spice. I’ll get you some sexy perfume so you can layer up.”
“You want me to smell like a high-class hooker?”
“Aren’t you? I mean, your pimp sold you twice now. Technically, three times, since he went back on the original deal he made with my father.”
He smells like bergamot orange and tobacco, and I instantly develop an aversion to it.
“Your dad isn’t really…business savvy, is he?”
“Just like you’re not up to standard when it comes to social skills.”
Abruptly, he grabs my hands, and I struggle as he pins my wrists above my head.
I grit my teeth as he glances down my front, the dress gaping between my breasts.
“Let. Me. Go.”
“Next time, Giana,” he rasps, “no bra. I like access to the goods at all times. And make no mistake, you are goods. As your husband, your tits, ass, mouth, cunt are mine. To do with what I want when I want.”
“Nice,” I say, unable to stop myself. “Is this why you have to buy a wife?”
“I’ll let that slide. This time.” He snakes an arm around my waist to pull me against him, and I can feel his erection as he grinds it against me.
My stomach heaves.
“Just a little bird in a cage, aren't you?” He flexes his hips again, and I’m swallowing bile. “Learn how to sing to my tune, and everyone has a good, safe time.” The threat is there, loud and clear—the reminder of who’s in charge. This isn’t a battle of wills like Caelian and me. This is a dictatorship. A landslide victory…for him.
I need to be quiet, docile, play my part exactly right, or my sacrifice will be worth nothing.
“You agreed to our deal. After the divorce, after our wedding, I’m yours.” The word wedding, the tone of my voice, make me shudder inwardly. They all make me want to puke.
He grins, lets me go, and helps himself to a drink, filling a glass with dark amber, piercing the room with the dried fruit aromas of the spiced dark rum Dad has but rarely drinks.
Aurelio knocks it back, then glances around. “When all this is mine, I might remodel. What do you think? Something modern? Or strip it bare and use this place as a torture den for my enemies.”
I clench my fist. “You should go.”
“I should do what the fuck I want.” He refills and tosses his second glass back, too. Then he lets the glass slip out of his hand, the heavy crystal hitting the rug, but it doesn’t break.
I’m barely breathing as I watch him lean against my father’s cocobolo desk—his favorite, most expensive one.
Every instinct is screaming at me to run, to get away from him, but what would that accomplish? All of this ends with me as his wife, and where will I run then?
“You’re a beautiful woman, Giana.”
Bile rises.
His leering gaze moves to my breasts in this ugly dress. “The fact that he’s already fucked you should disgust me.” A woman can hope. “But, truth is,” his eyes find mine, “I can’t wait to fuck you. And I can’t wait to fuck Caelian’s stench from you.” This time he straightens and stalks me. “Because by the time I’m done with you on our wedding night, you won’t remember his name. I’ll have fucked and erased every last trace of that ugly cunt’s touch from you.”
My stomach twists, knots pressing against my ribs. My heart is beating so fast, I’m sure it’ll rip out of my throat at any second.
“I have an idea. We could get started now.”
I want to tear his flesh with words. Find a gun, pistol-whip him. I want to punch his face, as hard as I can. Harder than I know I ever could. I want him to bleed and beg me to forgive him for saying such things. But while I’m no pushover and I’m really struggling not to make one of those things a reality, I have to stay calm. If I fight him, I’ll only taunt the beast he is. Make it all twenty times worse…if that’s possible.
I’m just not sure how, because I’ve never been that girl—the one to roll over and play dead.
“Maybe we’re not suited,” I say, keeping my voice flat. “There are so many more women from other, more powerful families, Aurelio, who’ll be the perfect wife for you.”
“I don’t want them. I want the one promised to me.”
“I’m not good wife material.” My jaw tics. “Not even Caelian wanted someone like me.”
“Shut your mouth.”
Immediately, I know it was the wrong thing to say, but that’s my point. I’m not a docile mafia wife in the making. It’s why I ran, why my so-called relationship with Caelian is in shambles. There isn’t a single ounce of obedience or compliance in me.
“Besides it’s not the amount of power, it’s what someone has, and the alliances and people your father owns. Gateways for me and my interests.” He stalks up to me. “Your father’s power with mine will combine and make me an equal to the Dark Sovereign. They’re already weak, with me taking out Alexius.”
“You didn’t take Alexius out. He’s not dead.”
His hand is around my throat, squeezing. “Permission is needed to fucking talk,” he grits. “I pulled the trigger, shooting one of the most powerful dons in this entire goddamn country. I’m already amassing allies. And your father has certain… assets …that once in my hands put me in a position to destroy that family, take their shit, and take Chicago. Or I can destroy your brother. Your choice.”
My blood freezes. “We had a deal. You don’t touch my brother.”
“The deal,” he says, “is you do whatever I want.” Then he smiles as his gaze travels over my face. “Fail to do so, and our deal is off.”
The cold realization of my situation suddenly grips me, and I grit my teeth. Caelian was right. Aurelio has no intention of keeping his end of our deal.
He’s studying me now, like I’m livestock he plans to purchase and wants to make sure I’m all fattened up and healthy first.
“Hmm,” he muses, circling me. “Some things will have to change. Your hair, it needs some red, something to liven you up a bit. You definitely need to wear more make-up, have those plump cherry lips of yours always painted pretty for me.” He stops and leans in from behind, causing me to shiver. “I like lipstick stains around my cock.”
He grabs me, hauls me in, and kisses me, wet, opened-mouthed, his tongue sliding over my lips. It’s like a dead slug, and I shove at him, desperately wiping every trace of him off my mouth.
Something snaps. I’m unsure whether it’s fear, anger, or a little bit of both. But I feel a wave of reckless defiance wash over me.
I whip around, meeting his smug stare with a fierce glare of my own. “You might think you own me because of a little piece of paper, a ring on my finger, and a five-second fuck on our wedding night. But make no mistake, I will never be yours.”
Pure rage explodes across his expression. He comes in fast, calculated, and hits me across the face, sending me reeling back under the crack of his hand, the explosion of pain, the stinging, throbbing heat.
I hit the floor, gasping for breath. The room spins around me in a dizzying whirl of colors and shapes. I can taste blood, metallic and bitter, on my tongue.
It hurts, but the shock hurts more. And the moment I look up at him towering over me, witnessing the look of glee on his face, I know two things. One, he held back. Two, he gets off on hitting women.
I should simper, or at the least, be quiet. Apologize—my brain short circuits at that. No. I’ve got nothing to apologize for.
“Does that make you feel like a big man? Hitting women?” I snarl, as I clamber to my feet. “Because it does quite the opposite. Caelian’s right. You have a small dick.”
“You fucking whore!” He grabs my hair, dragging me to my father’s desk.
“Let me go, or I swear I’ll make you regret it.”
“You?” He laughs, his other hand digging into my arm as he pushes me face-first into the desk, pinning my head down, his hips shoved against me.
He’s hard.
“You’ll make me regret it? You’re nothing more than an ex-Del Rossa whore whose father traded her to save his son’s life.” His grip on the back of my neck tightens, spit flying from his lips and hitting my cheek. “Baby doll, I control your brother’s fate. I control your fate. So you better learn how to control that cunt mouth of yours or there’ll be some nasty, bloody consequences.”
He lets me go, and I struggle to sit up when something metal and warm is pressed into my temple.
Everything in me lurches. A gun? Did he pull his gun on me?
“Stay down.”
“Not much of a wife for you and your dealings if you blow a hole in my head, you coward.”
He smacks the back of my head with the barrel, and I cry out. The pain is excruciating, stars bursting behind my eyes, and through the ringing in my head, panic and anger surge in equal measures.
The gun’s still pressed against my temple, and my stomach lurches when he bunches the skirt of my dress around my waist.
I’m not wearing panties. I didn’t put any on when I slipped into the dress after my shower. I’m completely exposed.
“Oh, now, this doesn’t need any changing at all. No panties. I like it.”
A single tear escapes my eye as his rough hand trails over my bare ass, sending shivers down my spine. The fear that grips me is unlike anything I've ever felt before, a bone-chilling terror that seeps into every fiber of my being.
My mind screams for action, fight or flight, but my body remains paralyzed, frozen under his touch. It's a fear that threatens to break me from the inside out.
“Aurelio, stop!” I thrash and jerk. “You need me, so put that fucking gun away and take your hands off me!”
“You’re right. I do need you.” He kicks my legs apart, and a sob rips from my soul. “But I don’t need your brother. Remember that.” His hand is between my legs, and he runs a finger along my cleft.
“No!” I scream, thrashing. “Don’t touch me!”
“Soon, you’ll beg for my touch.”
My world implodes when he shoves a finger into me. Rough. Brutal. Violating. It hurts. I can feel his nail scratching against my delicate flesh.
“We’re gonna have to do something about this dry pussy.” His finger thrusts and drags at me as he does so. “Soon I’ll have your cunt wet for me…even if I have to use your goddamn blood to do it.”
“Please,” I cry, “please stop. You’re hurting me.”
Aurelio doesn’t. He grows more vicious, wiggling and shoving a second finger in there, but I’m too dry, and it seems to stop him getting all the way in.
“Goddammit, Aurelio. Stop!” Tears are hot, searing, my body aching everywhere at once.
From somewhere close, I hear a sound. A door, footsteps, and I scream, “Help! Help me!”
“Maybe,” Aurelio says, “I’ll let you get gangbanged on our wedding night. I know people. We can teach you submission. Just one night and we’ll break you in.”
“Someone, please! Help me!”
There’s a shadow that breaks the light shining underneath the door. I can’t quite make it out, but I’m desperate. I need help, and I know whoever that is heard me, yet…the shadow doesn’t move.
It just…stays there. And for a bone-chilling moment I realize that whoever that is, they’re not going to help me.
While Aurelio’s fingers are violating me, this monster on the brink of raping me, all I can think about is that shadow. It can’t be security because they’ll bust in after hearing me scream. Cristiano, too. That only leaves one person.
My father.
The shadow disappears, and something inside me, something profound, breaks. He had to have heard my screams. My cry for help.
Yet he…he walked away.
Suddenly everything around me turns hazy. Aurelio’s voice. His hands. His fingers inside me. It fades into something dark, a terrifying emptiness that swallows my senses. The pain is there, the fear, but it feels distant and unreal, like I’ve fallen into a nightmare, and I can’t wake up.
Aurelio manages to shove his fingers deep. Then he mutters something, tone disgusted. I don’t say a word as he rips his fingers from me and takes me by the hair, tossing me to the ground.
I curl around myself.
“Thank me,” he demands, and I force myself to look at him even if the sight makes me sick. “I could have fucked you on your daddy’s desk, claimed what will be mine soon enough, but I didn’t. So, thank. Me.”
Tears stream down my face, dripping from my jaw onto my naked arms.
“Fuck. You,” I bite out, shivering, and he kicks me hard in the midsection, every ounce of breath exploding out of me. The pain is indescribable, and I’m nothing but a tiny ball of broken pieces on the floor.
“I’m going to have fun beating some manners into you. When all this is over, you will be the epitome of an obedient, submissive wife. I’m going to make a prime example out of you.”
He crouches next to me, arms on his knees, smiling like the sight of a woman in agony gives him pride. “Next week, there’s an event I want to go to. It’s important. Deals will be made. We’ll have our first public outing as a couple.” Then he reaches into his pocket and dumps a box on me. “Wear that from now on.”
The sound of his footsteps as he leaves echoes like a countdown in the room, and the second I hear the door slam, I wail.
I don’t cry. I don’t sob. I fucking wail like someone had just torn the flesh from my body.
Every ounce of me screams in agony, releasing a pain I never knew existed, a pain I never knew I could feel.
It’s not about what Aurelio had done. Even though it’s disgusting and vile, I can deal with his groping and shoving of fingers. His threats. I agreed to marry him, knowing he’s a monster.
I’m in agony because today…my father died. The man who read me bedtime stories when I was little, bounced me on his knee, danced me with me on his feet, snuck into my room to bring me milk and cookies when I was supposed to be asleep, that man died today. And now I’m living in this house with a stranger.
I try to get up, but my knees are weak.
“Get up, Giana,” I say to myself. “Get the fuck up.” With trembling legs, I manage to pick myself up from the floor.
I’m lightheaded, not sure whether it’s from the blow to the head or just a mash-up of everything that’s happened. My legs are weak. My hands are shaking. And on the inside…everything is raw and red and infected.
Everything in me is screaming for Caelian. My soul is crying for him. I need him. His embrace. Comfort. I’ve always fought against being a damsel in distress, but right now I want to run to him, have him save me. But that only happens in fairy tales, something my life is not.
I grab the jewelery box Aurelio dropped, then go up to my room where I strip, toss the dress back into the box, screaming as I shove it outside—my pain now morphing into an anger that’s red-hot and consuming.
I lock the door and get into the shower, not waiting for the water to heat up. I stay there for so long, the water goes from cold to scalding hot, and then cold again. I’ve washed and scrubbed his touch from me. But the bitterness bubbling inside, the angry lick of fury, that remains, grows, until it’s all I feel.