Chapter 3
Antonio
When Isabella was a kid, hanging about with Matteo, I’d already been inducted into the family organization. I was too busy building my reputation to pay much notice to her. She was just there, in the background. She was a sweet girl, but at six years younger than me, she wasn’t someone I was interested in. That changed when she turned up for Matteo’s eighteenth birthday celebration looking all grown up in a gorgeous blue gown that clung to her curves. Her long, dark hair had trailed over her bare shoulders and her vivid green eyes sparkled. I was captivated, but still I waited another five years before making her mine. I was too busy establishing myself as the boss to think about marriage. When I did finally make her my wife, she ripped my fucking heart out.
Now, draped across my desk, Isabella is a vision of loveliness. Her bare ass is already a pretty shade of pink and I can’t wait to add a few red stripes with my belt. I don’t know what it is about seeing her in my ratty old t-shirt, but a primal urge to claim this woman takes hold of me. I need to make sure she understands, however, that things have changed. My protection comes at a price and she’d better be prepared to pay it.
“Relax, Bella.” She’s lying there as stiff as a board. “This will hurt more if you’re tense.”
“Isn’t that what you want?” she demands petulantly. “For it to hurt?”
“Believe it or not, I don’t enjoy the thought of causing you pain. I’m doing this because I need you to be safe and that means obeying my commands.”
She mumbles something that might have been ‘whatever.’ I should chastise her for the insolence, but Isabella has been through a lot with Rico. She hasn’t had a chance to come to terms with being back in my home either. I don’t want to overwhelm her with overly harsh discipline. The last thing I want to deal with is an emotional breakdown.
“You’re to count each stroke.” It will help Isabella to focus on what’s happening rather than allowing her mind to wander. “Understood?”
“Yes.”
I still don’t appreciate her tone. She’s a grown woman, not a recalcitrant teenager. I tap her butt with the edge of my belt and she gets the message to loosen her muscles. The moment she unclenches, I draw my arm back and bring the thick leather strap down across the full width of her perfectly rounded ass.
“Oh, ow!” Isabella shrieks. She jerks upright and then settles back down on the desk before I have to tell her to resume her position. “One.”
The second time I strike her with the belt, she hisses sharply.
“Two.” The way she moans makes my cock twitch. This spanking may prove as difficult for me as it is for her.
With the third lash across her butt, Isabella screeches loudly. Tears roll down her cheeks, but she remembers the count, spitting out the word ‘three’ at me like it’s a curse. Her flesh is a deeper shade of pink now. I raise the belt and just manage to stop myself swinging it as she reaches back to rub away the ache in her bottom.
“Get back in position.” My tone is harsh. “And do not reach behind you again, or I’ll tie you down and thrash you until you’re begging for mercy.”
Isabella’s shoulders slump, and she lowers herself back onto the hard surface. She grips the far edge of the desk so tightly her knuckles turn white. I aim for a fresh spot on the fleshiest part of her bottom for the fourth stroke. As it lands, leaving a beautiful red mark, Isabella claws at the wooden desk.
“Four,” she cries out.
She dances from one foot to the other before settling to receive a fifth stripe on her gorgeous ass. I deliver it with precision, hitting the exact spot I intended to on her left buttock. The scream she emits is almost inhuman. She bounces on her toes a couple of times and then sags against the desk.
Isabella’s reactions are a lot more dramatic than I expected. She’s not the first woman whose ass I’ve reddened, but I suspect this is a novel experience for her. In the few weeks we were together after our marriage, she was on her best behavior and I had no reason to punish her. Perhaps I should have given her an introductory spanking back then, so she’d know what it feels like.
“Five.” Her voice is little more than a whisper.
I bring the belt down once more and it cracks off her tender flesh. Isabella wails loudly and rocks her hips from side to side. Her mouth twists and her eyes screw shut. She’s hurting now. I’m about to tell her I’ll let her off with one more strike, but she speaks first, shocking the hell out of me.
“Taxi.” The word is almost inaudible through her gut-wrenching sobs.
“What?” I’m not asking her to repeat herself. I just can’t believe what she said. Does she want to leave? Would she really rather face Rico’s family than take a thrashing from me? I don’t get the chance to ask. Isabella pushes herself up off the desk. Without giving me a backward glance, she runs from the room.
It takes me a few seconds to compose myself. What just happened is bewildering. Did I really hurt her so badly she had to get away? On reflection, I don’t think I did. I’ve spanked women much more harshly in the past and not gotten such a theatrical response. Perhaps it was the act of submitting to punishment that was too much for her.
Stepping out into the corridor, I’m just in time to see Isabella turn toward the stairs. There’s a brief flash of her bare pink butt from beneath my t-shirt before she disappears from view. A better man wouldn’t experience a surge of desire on seeing the result of his discipline, but I’ve never claimed to be a good person.
As Isabella heads upstairs, I follow. Trying not to spook her further, I don’t race after her. I take my time, allowing her to get to my bedroom ahead of me. When I enter the room, she’s lying face down on the bed. Her shoulders shake as she sobs into a pillow. Fuck! Despite everything, I hate seeing her like this.
“Isabella.” I announce my presence as I walk toward her because I’m not sure she heard me come in and I don’t want to startle her. “Sit up and face me, please.”
Sniffing loudly, she does as I asked. She looks up at me, eyes red and puffy. Her cheeks are streaked with tears. Though she’s a bedraggled mess right now, nothing can diminish her beauty. It’s those vivid green eyes, the vulnerability they betray, that pull me in. An uncharacteristic urge to put an arm around my wife and offer her comfort comes over me, but I resist it. I want to have a frank conversation about what happened just now and can’t allow myself to get sidetracked.
“I’m sorry,” Isabella says before I speak. “Please don’t ask me to leave. I can’t face Rico’s family.”
“You’re my wife, Isabella. I’m not going to throw you to the wolves.”
She looks up at me with wide, scared eyes, and I realize my stance might be intimidating. I’m hovering over her with my arms folded across my chest. Shoving my hands in my pockets, I step back and lean against the dresser. It’s a more casual pose that will hopefully put Isabella a bit more at ease. While I don’t mind her being on edge, I’d prefer not to witness a complete meltdown.
“But I used my safe word,” she says.
That makes me grin. I can’t help it. What would my inexperienced wife know about safe words?
“You don’t have a safe word, Bella. I decide when a punishment is over, not you.”
“But you told me to say taxi if I wanted you to stop.”
I rub my chin thoughtfully. It seems there’s been a misunderstanding here. “I was giving you the chance to either accept a spanking with my belt or leave. It wasn’t a suggestion for a safe word.”
“I don’t get it.” The exasperation in her voice emphasizes the fact. “If I don’t have a safe word, how can I get you to stop if it’s too much for me?”
“You can’t.”
The furrowing of her brow tells me I’m going to have to be clearer about what I want from her.
“Isabella, I expect you to trust that I will realize when you’ve had enough and stop before I push you beyond your limits.”
“But I thought the submissive was the one who decided.”
I almost roll my eyes. What the hell does she think is going on here?
“You’ve been reading too many books, Bella. I’m not a Dom. I want control in the bedroom, and I will punish you when I feel you’ve earned it, but there will be no negotiations and no safe words. You’ll obey me in the bedroom and outside of it.”
She swallows so hard I hear the gulp. “You expect me to give you permission to do whatever you want to me? I’m to have no say in what happens in my life?”
I scrub a hand over my face. Does she not realize her ability to do as she wished was stripped away the moment I put a ring on her finger? As the wife of a mafia boss, she was always going to have to live within strict boundaries. The men who work under me have expectations of how she should behave and my enemies would exploit any opportunity to get to me through her. I thought I’d made that clear to her from the start.
“You’ll get the opportunity to prove yourself trustworthy and earn certain freedoms, but you’ll never be able to go out and do whatever you want,” I tell her. “I’ll be hard on you, Bella, but I’ll be fair.”
“Uh-huh.” She sounds unconvinced.
“This is your last chance, Bella. Accept how things are going to be or leave.”
Her eyes flash with irritation, an encouraging sign that the inner strength I know she possesses hasn’t been completely sapped out of her.
“You know I can’t do that.”
“Sure you can. You just have to understand that rejecting my generous offer to resume our marriage means you have to go it alone.”
Isabella casts her gaze downward. She fidgets with the hem of her t-shirt. I’m being an asshole, but it suits me to have her scared. I need her eyes to be open to the reality of her situation. Since she betrayed me, I owe her nothing. She’s lucky I’m prepared to offer another opportunity to make our marriage work.
I give her a scant thirty seconds to consider her options. “Well?”
“Okay, I’ll stay.”
I bark out a laugh. This woman has some nerve. She actually made it sound like she was doing me a favor.
“Then it’s settled and I don’t want to hear another word about you leaving, understood?”
She bobs her head up and down but that’s not good enough. I lean forward and cup a hand around my ear. “Didn’t catch that, Isabella.”
Like an angry kitten, she bares her teeth at me. “Yes, Antonio.”
“Good girl. Now, do you want to tell me what happened downstairs? Was the spanking really so painful?”
She shrugs and looks off to the side. Classic evasion. Though I don’t know my wife as well as I should, it’s clear she’s hiding something. She chews her bottom lip and stares off into the distance.
“Bella?” I prompt her.
“No, it didn’t hurt that much.” Her voice is so quiet I hardly hear her.
“So why did you run?”
She still doesn’t look at me, but the reddening of her cheeks reveals a lot. The way she squeezes her thighs together also gives her away.
“You were aroused.” I try not to sound as if I’m gloating, though I can’t deny a sense of triumph. “You enjoyed being spanked.”
Isabella lets out a slow exhale. “Yes, I did.”
“There’s no shame in that, Bella.” Her admission pleases me. “How do you feel now?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. Restless, I guess.”
“I can help you with that.”
Finally, she lifts her eyes to meet mine. The corner of her mouth quirks up with the ghost of a smile. “Really? How?”
Now it’s my turn to grin. I know exactly what she needs. “Take that t-shirt off, lie back on the bed, and I’ll show you.”