16. Cassandra
16
CASSANDRA
“ Y ou’re going to leave, aren’t you,” I whisper across Rocco’s chest in the aftermath.
His lack of response is an answer in and of itself.
I trace over the lines of his tattoos, wondering if I should commit them to memory. How many more times will he let me lay next to him like this? How many women have wondered the same thing?
He said it himself: nothing serious could ever happen between us. Yet that foolish hope that maybe I could be the exception lingers.
I don’t even know if that’s what I want, yet the distance between us already feels painful even though he’s right there.
He gets up slowly, untangling me from his side as he does.
“I must return to work.”
“Right.” I try not to sound bitter.
“I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
“Cas.”
“What?”
“Look at me.”
Begrudgingly, I do. The soft expression on his handsome face is almost unbearable. “This doesn’t need to happen again.”
But God, do I want it to, though. I don’t want to stop, ever. And that’s perhaps the most terrifying truth of it all.
“It’s just physical, right?” I repeat his words back to him.
“Right.”
Still, we lay in silence for another moment before he leaves.
I try to fall back to sleep, but it cruelly evades me. Instead, I shift myself up and glance around his room which is illuminated by the gray of early morning light.
I am a little surprised by how little there is to examine, though. His bed is larger than mine, and the empty space where he was lying is almost cavernous. But aside from the bed, there’s nothing much in the room.
Two doors lead off into what I assume must be the same matching en-suite and walk-in closet as my room. The only real thing of note is the huge painting that looms on the wall opposite me.
Curious, I rise to take a closer look. I don’t know a lot about paintings, but after our discussion last night, it wouldn’t surprise me if Rocco had kept back something insanely rare for himself.
It seems to be made from some kind of oil-based paint, that much I can decipher, at least. Although there’s no real structure represented at all on the canvas, the abstract merging of line and color is intriguing.
In fact, the longer I stare at it, the more I think I might see figures hidden within the brush strokes. But as I blink, they seem to disappear once more.
The signature at the bottom is not one I recognize. Nor does it come up when I search for it on my phone.
With a sigh, I move on. Begrudgingly, I take myself back to my bedroom.
If Donatella noticed anything last night, she doesn’t comment on it when she knocks on my door several hours later.
“Shall I run you a bath?” she asks in that clipped English accent.
I groan a little in confirmation. Finally dozing off back in my own bed, I’ve woken up to find my body stiff all over. There’s no mystery as to why: Rocco’s methods in the bedroom leave no room for fragility.
It’s not something I ever thought I would enjoy, but when he pulled at my hair and squeezed at my neck, something feral came over me. It’s almost as if I subconsciously wanted to reclaim such sensations as purely pleasurable.
An interesting turn of events, but not one I care to think about too hard. Claudio barely lasted long enough to remember my own satisfaction, so it’s equally likely these tastes have always been a part of me.
“Do you have any plans for today?” Donatella drags me from my thoughts.
It’s become something of a routine since I’ve been staying here. Donatella will wake me with the offer of a bath, and we’ll make small talk until she’s bored enough to leave me to stew in the warm water alone. She always claims another errand needs her attention.
“I was thinking about staying in today, actually,” I reply sarcastically.
She doesn’t rise to the bait. “There is a great deal to watch on the television. Or else you could assist me in the kitchen if you wanted to do something more practical.”
“I think I’ll use the gym.”
“And then what?”
“I don’t know!” I turn to her, somewhat annoyed by her pestering when I’ve had so little sleep.
She matches my glare with her own. “I am at your disposal. You can do anything you want while you’re here.”
“If you’re at my disposal, why don’t you leave me alone?” I snap back.
Donatella looks me over once. “Fine. I need to prepare breakfast.”
With that, she takes her leave.
I can’t help but feel like she’s judging me. Honestly, since coming here, I’ve found little motivation to do anything other than wallow in my own self-pity.
It’s pathetic, but after everything that happened with my father, then Claudio, and now Rocco, I’ve needed the time to collect myself. To figure out where this all leaves me.
I step out of the bath and immediately go to the closet to retrieve my gym wear. Exploring the contents of the walk-in closet had taken me an entire afternoon.
To my surprise, it is equipped with a fairly even split of both men's and women’s designs in a variety of different sizes. This makes a lot of sense, but I'm close to trying on everything it has to offer and it hasn’t even been a week.
Not that it really matters, as Donatella brings me back freshly washed and ironed clothing every morning.
The day passes dangerously slowly. My boredom peaks enough to feel the temptation to answer one of the thousands of messages Mia left on my phone.
But I ignore them. Claudio’s betrayal had been enough to shake my entire world to its core. If Mia is somehow in on this, if she knew about the mafia or is somehow even a part of it, I’m not sure what I will do.
What would I even say to her? “Oh yeah, remember that guy you told me to stay away from? We’re living together while he baits my ex into exposing someone in his elite mafia billionaire circle. Also, we’re fucking now, apparently.”
It’s just physical, he said. I tell myself that’s enough, that he’s right. That anything more would not only be very, very complicated, but likely incredibly dangerous, considering his line of work.
When I see him again the next day, it’s when I catch him walking down the corridor to his bedroom.
He looks at me for a moment, then jerks his head toward his bedroom door in invitation.
And it’s stupid and careless and only going to end in pain, but...I follow him inside.
When he touches me, it feels worth it. It feels like I’m finally able to escape this goddamn place. I feel alive and wanted, Worshiped by that tongue as he explores every part of me except my lips.
It becomes our own secret game. I meet him in his bedroom, or he approaches mine. I casually straddle him on the couch, or he bends me over the kitchen counter.
We don’t talk, we don’t need to. Our bodies respond to each other almost instantly, already frustrated and in need of release. It’s pure, mindless physical abandon.
The high of it is otherworldly. It’s addictive, and I can’t help the way I’m drawn to him, how I seek him out again and again like a moth to a damn flame. But in the aftermath, I always return to that empty feeling.
I crave his kiss.
Even as he ties my hands to his bedframe and takes me so hard and so fucking fast that I see goddamn stars. There’s always a part of me that remembers what it was like to place my lips on his.
I want his hand to hold the back of my head and not let go.
“Cas?” he asks when we lie back on the soft rug of his bedroom floor. Breathless. Completely and utterly spent.
“Mmm?”
“I’m going to be away for a few days.”
Something sinks in my stomach. “Right.”
“Will you be okay here?”
I sit up, hugging my knees to my chest. “I think I can manage to get myself off without you.”
He growls, tugging me back down to him and making me giggle in the process. He pinches my sides, only making me howl louder.
I squirm away from him, but his arms entirely envelop me, pressing me back into his chest and holding me tight.
I let my eyes flutter closed at the feeling of his closeness.
“Don’t you dare.” He teases my ear with his teeth.
Dear God, this man.
I push him away, more for my own sanity than anything else. “I’ll be fine. Does this have anything to do with the rat?”
“Actually, no. I need to settle a few things in South Africa,” he admits, a careless hand running through his hair. “I’d invite you, but you’d likely be stuck on a plane the whole time.”
“A private one?” I give him a conspiratorial look.
“That we would share with many of my men,” he says as he shoots me down. “Unless you like a few spectators?”
I grimace. “Pass. Any update on Claudio?”
He shakes his head tiredly. “Nothing. It’s becoming…an issue. I’ll let you know if anything changes when I get back.”
I give him a disbelieving look. Despite our previous discussions, he hasn’t told me anything about his plans so far.
“I mean it,” he reiterates, seemingly reading my expression.
“Whatever you say.”
I go to stand up, but Rocco reaches for my hand.
“I will see you in a few days.”
To my surprise, he lifts my knuckles to his lips and kisses them softly.
It’s such a tender gesture I can almost feel myself melt at the touch.
“Try not to miss me too much,” I manage to reply before turning on my heel and walking away before I do something stupid like beg him to take me anyway.
Or kiss him.
The next day starts the same as any other. However, knowing that Rocco won’t return that evening already sets a sour tone.
It’s not until I leave the bathroom that I decide to check my phone.
As usual, there are about a hundred notifications from Mia. But something else catches my eye.
One New Message. Claudio Lazzaro.
My heart begins to thump wildly in my chest. It must be almost a month since the day he signed me away to Rocco. This entire time, I haven’t heard a thing from him. No message of remorse, no goading email calling me a slut.
Not even the pile of personal items he’d promised to send over.
With a shaking hand, I unlock my phone and read it.
“This is shit, Cas. I want to see you.”
A glance at the timestamp tells me everything I need to know about how sober he was when he messaged.
I think about ignoring it, letting him stew in the realization that he’d fucked up for as long as possible. He deserves it, after all.
But…
But Rocco doesn’t have any other leads. He hasn’t been able to get anything out of him so far, and we’re already a third of the way through our time together.
What would any of this be for if the hundred and one days pass without anything happening? I would go back to Ohio, closing this weird chapter as a fever dream.
I might not be a super-rich mafioso, but there is one thing I know how to do better than anyone else.
I can make Claudio talk endlessly about himself.
A plan begins to take root as I type back my response.
Donatella knocks on my door a moment later. “Breakfast!”
“I’m not feeling good today,” I call back, forcing my voice to sound gravelly. “I think I’m going to stay in bed and sleep it off.”
“You should still eat something.”
“I’ll eat later,” I insist.
I can almost hear her rolling her eyes through the door. “Call me if you need any medication.”
As soon as I hear her footsteps disappear, I spring into action.
In my first few days here, I’d contemplated how difficult it would be to escape out the window. I even fashioned a rope out of some of the men’s shirts from the closet. I retrieve it now, stashed in one of the drawers Donatella never bothers to look in.
Within seconds, I’m crouched on the damp ground outside. The years of sneaking out to perform at bars were finally working in my favor. And with one quick vault over the fence, I make it into the yard of the neighboring brownstone.
After so many weeks of being cooped up, I try not to spend much time reveling in the fresh air.
I don’t know where the brownstone is in Brooklyn. But as long as I can find a main road, I’ll be able to summon a cab. The jingle of too few coins in my purse reminds me to pray I’m not too far away.
There, only a few blocks away, seems to be a busier road.
I stride toward it, focused on my goal.
So much so that I don’t hear anyone approaching behind me.
“What the hell are you doing?”