12. Run for Your Life.After a Snack
Run for Your Life...After a Snack
Bianca
My vagina needs a check-up and a resurrection.
“Shit,“ I groan for the second time in this abyss of a bed. The aches battering my insides aren’t in my head this time. The steady thrum between my legs is evidence of being thoroughly fucked.
I deserve a medal of valor and a long soak in the bath. That man rearranged my guts like living room furniture being repossessed. Muscles I’ve never used are crying out, questioning why I tried to play him in the first place
Everything about “Sir Bennici” screamed danger. The warning in his dark brown eyes was trained on my pleasure, and the hard ridges of his chest pressed against my back.
Sir Bennici.
Tuh!
I still don’t know his government name. Watch it be Thiago or Cornelius.
We’re in Sicily.
Pietro then.
Dick drunk is the only justifiable reason I chanted “Sir” while he railed into me.
He stroked places no man or toy has touched.
Just planted his flag between the walls he claimed and shot me to the moon.
Had I not woken myself up from hollering in snores, I’d still be passed out in this bed, risking my life.
Once “Sir” finds out he put the wrong Bianca through the mattress, there’s no telling what he’ll do.
“Time to go.” I will my joints from the firmest mattress I’ve ever screamed into. Rumpled silk slithers down my skin. The room isn’t freezing, but I’m not waltzing out of here butt naked.
“Where are my clothes? I know they didn’t grow legs,” I huff, a hand on my hip and every ounce of attitude animating my neck.
Did he leave naked? His clothes are missing too.
His staff is in for a treat if the answer is yes. I bet he talks his employees through it, all mean and serious.
I’d scrub every floor twice off the memory of that ass and the happy trail to the length that left me drooling. The dick alone had me in a chokehold, constricting my airways with a force that made speaking in tongues a new language.
Thick, dark, and veiny.
Not you describing a Snickers!
The closet stirs awake under motion-sensor lights.
“Someone has a hard-on for black,” I mumble to the walls and lacquered wood floors matching the bedroom.
Panels illuminate curtains of custom suits.
I settle on a two-piece navy set and a black button-down.
The blazer hangs below my hips, holding up pants skimming the floor.
I tuck the shirt in and throw on a pair of dress socks.
Shoes are a no-go, unless I want the entire house to hear me clomping around in search of an exit.
“This will have to do,” I say to my reflection in a full-length mirror.
I grab the euros off the nightstand and pop my head out the door to the suite. A large fresco hangs from the ceiling. Pastels swirl with intricate gold over a suspended chandelier.
I squint at the hallway illuminated in sconces and Queen Charlotte finishes. “What kind of Liberace shit is this?” I spin in a slow circle, head tipped at heaven on the ceiling with baby angels.
Going from Wednesday Addams to the Italian Renaissance is a choice.
Either Sir Bennici has a fetish for grand country estates or is an actual sir, like one of those knights of the high court.
What if he lives with his mother or a regal granny who sips tea from hand-painted porcelain while petting a poodle with more curls than Eric LaSalle in Coming to America?
Forget him and his granny’s Jheri curls.
I’m not calling him “Sir Bennici.” Benny will have to do.
The tips of my toes press into aged marble, my head on a constant swivel. I follow a flight of stairs with an iron railing. On the lower floor, vacant rooms connect via doorways dressed with molding. There are no windows, clocks, or people.
Huh.
I expected guards, a staff scurrying around like ants, or Alfred. Something.
The belch in my stomach roars with a gurgle. I need an Advil and food. A burger or the entire cow, the way my bruised guts touch my back. The sardine pasta was good, but it wasn’t enough.
A parlor and a series of open rooms blend with decorative wallpaper.
The kitchen is down a separate hall and could double as a chapel.
Limestone scales the walls to reach tall windows framed in molding.
The floor is a testament to whoever keeps the marble buffed.
Not a scuff mark or speck of dust in sight.
Modern steel appliances are on opposite sides of an island three times the size of Vince’s in his restaurant. Behind it is a recessed altar with sculpted pillars and a mural painting.
Consecration before dinner.
“Something for the road.” A piece of cheese and I’m out.
I pull one of the two refrigerators open and sigh. Fresh fruits, vegetables, and cured meats on a platter wink. The tray has no time to breathe before I’m fondling mangoes and salami with olives.
“Shondala, two Camrys, and a Honda,” I moan into another olive. Bursts of salty flavor coat my tongue.
A thud startles me from eating the ass out of this refrigerator. My brows hike, my mouth too stuffed with food to scream.
The good news is I didn’t kill Bane.
The bad news is he’s here.
Hands clenched and nostrils flared, his muscles strain what little neck is visible in his all-black suit.
“You’re alive,” I mumble over a hard swallow. “Are you here for a meeting?”
Wrong question.
Veins streak across Bane’s forehead before he charges me.
My legs groan at the sprint to the other side of the island.
I shriek, the tremors in my voice rising an octave.
Under any other circumstance, I’d grab a chair to stand on and square up.
Judging by the slow death he wants me to experience, flaring in his eyes, it’s safer to get my ass on.
“Bane, stop. You tried to tase me first!” I shout in Italian, shifting left when he moves right. “Your boss will have something to say if you put hands on me. I’m wearing his suit.”
He stills. His eyes drop to the tailored suit free-falling from my body.
“Take me to him.” I shift closer to his figure decorating the stainless steel counter in shadows. “Please.”
The cautious smile I offer defuses Bane’s glare enough for him to grunt. He nods at the door.
“After you,” I say, voice shaky. “I don’t know where to go.”
With another grunt, he moves toward the entrance, giving me his back.
“Sorry about this,” I whisper.
My hand curls around a cast-iron skillet on the stove, and I swing for a home run. The durable pan collides with the back of his shiny head. He tips forward, his temple clipping the edge of the island before he face-plants.
At least he didn’t pee himself.
I step between his outstretched arms and legs to check his pulse. He’s shooting my ass for real once he wakes up.
The times I cackled at Olivia Pope breaking free from her makeshift cell come back to haunt me. She was running for her life, looking like she’d survived a Looney Tunes blast. Now here I am, running for my damn life while on vacation.
Behind the door is a hall of stone and a spiral staircase that I take two steps at a time.
The air shifts, filling the long corridor with a stale hint of musk.
I frown at the metal doors with matching padlocks along the left side.
At the end of the hall is a single door, padlock-free.
Maybe it’s an exit…or one of those garages with twelve cars and the keys on a mounted board.
The thought of a cold dungeon with pliers and an embalming kit has me doubling back to the staircase. They probably kill people down there. If Bane is still knocked out, I’ll slip out the front door, assuming no armed guards are around and there’s no iron gate I need to scale.
I struggle to touch my toes without cramping. There’s no way in hell I’m climbing over three flights of stairs, let alone a damn fence with no help.
The door at the top of the staircase creaks.
Shit, shit, shit.
Why can’t I have a normal trip?
“I just wanted sunshine, a beach, some dick, and a few keychains,” I grumble back down the rest of the steps. “The Griswolds went through less!”
My thighs burn in a sprint to the door in the distance. Wealthy people have lots of cars. Lots of cars need somewhere to park. I’ll borrow one and drive it to the authorities. They’ll take the keys and I’ll get my life back.
I squeak at the shouts pelted at my back. “I’m staying in the house for the rest of eternity. Fuck this for real!”
My body wants to roll over and play dead. A cliff could be behind the door I’m running toward, but the unknown is safer than whoever is chasing me.
“I’m not.” Pant. “Going out.” Pant. “Like this.”
I sink low and brace my shoulder for impact.
The door tosses me on my ass.
“Ouch.” I wince at the fire spreading across my tailbone.
Plan B.
I crawl on, my hands and knees cussing at me in common sense. Cold metal glides between my fingertips as I grip the handle and turn. I flip over and meet six pairs of eyes in a room of brick and steel.
Crimson streaks cross polished concrete in thick, angry strokes. I swallow a sharp inhale of disinfectant, searing my chest under Benny’s glare. It hardens, tightening the jaw I gripped to ride each of his thrusts.
He stands in the middle of five men, his shoulders low in an all-black suit. The edges are rolled up to his forearms, inked in tattoos and the same crimson from the floor.
I’ve witnessed his danger. Tasted it. Survived it. This is different.
My attention shifts from his legs, coated in lean muscle, filling out his suit, to the hacksaw in his hand. Covered in blood.
I’m sorry, what?
“I’m a little busy, Trouble.” Benny’s brows dip. “Is that my suit?” His tone is even, with zero care for the damn saw in his hand.
What. The. Fuck?!
“Mm-mm.” I shake my head slowly, my eyes wide, unable to look away.
Just test drive him once.
Let him put you through a mattress.
You’ll be fine.
Lies!
My elbows give out, tipping my gaze from the man who’d pummeled me into his high Egyptian thread count to a body suspended from the ceiling.
Metal hooks tear through motionless flesh. A head lolls to the side at a weird angle, matted auburn hair clinging to a forehead in clumps. Gashes in the torso dripping blood onto the floor clog a scream in my throat.
My lips part, but nothing comes out.
“Bianca,” Benny calls out.
I fall back on my hands, legs flailing to push me out of the room.
Jagged concrete in the hallway scrapes across my palms, which eventually land on Italian leather.
I follow the pleated black pants up to a blazer and a cleft chin engraved with a scowl.
His crooked nose and the scar across his brow are unfamiliar. His voice scratches at a memory.
He says something to Benny in the same language Alfred first spoke to me, which I now assume is Sicilian. Benny’s eyes shift from the gargoyle’s to mine.
“You beat Simone unconscious with a skillet?”
“Oh shit,” a man next to him chuckles.
The corner of Benny’s quirked mouth falls at Gargoyle’s mention of Diana Peretti.
That can’t be good.
He sighs and with a sneer says, “What a disappointment. Take her.”
What?
I scramble to my feet and lift my hands. “Wait!” I’m not trying to end up like that man on the ceiling.
Gargoyle pulls me into his chest and drags me out of the room spritzed in torture and commercial-grade cleaner.
“I’m not her!” My plea bounces around the cold hall. Benny’s emotionless figure shrinks.
“Help me!” I scream in Italian and English, gripping the side of one of the steel doors that Gargoyle snatches open. He pulls my hips and grunts at the hail of elbows I rain down.
“Let me go!”
I had Benny’s penis in my mouth—however many hours ago that was—and this is how it ends? The least he could do is hear me out before he clips my fingers off like I’m some stranger.
You are some stranger.
I’m never going on a solo trip again!
I scream before a sharp prick pierces my neck. My fingers ease apart on the door as my head slumps over Gargoyle.
“I didn’t want to do this again, but I used a smaller dose,” he says into my ear.
“You. Bitch,” I slur.
Everything goes black.