9. Livia #2
I wanted to surrender. Just for a second, I wanted to let him take the weight of the world off my shoulders and pin me to that mahogany desk.
I dunk the brush into the dirty water again, violently angry with myself. I am weak.
It is nearly eight in the evening when I am finally carrying my bucket and brushes back toward the utility closets near the staff lounge. The hallway is quiet. The only sound is the sloshing of the dirty water in my bucket.
As I approach the slightly ajar door of the staff lounge, the sound of hushed, excited voices drifts out into the corridor.
I stop. I don't want to walk past them. I don't want to give Gia another opportunity to shoulder-check me into the wall. I press my back against the expensive wallpaper, intending to wait until they leave the room.
"Did you see the fabric samples that came in today?" a maid named Elena asks, her voice breathless with excitement.
"I saw them," Gia replies, a smug, arrogant lilt to her tone. "Silk from Milan. Real lace. It’s going to be the wedding of the decade. The entire eastern seaboard is going to be there."
"I can't believe it's actually happening," Elena sighs. "I heard the Don broke a man’s jaw at a meeting yesterday just because he questioned the guest list."
I frown, my grip tightening on the plastic handle of the bucket. A wedding?
"Well, it’s about time," Gia says. I hear the sound of a chair scraping against the floor. "The alliance with the Falco family is too important. Don Roberto has been pushing for this marriage for three years. Don Niccolò is finally stepping up."
The bucket slips from my fingers.
It hits the floor with a loud, hollow thud. Dirty water splashes over the sides, soaking into the runner rug.
My heart stops. It doesn't just stutter; it completely ceases to beat in my chest.
"Caterina Falco," Elena says, the name dripping with awe. "She’s practically mafia royalty. Have you seen her? She is stunning. And she’s going to be the Don’s wife. The Lady of this house."
"Of course she is," Gia sneers, and I can practically hear her looking in the direction of my quarters.
"Did anyone actually think he would marry some street rat? Men like Niccolò Severato play with their food, Elena. But when it’s time to sit at the head of the table, they only marry their own kind.
Caterina is his equal. Everyone else is just a temporary stain on the sheets. "
I can't breathe.
The air in the hallway turns to solid ice in my lungs. My vision tunnels, the edges of the corridor turning a blurry, static black.
Caterina Falco. Engagement. Wife.
I press my hand flat against my chest, right over my sternum, trying to hold my ribcage together. A sharp, agonizing, violently physical pain tears through my core. It hurts worse than the bruises from the police raid. It hurts worse than Gia’s vile words about my mother.
Why does it hurt?
I squeeze my eyes shut, a hot, furious tear leaking past my lashes.
Why does this hurt?
Because I am an idiot. Because I am a weak, pathetic fool who let a monster play a trick on her mind.
I think back to my pathetic, humiliating fantasies just twenty minutes ago. I was scrubbing his floors, getting wet over the memory of his body against mine. You hate me. Then why is your heart beating so fast?
He made me feel seen. He stripped away the terror and replaced it with this dark, consuming heat. He made me feel like I was the only thing in the room that mattered.
And it was all a lie.
It was a game. A calculated, sadistic manipulation to get me to lower my guard. He isn't my twisted protector. He isn't a savior who recognized the survivor in me. He is an engaged man playing with a captive toy while he waits for his mafia bride to walk down the aisle.
The humiliation is absolute. It burns through my veins like battery acid, destroying whatever fragile, terrifying attraction had started to take root in the dark corners of my mind.
I am a temporary prisoner. I am a maid. I am a body he bought out of a holding cell to keep his bed warm until the real Queen arrives.
I open my eyes.
The blurry, static darkness clears. The tear on my cheek goes cold. I don't wipe it away. I let it sit there as a reminder of my own stupidity.
I reach down and pick up the bucket. My hands aren't shaking anymore. The panic is gone, entirely incinerated by a cold, protective fury.
I turn around and walk away from the staff lounge.
As I walk down the long, empty corridor toward my assigned room, I build back the iron wall. This wall is made of titanium. It is built on reality.
Niccolò Severato is not a man. He is a warden.
He is a predator who orchestrated my ruin just to own my time.
I will not look at his broad shoulders. I will not inhale the scent of his bergamot cologne.
I will not let his dark, obsidian eyes convince me that he possesses a soul.
I will not let my body betray me ever again.
I will wake up at six in the morning. I will wear the black dress. I will pour his bourbon and I will scrub his floors. I will endure the cruelty of Gia and the coldness of Marta.
I will survive the next three hundred and fifty-nine days.
And when the contract expires, I will walk out of those heavy iron gates, and I will never look back.
He wants compliance? I will give him exactly that. I will be the perfect, silent, hollow maid. I will give him my labor, but he will never, ever get another genuine reaction from me for as long as I live in this house.