Chapter 52 Ivan
IVAN
I fist the thong and tear it from her body, and it makes a satisfying rip as the frivolous white lace snaps. Gabriella gasps, but already, a shield seems to harden over me as I ignore her and cross to the wall to switch on the light.
For a moment, I have my back to her and press the drenched thong to my nose, inhaling deep. Her arousal is the biggest aphrodisiac out there, and I curse under my breath. For all that there’s a virginal blood stain, my sweet wife, straight from the convent, isn’t as innocent as I thought.
Some shit a man needs to know before he ties the knot. This is one of them.
And what the fuck happened to her period? I’ve been counting, and those last a bit longer and toward the end, the flow isn’t this color.
Of all the things I’ve expected, a piercing never crossed my mind.
It should have. She’s from the fucking Mafia. I checked for tattoos, scarification, any other scar on her skin, but not this.
All I know is she didn’t give herself this piercing. Someone did, and I’m entitled to know who the fuck it was.
My gaze slices to hers as I turn and toss the drenched thong on the floor.
Fucking hell. She’s crying, curled into a ball, protecting herself.
As if I would hurt her. I’m an asshole, sure, but I’m not that fucker.
“Spread your legs,” I say, already reaching for my pants. This is going to be an aborted fucking mission. Not until we’ve talked. As her husband, I have a right to know.
She’s sitting up now, legs hugged to her chest, head dropped to her knees, closed up.
“Ivan—”
“Do as I say.”
I don’t repeat my first request because she heard me perfectly fine. I can imagine how she interprets my tone because she leans back, cups her hands to her face, and opens her bent legs about two inches.
I soften mentally as I take time to zip up. The visual of her just sitting there, clenched tight like she would have been in that fucking cellar, presses pause. This poor girl has been through a lot, and now this.
“Just let me have a look, moya ptichka,” I say softly, my hand gentle on her knee, applying slight pressure.
She’s breathing hard, similar to that night when she panicked about Irisha and Katya. I want to hold her, comfort her, but first, I’m getting to the bottom of this.
I trail my hand down her inner thigh, and chills spread over her skin as she opens a few more inches.
I lean in and nudge, my fingertips just shy of spreading her open between her short, dark curls.
At any other time, this could have been the hottest fucking thing since the devil spewed fire into Hell, but she’s clamping back against my touch, breathing stalled.
Fuck. She’s petrified.
“Breathe, moya ptichka, just breathe for me,” I murmur as I circle my thumb on her mound’s soft, sensitive skin, a touch that’s usually arousing, but the whole atmosphere has changed. “I’m not going to hurt you, Gabriella.”
She drags in a breath and exhales a shaky one, but doesn’t move, hands plastered to her face. Her whole body seems to quiver, tense, and all I want now is for this to be over so I can cradle her in my arms, steer us back to the path we were on before this little detour.
“One more breath,” I say softly. “And then you’re opening up for me, understand?”
A barely perceptible nod, but she pulls in a strained breath and collapses her legs. I run my fingers over her sex, watching her reaction, but she’s breathing now, nipples hard, gooseflesh spreading over her skin. She is cold, in shock.
I dip my fingers between her folds and split them wide as I lean in to look closer.
Two tips of metal, one mostly hidden by her soft curls. The most intimate of secrets. To be discovered only by her husband. She’s so fucking wet, dripping for me with lust I bet she didn’t understand before today, and my need to fuck her hasn’t abated, but this…
I feel the rounded tip of the piercing and freeze. It isn’t smooth; it definitely isn’t the usual go-to clitoral piercing.
I read its shape like braille. The little dips and valleys, a picture forming in my mind. An icy fist closes around my body, squeezing the air out of me.
No. Just no fucking way.
She clams up, closing her legs, but I’m not done.
It can’t be… It just fucking can’t.
“Gabriella,” I hiss as I clamber deeper onto the bed, a knee trapping hers as I hold her other leg down, forcing her to splay wide, my eyes focusing on every last detail of her swollen clit, the piercing and its two ends.
It’s fucking art, the finest work a jeweler could achieve, with two tiny skulls on each end of the barbell-style piercing.
My blood pressure spikes as adrenaline starts to pump through my veins. I’ve seen this type of piercing before, and it didn’t end well. And I really thought this time would be different, that I could have a chance for more than a fucked-up arranged marriage—
“Who the fuck are you?” I growl as I pull the reins on my budding anger.
“I’m Gabriella Scalera,” she manages between two shattering sobs.
“Fuck if I believe that.” This piercing is proof to the contrary. And technically, it’s Gabriella Petrova now. “Who. The fuck. Are you?” I repeat, but she only shakes her head, tears streaming.
I run my finger over her clit, slick with arousal, testing if the piercing moves, and she jolts as the pleasure wave hits her. Fuck. She’s so sensitive there. No wonder she comes in minutes.
She lets go of her face to slap my hand away. “Don’t.”
I won’t put up with this shit. She’s no challenge for me as I trap her in seconds, wrists gathered above her head, legs splayed, chest heaving, breasts to fucking die for, but tears flowing, her fear morphing into anger.
“Don’t?” I snarl, staring into her eyes. “Don’t? We’re married and I have every fucking right to touch you.”
I circle my finger around her clit again, but I’m trembling.
Unknown rage is simmering up in me, because I’ve seen one of these piercings before.
Platinum, delicate, permanent. Soldered.
No threads to untwist it and take it off.
It’s part of her body, and with the flesh closing up the only way to remove it is with surgery.
“Are you a spy? Are you here to kill me? In my fucking sleep? Once we’re in the same bed?
Or is poison your go-to? And what about my girls? You’re here for them, too?”
“No—I’m…I’m nothing of the sort.”
“No?” I smirk, but it’s fueled by rage. “What other secrets are you keeping, my little convent girl?”
A blush blooms on her cheeks, and she blinks, her body language giving away that she’s hiding more from me.
I’m shaking, livid. Walked into this blind as a bat the second time around. I must be cursed. “Tell me who sent you.”
“Nobody. I—I—”
She strains against me, but it’s a joke. She weighs probably half of my body weight, and I can hold this position forever.
“Then tell me who the fuck did this to you, because you were there, in person, conscious at some point.”
“I don’t know,” she whimpers with a wince.
In my fury, I’ve tightened my grip on her wrists, bruising her. I haven’t been careful with my weight, pressing down too hard on her knees. I let go with a string of Russian curses she won’t understand as I get off her and stalk out of the room, not looking back, slamming the door for good measure.
I need to deal with this anger first, because right now, I’m fucking dangerous.
She might not know who did this to her, but I can guess.