When I did wake up, thunder was still booming. It was as though the weather had changed overnight into this awfulness just like my life. I couldn’t tell if it was morning or night. The windows were closed, and the lights were on. I was naked in his bed, my arms more strained than the rest of my body. One rattling tug was enough to tell me I was in cuffs again.
“Buonasera, my sweet Angel. Slept well?”
My head whipped toward his voice. He was sitting naked in a chair in the far corner of the room, an easel in front of him, and a brush in his hand. “What the fuck is this?”
“If you want me to spank you, you can just ask. You don’t have to be a bad girl and make me angry like this.”
“Where’s the fucking fun in that?”
He chuckled, painting. “A year ago you barely cursed. What happened to you?”
“You. You happened to me.”
“You know what? You’re eighteen now. Swear all you want. It’s kinda cute when it comes from you.”
“Fuck you.”
He cocked a brow at me. “Gladly, Angel. Let me finish this painting first.”
I fought back the tears threatening to burst. Was this how I was gonna live from now on? A fucktoy for this psycho, used for his pleasure whenever he wanted?
“You look so sexy cuffed to my bed I had to paint it,” he added.
I blinked. “What?”
He shifted the easel a little so I could see what he was working on. My naked body was sprawled naked in the painting, cuffed in submission. The details sick yet incredibly vivid. So alive. So real, even my wound was there.
I hated how much I loved it.
How much it turned me on.
The helplessness. The forced submission. The feeling of being used. The feeling of losing all control to a vicious monster like Tino.
I tore my eyes away, and he laughed. “So hot, vero?”
Anger rumbled in me. “What are you gonna do with that? Fuck your fist and come all over the canvas?”
His tongue darted and licked his lip as his predatory eyes devoured my nakedness. “I prefer to come all over a different canvas.”
I cringed as I remembered all the times I’d woken up with his cum in my panties, thinking it was mine. Abruptly, my pussy throbbed, like a man fucking himself to watching your naked body in your sleep when you didn’t know and then shoot his load all over your pussy and keep it there was hot as fuck.
Another clenching throb.
Fuck.
He dropped the brush and prowled toward me, stroking his erection. I yanked at the chains before, in one move, he was on top of me.
Totally incapacitating me, he feasted on my skin with his lips, tongue, teeth, hands. My breath came out hard, and my body burned with the exasperating old need for him. “Stop. Stop touching me. Stop kissing me. Stop!”
“God, Angel. Why do you keep doing this? Do I have to dip my fingers in your pussy every time to show you how wet you are for me? You need me. I’m giving you what you’ve always needed. I’ll always give you anything you need or want.” He settled between my legs and kissed my mouth. “But seriously, this behavior needs to stop. It’s exhausting. Before, you were a kid. You didn’t know better. You had no clue what was best for you so I had to make those decisions for you. You’re a grownup now. What’s your excuse?”
I couldn’t begin to fathom his logic. “What? What are you talking about? What decisions have you made for me?”
“Everything. Starting with that fucker Baldi. One of you had to off that bastard, but you were little girls. It was a hard choice for you to make, so I made it for you. Then there was the violin. Another choice I had to make when you were about to ruin your future picking the piano. And…” he parted my legs, his expression darkening, “there’s the worst decision you’ve ever made, Leo. Look what I had to do to fix that. You couldn’t make the right choice even if your life depended on it.”
He held my thighs and started to push inside me. I cried out, my knees jerking. “Wait!”
“What now?” he grumbled, losing his patience.
“Look.” I nodded at the stained sheets and the dried blood between my thighs. “I need a shower to clean all the blood first. Maybe change the sheets, too?”
I was only delaying the inevitable, but who knew? Maybe something would happen with time. Maybe he’d get distracted with something else. Maybe he’d get a heart attack all of a sudden and die.
He grunted, and then shifted on his elbows and uncuffed me. With a smile, his thumb caressed my cheek before he picked me up and headed for the bathroom.
He gave me a bath himself, thoroughly cleaning me up yet gently as if he was bathing a baby. My eyes traveled along his body—his gorgeous, muscular, tattooed body—and I couldn’t help but stare. The angels on his body made more sense now. Despite everything, it made me feel…special.
Being the object of someone’s obsession, someone as powerful and rich as a Mafia boss like Tino, was intense and dangerous and utterly frightening but…somehow beautiful. Like he was.
However, I couldn’t see him as the man that lit up my life with care and protection. He wasn’t the man that had me falling hard and fast. The man I’d long fantasized about, making love to in my dreams.
Yet there was a truth about my time with this man I couldn’t deny. I’d never felt more cherished than when I was with him.
As if he couldn’t help himself, he stopped moving the loofa over my thighs and leaned in, running his nose up my jaw. His scent surrounded me, and my pussy betrayed me for the millionth time. I was conditioned to crave him. It’d take a lot of time, a lot of healing, to reverse what he’d done to me.
If ever.
“You can touch me, Angel,” he whispered. I know how much you want it. I want you to touch me, too.”
“I don’t want to touch you. I don’t want you to touch me,” I lied.
He dropped everything in his hand and grabbed my hair, whirling it around his fist and pushed me, my face against the bathroom wall. Without a word, he parted my legs and bent me over. Then he thrust his cock inside me without warning.
I screamed so hard, but it seemed to fuel him. He slammed into me harder, stretching me, his hands rough on my scalp and hips. With a loud, tight groan, he tugged at my hair, and his fingers dug into my flesh as his warm, thick seed exploded inside me.
“You’re an animal,” I sobbed.
His rapid breaths fell on my neck. “So lucky for you, Angel.”
“Lucky?” I sobbed again.
“You don’t know much, but you gotta know by now you like it rough, naughty girl. That’s why you keep provoking me. You’re a sucker for punishment, for pain. You’re lucky you married an animal that can accommodate your needs.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Married?”
He kissed my neck, still inside me. “Certo. I don’t need a piece of paper or a wedding to make you my wife. Fuck, I wanted to propose to you since you were sixteen. I wish I had. It’d have saved us a lot of time and trouble. But it’s okay. We’re here now. A man and his woman. That’s all that matters.”
“What you’re saying is insane! Do you even love me, Tino?”
“Love?” He laughed hard. “Oh, Angel.”