Chapter 42
Get a grip, Lilly. Pull it together. I tell myself over and over as my blindfold is so damp with tears the fabric begins to cry itself. I focus on the peppermint smell, trying to pull up the comforting memories from the depths of my mind. The recollections are an endless reel of images to lose myself in.
I gasp and become paralyzed, my memories cruelly snagged away as a finger trails over my collarbone. It moves purposefully from one end to the other and then slowly, tortuously back to its starting point. He makes no sound, no other movement, just a fingertip pressed to my skin so all that rages in my ears is my shuddered breaths mingled with my pulse.
Time passes. Seconds? Minutes? I’m unsure because it feels like an eternity sitting in this suspended state of the unknown.
He sighs into the room and it hangs there like a hand waiting to smother me.
“Bellisima, vuoi essere il mio amante?” His murmured voice hits my ears, a deception to my senses because even though I don’t understand him, I know it’s sexual content. I know his voice sounds seductive, but it’s what he’s going to do to me that stops any part of my body from reacting.
“Don’t be scared, sweet Bella. I won’t hurt you.” He laughs, rich and amused, and I’m confused, trying to draw into myself and away from him because I know that laugh is a ruse to trust him. To not fight him when I’m sure he’ll violate my body. Scar my mind. Steal my soul. His laughter stops when I whimper.
“You think I lie? You think that I want to hurt this beautiful body of yours?” His voice is firmer now with a touch of anger, a result of my disbelief. The bed shifts as he gets off it, and behind my blindfold, my eyes move as if I’m watching. My ears strain to track which direction he is going. “This body is mine. Your body is mine. I do not hurt what is mine.”
I start trembling again. My toes curl and then relax, the only movement I voluntarily make under his quiet scrutiny I can’t see but can feel. Processing his words is just too much-everything too much-because all I can focus on is I’m now at this man’s mercy.
His slave.
His next whim.
“I will give your body pleasure-take the pleasure you give me willingly-”
Like hell I’ll give him anything of me. “Fuck you.” The garbled sound is out of my mouth before I can think, and I realize my mistake a second too late.
Spikes of pain light across my right breast, pinpricks that sting causing my nipples to harden instantly. My breath hitches and I arch my back in reflex to the bites into my flesh, my only reaction to combat the unexpected pain.
And I start thrashing my head from side to side as the contradiction of his words and actions hits me. He’s not going to hurt me? Then what the hell was that? My body vibrates with trepid anticipation because the silence is killing me. I want him to talk again. If he talks then maybe I won’t be obsessively focused on the silence, on the creaks of the floor, on waiting for the next blow to strike.Belonging to NôvelDrama.Org.
His hand presses on my neck, covering the entirety of it, and forces my chin up. My mind races. My body freezes. His undetected approach reaffirms my unchallenged vulnerability. Silence screams between us, our only connection his hand pressed against my throat. My lips shock apart when I feel the heat of his breath against my cheek. And yet he doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, just remains there, reminding me of his constant presence.
An unknown amount of time stretches. When he finally speaks, there is an unprovoked bite in his tone. “Do not fucking question me. Do not talk back. Is that understood?” I can’t find my voice to answer because I’m focusing so hard on trying to find the breath that he’s robbed from me. “Is that understood?” I nod my head as best as I can with his hand still pressed there. “I will fuck you as I see fit. I will use you, own you, make you mine.” I feel his tongue slide down the line of my jaw to the lobe of my ear, and I fight the shudder of revulsion that riots within. His lips brush against my skin. “And when I’ve taken everything I want from you, I will let you go.”
My head startles at his last words. “What?” The word falls from my mouth but all I hear is an incoherent mess of sound. He’s going to let me go? The question is in what condition will I be left when he’s done with me? It doesn’t matter. I can do this. I can survive this-anything-if it means I get to go home to my boys.
My moment of skeptical joy is halted when his finger begins a slow descent over my collarbone. This time he stops when it hits my midline and starts to move down between my breasts. My body shivers at the feeling- at the coarse tug of my skin against his finger, and I realize he is wearing gloves. Leather gloves, I think. The material pulls on my skin, an odd contrast to the gentle nature of the touch causing chills to dance and disquiet to own my every fiber.