7
Cristina
It’s fully dark when Damian returns more than an hour later. One of the women is finishing packing her things while the other puts the final pin into my hair to hold the veil in place. It drags along the floor behind me, and I can’t help but think it’d be pretty under different circumstances.
The dress itself is close fitting made of a soft organza silk, like the white dress he had me wear to that party that wasn’t a party at all. It reaches my ankles and has long trumpet sleeves and a high neck with a section of lace that matches the veil across the bodice. A dangerously high slit runs along the front of my right thigh, and with every move, I’m very aware of how naked I am underneath. Just like the other night.
Damian’s request.
No, not request. Damian’s requirement.
Dick.
I drop the lace of the veil I’m holding on to and look up at him as the woman steps away. She gives him a coquettish smile that makes me want to punch her.
He’s wearing black on black. Fitting.
My eye is drawn to the cuff link he adjusts, a deep red jewel to match the red diamond on my ring, and in his lapel is a single blood red rose so much like the roses he sent me must once have been. This one, though, isn’t dead.
It’s striking, all that black and the blood red against it.
He’s striking.
But tonight, so am I. And I see the impact in his eyes as they lock on mine for a long minute before sliding over me.
The idiot woman starts to talk.
“Get out,” he says, cutting her off without looking away from me.
She looks shocked but recovers quickly. They both scurry, all heels and hair and perfume disappearing out of the room.
He steps toward me.
I don’t back up. I lick my lips instead as I tilt my head back to look up at him. He stands so close I feel the heat of his body. Mine thrums along with the strange vibration coming off him. Almost like our bodies have their own ritual, a sort of mating dance.
He lowers his gaze to the lace bodice. The fingertips of his right hand find my hip, grazing the curve of it up over the arc of my waist. He meets my eyes before wrapping his fingers around to my lower back, the flat of his hand spanning the width of it as he tugs me close. I can feel him, feel his erection against my belly.
And I want him.
“You start something in me,” he says, grinding against me. “I’m going to start it in you.”
Before I can speak, he pushes me backward, so I drop onto the bed, half lying on my elbows.
He crouches down between my legs.
I look at his dark head, unable to move away. He grips a hip with one hand while with the other, he pushes the slit of the dress over and up. All it takes is a few inches to expose me, and the sudden cold makes me gasp.
Damian drags his gaze from my pussy to my eyes, then back.
I’m laid out like a feast. A feast for him.
All I can do is watch as his hands come to either side of my pussy. A little pressure and I’m open to him. He looks at me. Just looks at me. I bite my lip, but I can’t close my legs. I don’t want to. Instead, I feel the heat of his gaze, feel the damp between my legs.
Without a word, he closes his mouth over my clit. His tongue is wet and soft, the sucking motion making me gasp as I drop my head back and bite my lip, drawing blood.
He licks the length of me from one hole to the other, then flicks my clit with his tongue. Just when I think I can’t take another moment, when I’m on the edge of orgasm, he’s up on his feet, pulling me to mine.
I stumble.
He wraps a powerful arm around my lower back, cradling me, holding me to him as he looks at me with his nearly black eyes. His lips glisten, and I smell myself on him. When he kisses me, I open to him, tasting myself, and as wrong as it is, I want more.
I want him to finish what he has started more than once.
I want to come. Want him to make me come. It’s not the same when it’s my fingers doing the work.
He pulls back with a grin.
I’m breathless, clinging to his shoulders to stay upright.
“I’ll finish you tonight.” He kisses me again, then steps backward. “After I’ve made you my wife.”
I only remember the phone I’m somehow still holding in my hand when his hand closes over mine, and he relieves me of it.
“No,” I start, almost like I’m coming out of a trance.
“You’ll get it back after the ceremony. It’s yours. Now let’s go. The vultures hunger for their feast.”
With his arm around my lower back, we walk out of the room and through the house, down the stairs to the main floor where a fire burns in every fireplace and music plays from invisible speakers. Candles are lit and a meal that should make my mouth water, makes my stomach turn instead.
We walk through the dining room where we ate a few days ago and into the large kitchen where several staff are hard at work.
Damian takes off his jacket, and before I can figure out what’s going on, he drapes it over my shoulders, and we’re outside.
It’s a clear night, colder than I’ve felt in a long time. I shiver even with his jacket on my shoulders and his arm around me.
I hurry to keep up in my high heels as he leads me over a path that’s only recently been cleared to a small stone building in the distance. I realize it’s the chapel as we near it. I can smell incense.
God. How long as it been since I’ve smelled incense? I haven’t been inside a church in ages. Since the funerals. After those, I’d had enough of churches to last me a lifetime.
The warm glow of lights comes through the two windows at the front and the deep red stained glass above the door. It’s the crucifixion scene.
Someone begins to play the piano inside.
Damian climbs up the stairs, taking my hand to draw me along with him as my attention is absorbed by that window. When he pushes what appears to be an ancient door open, I can make out that the pianist is playing “Ave Maria.”
All the faces inside turn to us. To me.
Damian slips his jacket off my shoulders and draws the lace over my head to cover my face, skewing my view. Shielding me from them. When he pushes a small bouquet into my hand, I have no choice but to accept but wince instantly and drop the flowers.
Blood red roses litter the floor at my feet, their thorns uncut. I look at him, and he just watches me. I want to ask him why he would do that. But I look down again and remember the dead roses that littered the marble floor of my uncle’s house.
Blood on white marble. Blood on stone. Always blood with him.
I touch my finger to his mouth and smear the drop of blood over his lips. I don’t know why I do this. Don’t know what I expect.
He licks his lips, and I think he likes the taste of it. The taste of my blood.
The music changes to a bridal march. How out of place.
I turn again to face the altar where, through the pattern of the silk, I see the waiting priest in all his robes. In the front pew sits a woman and a young boy. Michela and her son, I think. Michela dressed in black with lace over a part of her face, too. She doesn’t smile, but the little boy is up on his knees in the pew, arms on the back of it and smiling wide at me. He’s the only normal looking one in here.
Across the aisle sits Lucas, the good side of his face to me, and I can’t help but shrink away.
And at the front of the church is the old man in his chair, a heavy blanket draped over his legs. The man who was with him last time—what was his name—is standing off along the wall nearest him.
What a strange gathering we make.
I feel a little sick when the march begins anew, but when I take a step back toward the door, Damian catches my arm.
This is wrong.
This place.
These people.
This house of God?
All I feel is hostility alongside my own fear.
I make a sound, a
small whimper.
Damian pulls me forward, and I don’t know why I resist. I said I would do this. I made up my mind. But I don’t want it. And the closer we get to that altar, all I can think is—this isn’t a funeral dress at all, but one for a sacrifice.
And I’m already bleeding.
I know there’s no getting away, but still, I struggle.
He must have known I would. He just keeps on walking, hand like a vise around my arm. I’ll have bruises in the shape of his grip tomorrow.
Does he care? Would he?
We walk toward the two kneelers set side-by-side before the priest. Damian forces me down to my knees, then follows. I’m surprised he kneels. Maybe he does believe in God. His left hand engulfs mine, and with the right, he makes the sign of the cross.
The priest begins.
I’m shaking and I feel faint. Maybe Damian was right. I should have eaten something.
I turn to look at him. He’s looking straight ahead, his beautiful face set and hard as if carved from stone.
I look beyond him to his father whose face is openly hostile. Turning to see Michela, I try to avoid looking at Lucas, whose eyes I feel burning into my back.
The priest prattles on and on. I only hear one word, obey, as my heart races until everything goes quiet. He and Damian and everyone stare at me. Waiting for me.
It’s my turn to speak.
“Say I do,” Damian instructs.
I look back at him through the veil. I think about my uncle and Liam and Simona and my life before. My life now.
I think of that line of demarcation I felt like a physical thing the moment I closed the apartment door behind me on the night I tried to escape my destiny.
That’s not when my life’s course was determined, though. That was almost a decade earlier when I was just a little girl. When he was already a man.
The shaking grows worse.
Damian wraps a hand around the back of my neck and squeezes. He leans toward me and through the lace I feel his breath at my ear.
“Don’t make me take it. Remember what I told you.”
I have no doubt he will take it. I look from him to the priest, and I say the words.
“I do.”
I say them, and I seal my fate. Not that it was ever up to me.
A moment later, it’s Damian’s turn and then come the rings. He reaches into his pocket and slides mine onto my finger. This one doesn’t hurt, at least. It settles against the engagement ring, the thorns locking into the holes on the thick band, the set complete. Thorns hidden but there. Always there.
He holds his hand out to me, and in his palm, I see a black band.
My turn again.
With a trembling hand, I take the ring. I look up at him, at his wolf-eyes. He’s waiting for me, but this part doesn’t matter. It’s already done. I said the words.
I slide the ring onto his finger, and strangely, it’s like I’m sealing his fate too.
The priest pronounces us husband and wife, and Damian lifts my veil to kiss me.
I don’t close my eyes and neither does he. I still taste myself on him. And then we’re on our feet, Damian pulling me up by my wrist. No one is smiling or throwing rice as the pianist plays a happy tune that doesn’t belong in this place or to these people or even to me. We walk out of the chapel and when Damian lifts me in his arms and carries me back to the house, I don’t fight him. I don’t do anything.
I’m in shock, I guess.
Trembling with cold.
This changes things.
This changes everything.
How did it get to this point? How did we?
I’m so lost in thought that I don’t register the warmth of the house. I barely notice when Damian whips the covers off the bed and sits me down. I blink, looking around.
This isn’t my room.
Damian pulls my veil off. It hurts because he doesn’t undo the pins first but drags them off along with the veil tugging at my hair. He’s not smiling anymore. Not even grinning his wicked grin.
He walks away from me to pour two glasses of whiskey. He hands me one and swallows his completely before I’ve even lifted the glass.
I don’t like whiskey, but tonight, I’ll drink it like water.
Damian does, too. And he doesn’t seem any happier than me. Any more victorious. He sits on a chair across from the bed and watches me like he’s done before.
“You belong to me. Even before this, you belonged to me.”
I don’t speak. What am I supposed to say to that?
“Come here, Cristina.” He sits up, motioning for me with two fingers. He widens his stance to make space for me to stand between his knees.
I get up and go to him. To my husband.
He leans forward, takes the empty whiskey glass dangling from my hand, and sets it aside. He looks me over.
My belly quivers. I’m not sure if it’s the whiskey or his eyes on me.
Everything is still for a long minute and so deadly silent. But then he takes hold of the dress at either side of the long slit. I let out a scream when he rips it up to my belly.
“Shh.” He grips my hips and tugs me closer. Without another word, he finishes what he started before our strange wedding.
He drags me so close I have to bend to place my hands on his shoulders. He clamps his mouth over my sex, hands shifting to my ass, kneading it, pulling me open as he devours me. His tongue and teeth are wet, so wet, and when I cry out as I come, I weave my hands into his hair. I’m holding him to me, hips spasming as something leaves me, something heavy and weighted melting out of me as I come on his tongue and I scream his name.
His.
I’m his.
But I already knew that.
When it’s over, and I’ve gone limp, he slides me down over him. My knees hit the rough carpet covering cold, unforgiving stone and all I can do is stare up at him as I try to catch my breath.
He wipes the corner of his mouth with his thumb. The way he does it and the way he looks at me, it’s humiliating and arousing all over again.
He takes my face into his hands and mine close over the backs of his. His lips are wet, face smeared with me. And he kisses me hard, kisses me like he owns me.
But he does. He’s told me as much.
When he draws back, he looks at me again, then lifts me to my feet. Strangely, he unzips the dress rather than ripping it the rest of the way off. It pools at my feet as he picks me up, carrying me to his bed.
I’m naked when he lays me down, watching as he undresses, removing his cuff links and setting them aside. Undoing a few buttons at the top of his shirt before pulling it over his head, he never stops looking at me. Doesn’t speak a word as he undoes his belt and his pants, pushing them and his briefs off. I see him for the first time, fully naked. I’ve felt him before, but I’ve never seen him.
I back up a little on the bed. I lick my lips as the muscles of his belly and thighs tense. Then he walks toward me, arms powerful when he climbs up onto the bed before grasping one of my ankles and dragging me toward him.
“Damian…”
He lays his weight on me, not all of it though, some of it on his elbows on either side of my head.
I don’t know what to do with my hands, but when I feel him between my legs, I tense and try to pull away.
“Shh, relax.” One hand closes over the top of my head. He leans his face down to kiss my forehead, my cheek, my mouth. He touches my scar, traces the part on my chin, my lip.
His eyes are open, watching me, and all I can do is watch him back.
His other hand snakes down my side to close over my left thigh, winding down to my calf. He draws my leg up.
“I’m not ready,” I start, hands flat against his chest.
He slides the hand from my thigh to my pussy and rubs my clit. I’m so sensitive already, and it feels so good.
“You’re ready, sweetheart.”
I wrap my hands over his shoulders as he slides his hand back to my leg, ope
ning me wider. I swallow hard because I’m scared. I never thought I’d be scared.
I don’t realize I’m crying until he leans down and licks that tear, then kisses my cheek.
“You’re especially beautiful when you cry.”
“And you like to make me cry.”
“Look at me. Just look at me.”
“I’m scared.” As I say it, my shoulders shudder, and I feel myself curl into him.
Into him. Not shrinking away from him but curling into him.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
“It has to happen. You know that.”
I shake my head, turn away.
He touches me with a gentle hand, bringing my face back toward his.
“Did you like my mouth on you?”
“I—”
“No lies. Not now. Not in bed.” The way he says it, it’s strange. He’s not mocking or manipulating. I think. “Tell me the truth, Cristina. Did you like my mouth on you?”
I nod.
“I liked my mouth on you, too. And I want to be inside you. I want to feel you. I want to feel you come on my cock. And I want to come inside you.”
I shudder at his words, my stomach tied up in knots, in anticipation.
“I need to feel you, do you understand?”
I don’t. I understand that he wants, but I don’t understand that he needs.
“There’s something about you, Cristina, and I need it.”
He moves his hips, and I feel his length slide between the lips of my pussy. I gasp.
“You look at me, understand? You don’t look away.”
I nod, bracing myself. My hands close on his shoulders as his hand slides to my leg once more, lifting it, opening me.
I hold my breath when I feel him at my entrance, and I watch his eyes as he begins to push inside me. He’s being careful. I can tell. I know if he wants to, he can tear me in two, but he’s being careful.
“Fuck,” he groans, dipping his head down as he pushes in a little, stopping when I tense. “You’re so fucking tight.”
He brings his eyes back to mine and kisses me. A deep kiss, his tongue invading my mouth like his cock is invading my sex. I close my eyes momentarily as he claims a little more of me.
When he pulls back his eyes are almost black, and I know it’s taking all he has not to thrust hard into me.
Unholy Intent Page 3
