This man really saved my ass last night. Now we have this shared secret, this history between us, it’s like he knows me inside out. It’s like we’re partners in our crime; we’ll keep our secret till we die. I’ve never felt this close to anyone. I feel like he can read my soul. But of course, he still thinks I’m Beth. . . .
He downs his shot, then walks over to the easel. He runs his fingers through dark-blond hair, strands of white where the sun has bleached it. If I didn’t know he was Sicilian, I’d have guessed that he was Swedish. Swedish or Dutch; the Dutch are tall. I brush a lock of hair from my face, it’s tickling my nose.
“I mean it, don’t move. Not even a millimeter.” His voice is hard.
I giggle. That vodka’s gone straight to my head. Is he trying to get me drunk? I hope so.
“Stop laughing. You’re moving,” he says. Now he’s cross.
I force my face out of a smile.
Salvatore takes a piece of charcoal and stands behind the easel, a few feet away. I suck in my stomach, sit up a little taller. I am Beth. I am gorgeous. I suddenly feel sexy, sexier than ever. I feel my hair draped over one shoulder. I am sensual. Powerful. I hold my breath. His blue eyes trace the curves of my body, linger on my neck, my shoulders, my breasts. I’ve never felt a gaze so intense. It’s fucking hot. He looks down at my hips, a frown on his face, and then starts to draw, sketching with long, wild, frantic gestures. His hands move across the length and breadth of the page, shaping, shading, sculpting. He looks up at me, then back down at the page, over and over and over again. Charcoal scrapes across the paper. My breathing is shallow. The scent of burned coal.
I scan the room: the sculptures and sketches all look just like Beth. They look down at me now, glancing over their shoulders with Beth’s wide eyes, Beth’s beautiful face. It’s strange. It’s like she is still here, watching us. Watching me. The studio walls are filled with paintings and drawings of women all sketched from behind, their buttocks are round and pert and perfect. Beth. She must have been his muse.
I watch his forearms moving, working; they are muscular, tanned, defined. I want to touch him. Reach out and kiss him. But I stay still. My pussy’s aching; I really, really want to fuck. I already feel myself dripping wet. He slams the charcoal down on the table. I catch my breath.
“OK, we’re done,” Salvatore says.
“What? Already? Can I see?”
“No,” he says.
There’s no explanation; it seems a little unfair.
“Oh. OK. Well, I guess if you’re finished . . . then I’ll get dressed.” I rise and reach for my clothes.
“No need,” says Salvatore. “It’s just you and me now, kid.”
He pushes me back against the wall, the surface is cold and hard against my skin. He wraps his arms around my waist and he’s already kissing me, his tongue deep and hard inside my mouth. His hands run through my hair, grabbing it in fistfuls. His body pressed against my skin.
“Hey!” I say, into his mouth. He’s pulling my hair and it hurts; I love it.
He tears off his shirt and throws it down on the floor. His torso is perfect, a work of art. His abs are sculpted: Michelangelo’s David. He’s a fucking masterpiece. He pushes me back down on the stool, and firmly, roughly, spreads open my legs. He kneels down before me and gives me a look—a hungry predator—then shoves his face between my thighs. The bridge of his nose, cheekbones, eyebrows, tousled hair slicked-back from his forehead. His tongue, thick and wet, slicks up and down, left and right across my clit, forward and backward and round and round. His fingers inside me. His soft lips kiss and his hard, hungry mouth eats me out with a mad, bad rage and a crazy, angry burning desire to make me come, to tip me over the edge of the here-and-now, up into eyes-rolled-back-in-your-head-sockets ecstasy.
“Oh yeah . . .”
I grip at the edge of the stool with scrunched-up fingers, claw at the wood. I push my cunt toward his mouth. Eat me. Eat me. I want him to swallow me whole. I want him to suck me into his hot, sweet, sexy body.
“Oh . . .”
He is so much better than Ambrogio.
His shoulders heave and glow in the light of the sun streaming in through the studio windows. His skin is creamy, glistening, smooth, like a Henry Moore. He’s polished and now he’s polishing me with his tongue and the cool, circular motion of an oyster swishing and swirling a pearl around inside till it glows. And I’m glowing and groaning and growing warmer and warmer until, I think, I’m going to come. His hands reach up over my belly, his fingers smoothing my hot skin. Every nerve is alive. I’m dizzy, weightless. I’m going to come, I have to come, but he stops. . . .
I open my eyes and see Salvatore in all his spectacular naked glory, staring at my stomach, at the bit of skin just down from my navel, like it’s the most interesting thing he’s ever seen in his life. There’s a strange, faraway look on his face.
“Salvatore?”
I grab his shoulders and pull him up onto my naked, panting chest. I kiss his hot, wet, cunt-covered mouth with his chin stubble wet and his hot breath warm on my cheek. The smell of sex.
“Fuck me,” I say into his hair.
He flips me around so I’m bent over the table with my back pressed up against his chest. His fingers trace the lines of my shoulders, my back, my ass. His hands feel rough, a sculptor’s hands, dry and callused, strong and broad. His hands glide up the inside of my thighs and reach for my clit; I groan. He’s massaging my clit with his thumb and I sink into him deeper—he pushes me forward over the table, my face slams flat against wood. The taste of beeswax. The cold, hard oak. He unzips his fly, the rustle of denim; pulls off his cut-offs, kicks them down to the ground. He reaches around and grabs my breasts, pulling me into his sexy body so hard I can’t breathe.
“Oh God. Do it,” I say.
He pulls on a condom and pushes inside me all in one go, strong and deep, so hard I gasp. He’s pounding me now, over the table, table legs scraping across the floor. The wooden edge digs into my thighs. He’s so big and hard and I want him, I need him. He’s rough and I’m moaning; I’m going to come. It’s building, building, that faraway feeling. He grabs my neck with both his hands; his fingers close around my throat. And he’s squeezing, squeezing! Harder. Tighter. I’m choking, gagging, panic filling my mind.
“What have you done with your sister, huh?” he pants in my ear. “Where the fuck is she? You’re not Beth.”
And I come so hard on his dick that I think I’ll never come down. And I don’t know where I am or what he’s saying, but I hear him groan and I feel him coming in waves inside me, squeezing me, pulling my hips against him, throbbing and pulsing and filling me up.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Chapter Thirty
We’re panting and sweating collapsed on the table. He pulls out and I flop down, breathing hard. What the hell? He knows? But how? I think of my stomach. What the hell was he looking at? Of course! Beth had a cesarean scar. That’s it! The only physical difference between us, the only way you could tell us apart.
“This is fucked up,” he says at last. “I should have known. Your sister has a spectacular ass.”
I clench my jaw. Dig my nails into the wood.
“I can explain,” I say into the table. My voice falters. Can I explain?
“So where is she?” he asks. He takes a cigarette from a pack on the table and slams the pack back down on the wood.
“She—she asked me to swap places with her. She went away,” I say at last.
He lights the cigarette, sees me watching, and offers it to me. I inhale. It tastes good. I think it helps; at least it’s something to do with my hands. He lights himself another.
“Now, why wouldn’t you tell me that? You don’t think I would want to know?”
“She said to keep it secret between us. Are you cross?” I hold
my breath. My hands are shaking. My heart is pounding. He shakes his head.
“No. Whatever. You’re both good to fuck.” I try to smile, but I’m not sure if it’s funny. “You want another drink?” he says. Salvatore bends down and pulls up his boxers.
“Vodka.” I need it. I grab my pants from the back of the chair and pull them back on.
“So, what was your name again? Olivia or something?”
“Alvina,” I say. This is embarrassing.
“Nice name. I like it.” He pours out two more shots. “Alvina. Well, it’s nice to meet you. Piacere,” he says.
“Thanks,” I say, taking my glass, avoiding his gaze. My hand is trembling; I don’t want to spill it. I don’t want Salvatore to see that I’m scared. I down it in one and then blurt it out: “But aren’t you in love with my sister?”
He smiles a half-smile. “What? No way. She thought I was. She wanted to run away with me. Can you believe it? She wanted to hide out in London.”
“Oh?”
So that’s where she was going, why she took Ernesto, why she was “stealing” those diamonds. Was Beth really going to elope? With this guy? No, I don’t believe it. Ambrogio was plotting something against me, but clearly my sister had other ideas. I knew she would never have wanted to kill me. That was insane.
“But you didn’t want to run away?” I ask him quietly. This is my chance. I need to find out what the hell’s going on. I inhale smoke. I like his cigs; they’re stronger than mine. My head feels light with my nicotine high.
“Me? No way. And leave all this?” He gestures to his studio. “Anyway, it was much too dangerous. We’d never have been able to come back.”
What? Why not? What’s so scary? What’s going on? I set the shot glass down on the table. The glass shakes and rattles against the wood. Salvatore’s half naked, leaning against the edge of the table. His forehead’s creased like he’s thinking too hard.
“So what happened to your sister? Where is she?” he asks.
I swallow.
“She’s gone. She left. Don’t know where.”
“Right, makes sense. She was desperate to go,” says Salvatore. “What about the kid? Kid was the reason she wanted to run. . . .”
“The kid’s still here. In the villa with his nanny.”
He frowns, shakes his head. Stubs out his smoke inside a glass.
“She left the kid here? Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” What kind of a stupid fucking question is that?
“No, that’s not right. Shit, you’d better be careful. She’ll be back. She’ll come back for you and the boy. . . .”
All the muscles in my body tense. I hold his gaze. “What? Why do I need to be careful?”
He doesn’t reply.
“Why the fuck do I need to be careful?” My voice is uneven. My lips curve down. A sick feeling spreads from my gut and up my throat. “Salvatore?”
“Hey . . . I saved your life; you should be grateful,” he says, grabbing onto my wrists, looking into my eyes.
“You saved my life?” I pull my arms free.
“Look it wasn’t my idea, OK?” His voice is raised. “Your fucking mental sister wanted me to help her kill you. That night, she went mad! Said a dead body was the only way she could get away. Get away from that stronzo, Ambrogio. That they wouldn’t come after her. She was probably right.”
I step away from Salvatore, support myself on the wooden stool. I’m suddenly dizzy. What the fuck is he saying? My fucking sister fucking what?
“I don’t understand.” I shake my head. That doesn’t sound at all like my twin. Beth is the good one. Beth is the angel. “You’re lying!” I say.
“I’m not! I’m telling you. I think you should know. She was desperate. Pazzo. She said you were her only chance to escape. Get away from her husband, from Sicily, everything.”
It doesn’t make sense. Unless . . . she was desperate. Unless she was frightened. Unless she really did go nuts.
“When? When was she going to kill me?”
“At first she thought it was enough to swap places, to give her the time she needed to run, but then I guess she wanted more.”
“More?”
“She wanted you dead. She was hysterical, crying, begging me to help her. I managed to persuade her to change her mind. She wasn’t going to do it. I think—”
“Is that . . . is that what the argument was about?” I remember them fighting that night by the car.
“Yeah . . . yeah, we argued,” he says. He holds my gaze, his eyes searching, strained.
“How? How was she going to do it?” Did she know about Ambrogio’s gun?
“It doesn’t matter now. . . .” He folds his arms and looks down at the floorboards, traces a knot in the wood with a big toe, round and round and spiraling, spiraling, down, down, down.
We stare at the floor.
I’m glad I killed her; I got there first (for once). But it still fucking hurts; even my sister? My very own sister? It feels like I’ve been stabbed in the heart. My head flops down into my hands; the ground spins round beneath my feet. I guess I was wrong about Beth being good. Perhaps I was wrong about everything? What does this mean? I’m completely lost. Does this mean I’m the good one?
“I said I wouldn’t do it. You should be grateful,” he says.
“I am grateful,” I say to the floor. I’m speaking on autopilot. I don’t know what I’m saying. For some reason, I laugh, but it’s empty, hollow.
I want to get out of here.
I look around for my clothes. Salvatore watches me pull on my bra and do it back up, but I can’t do the hooks.
“Why? Why did she want to run? It doesn’t make any sense. Her life seems so perfect.”
“You mean you don’t know?”
I shake my head, my eyes cloud with tears. Oh my God, not crying again.
“Your sister never told you?”
“Told me what? As far as I knew she was living the dream.”
“Shit,” says Salvatore. “You really don’t know?”
I wish he’d stop saying that.
“Are you going to tell me?” I turn around and look into his eyes. He frowns, looks away. Annoyed.
He crosses his arms against his chest, his biceps press against his pecs. I hold my breath. I have no idea what he’s going to say, but suddenly, I feel it: it’s going to be bad. It’s going to change everything.
“You’d better sit down.”
I pull up the stool, its wooden legs scrape against the floorboards. I sink down hard, suddenly dizzy. Weak as a child. My whole body is cold now. I want to drink some more vodka. I stretch the dress out over my lap. I wish I had my old jumper.
“There’s a fucking war going on out there,” says Salvatore, gesturing to the window with an open hand.
“A war? Where? Here in Taormina?”
“Fighting. Everywhere. All over Sicily. On the streets. In broad daylight. They’ll shoot a guy walking down the street. And it’s only going to get worse.”
“What are you talking about? What war?”
I’m sure I’d have seen something on the news; in the Metro in London. I wouldn’t have come.
“A turf war?” Salvatore sighs. “Ambrogio was in deep with the Cosa Nostra, which means Beth’s in deep and the kid’s in deep. . . . It’s a family affair.”
I look at up him like he’s speaking Greek.
“What’s that? Like the Mafia or something?”
He nods; his mouth turns down at the corners. “They’re animals. Vermini.”
I can’t believe it. Not the Mafia. That stuff only happens in films. Doesn’t it? Oh. Now I get it. That’s where all the money comes from, why Ambrogio had a gun. I thought Nino looked dodgy. It all makes sense. My sister would have hated that. I take a deep breath.
“And this war?” I ask.
“It’s all about territory. Palermo, Catania, Agrigento . . . everywhere. It’s over for La Cosa Nostra. They will fight to their death. Criminal gangs from the south have moved in, from Africa and the Middle East. They’re fighting for control: the drugs trade, heroin, prostitution, everything. Cocaine . . .”
“Oh. I see,” I say. It’s bad.
“The kid’s in the middle of it . . .” says Salvatore. “Ambrogio’s nonno, Ambrogio’s dad: all Cosa Nostra. Ernie’s bloodline is Sicilian. . . .”
“Elizabeth didn’t know.” I suddenly get it. “When she met him in Oxford, she had no idea. They got married in Milan, where Ambrogio’s mother came from.”
“Yeah, that’s right,” says Salvatore.
“And Ernesto . . . he is only a baby. She didn’t want to bring him up, just for him to get shot in the head.”
Salvatore nods.
“Something like that. Ambrogio bought Ernesto a gun and Beth went crazy. Kid’s not even one year old. She wanted out. They’d kill her if they knew she tried to run. Once you’re in, you’re in. There’s no turning back.”
“Even when you’re dead, there’s a special place in hell . . .” I interrupt.
Salvatore looks at me with his cool, blue eyes. “Beth was scared, scared for the kid.”
I think I get it. I understand. Ambrogio and Beth were going to run. But that wasn’t enough. Beth wanted more. She wanted to get away from Ambrogio. That’s why I’m here. I was the body double. I was the body. I stand up from the stool, unsteady on my feet, and pull the dress back over my head. I walk over to Salvatore and reach my arms around his neck.
“So, you really don’t mind, about me not being Beth?” I’m the lesser of two evils: I bet he’s relieved. I rest my head on Salvatore’s broad chest. I can feel his heartbeat under his ribs. His skin is sticky. He smells musky, like sweat.
“No way, baby, I just wish I was fucking you both at the same time.”
I let myself out of his villa and walk back round to Beth’s. I think I believe him. There’s no way Beth fell in love with this guy. For him it was just sex, fucking fantastic sex, so I can’t really blame him. (I’m sure it was better with me than with Beth.) And for her he was useful. He was just a way out. Poor Salvatore. I guess he’s just a typical guy. But now he’s a guy who knows too much. Now he’s a problem.
Mad Page 23
