Promises and Pomegranates: A Dark Contemporary Romance (Monsters & Muses Book 1)

by Sav R. Miller

  Pulling him farther into my mouth, I swirl my tongue over his shaft, hollowing my cheeks when I reach as far as I can go. His fingers in my hair are warm, gentle, despite the urgency in his breathing and the distraught tone of his words.

  “I’m not surprised my little slut wife has such a dirty fucking mouth,” he grunts, hips jerking as I lap at the slit in his tip, then push back onto his length. “You were fucking made for me, weren’t you? Made to take my cock. Made to be my little cock whore.”

  I hum in agreement, his dirty mouth stirring an eagerness in my belly, the need to make this phenomenal blotting out everything else in my brain.

  My nails claw at his pants, digging into his thighs as I try to scramble closer, bobbing up and down in time with my second pulse.

  “Touch yourself,” he says darkly, the command sending a shiver down my spine.

  I pull off with a pop, my sex clenching in anticipation.

  “I don’t want to be sore,” I say. “I can’t.”

  “You will,” he replies, a challenge lacing his brow. Renewing the force of his grip on my scalp, he yanks me to his slobbery cock, smacking me across the cheek with it once, twice, before pushing back in. “Relax your throat and play with your pussy. Can you do that for me?”

  I hesitate, again, my fingers twitching, but eventually nod slightly. He exhales, shoving his cock to the back of my throat; I flatten my tongue at the last second, his command about relaxing barely registering enough for me to go through with it, and try not to retch.

  His eyes never leave mine, even when he keeps me flush against him, my nose tickling his pubic bone. When it becomes evident he doesn’t plan on letting me up until I touch myself, my fingers drift to the apex of my thighs, swiping through my sopping folds.

  As soon as I make contact, I wince, still sensitive from the orgasm he gave me. Heat floods my face and my vision blurs, and Kal drags me off, sputtering and coughing as oxygen invades my nostrils.

  Saliva coats my lips, dripping down my chin, a thin layer connecting me to him, and I feel that familiar pressure building inside me, taking precedence over the soreness.

  I circle two fingers over my clit, working furiously as ecstasy courses through me, and he chuckles, pushing past my lips and repeating the same air-robbing motion.

  A wave of something that looks twisted, stuck between pain and pleasure, washes over his face, and as he removes my mouth again, he sighs.

  “I’m going to come, little one. Mark you, like you asked. And you’re going to wear it out of here, like a good little slut wife.” He brushes over my swollen mouth with his thumb, and I rub myself faster, trying to get to where he is. “Okay?”

  I nod, sticking my tongue out in acceptance.

  Sliding back in, his crown pokes my throat, coasting in and out for several strokes, as if gearing up for a finale. My clit swells to the point where it feels like it might burst, sparks flying where my fingers work, and then he pushes to the hilt, keeping me in place.

  All other thought dissipates as I focus on relaxing into his hold, absorbing the salty musk of his arousal, and the way his abdomen ripples with his impending climax. My fingers fly, rubbing and kneading, my chest getting light as it becomes more and more difficult to breathe.

  I feel it, my consciousness floating past my fingertips, just out of reach, and with it, my release.

  “I want to hear it,” he says, tapping my nose. “When you come with my cock in your throat, I want to fucking hear it.”

  It begins before he’s even done speaking, erupting like a volcano as the corners of my eyes darken. My clit throbs beneath the pressure of my fingers, and as Kal pulls away just enough to thrust back in, I cry out as shock and elation mix in my gut, powering through every nerve in my body.

  “That’s it.” Kal groans, the sound soft and primal, and I swear I feel him swell in my mouth, ropes of hot semen rushing out as he comes.

  He withdraws from me while the stream continues spurting, dragging his slit over my lips and then pointing down at my breasts, coating them in his seed.

  Collapsing against the door, he gulps in a lungful of air, brushing sweat from where it percolates on his forehead. “Jesus. I think one day you might kill me.”

  Catching my breath on the ground, I take a minute to collect myself. Smirking, I push to my feet on wobbly legs, looking around for a tissue to dry myself with. I walk to the desk and pluck one from its box, but he clicks his tongue in disapproval.

  “What are you doing?” He joins me, taking the tissue from my fingers. “Did you think I was kidding about you leaving here covered in my cum?”

  My cheeks flame. “I just thought it was kind of a heat of the moment thing.”

  “It’s always the heat of the moment with you,” he says, that weird fucking smile back in place as he maneuvers my arms back into my dress, pulling the neck up over my breasts. His cum is cool against the soft fabric, hidden beneath it, but I can smell it.

  I know it’s there, like a secret the two of us share, and the notion makes me feel... alive.

  Chapter 25

  I’ll never forget the look in the eyes of the first man I ever killed.

  At sixteen, I’d already been under the Riccis’ guidance for three years. I met Rafael during one of my mother’s trips to the Dana Farber Cancer Institute for clinical trials of a drug that could stop the growth of her cancer cells.

  Rafael had been sitting in the lobby, awaiting news on whether or not his grandmother was in remission. He sat tall, in his crisp navy suit, twirling rosary beads around his fingers like a man who didn’t fully believe in their power.

  I remember passing him on my way to the cafeteria, and the gold metal of his thumb ring shining in the fluorescent lighting.

  In my short time on Earth, I’d never seen anything or anyone so inherently lavish. The man oozed luxury and authority, and he knew it. Let it collect in the air around him, daring someone to try and assert otherwise.

  I didn’t officially meet him until our last day in Boston. I’d been standing outside, watching my breath appear and disappear in the chilly November air, trying to mask the disappointment on my face for when the nurse brought my mother out.

  Rafael stepped outside, dressed in another dark suit, and pulled a cigar from his breast pocket, lighting up as he leaned against a concrete wall with a NO SMOKING sign hanging on it. He’d glanced at me, nodding as if he understood some unspoken request.

  “Just you and your mom, kid?”

  I swallowed, nodding, aware that I wasn’t supposed to be talking to strangers. But an obviously rich stranger, hanging around in a hospital? How bad could he be?

  He sucked on the end of his cigar—Cohiba Behike, a brand I would eventually come to know by heart—and dipped his chin. “What’s your name?”

  My eyes narrowed.

  He chuckled at my expression, laughing as if we were sharing an inside joke.

  A few moments later, he was joined by a leggy brunette, wrapped in a deep purple fur coat, cradling a baby to her chest. They made their way to a blacked-out Cadillac waiting in the emergency lane, but not before he clipped me on the shoulder, dropping a card to the ground bearing the Ricci Inc. Insignia.

  It was a simple crest, a lion wearing a crown made of skulls, but nevertheless, it engraved itself on my brain that day, as if it was always meant to be there.

  But it was the woman I couldn’t stop staring at, and when her dark, captivating gaze met mine just before she climbed inside her vehicle, I was a goner.

  After my mother died, and my biological father rejected me again, I sought out the Riccis, unaware of how their presence would alter the course of my fate forever.

  It’d started innocent, with me running tickets for one of the illegal gambling operations Rafe ran from the back of a deli in Roxbury. But when he started training me to fight, to defend, I knew things were turning.

  And when I carried out my first hit, I did so in the dead of night, in a dirty alleyway while the man
who’d been accused of ratting on Rafe’s father pissed himself.

  When I put the bullet between his teeth, blood spraying across his wife’s white blouse, brain matter splattering against my face, all I could see was the horrified look in his eyes. The pure terror, frozen forever in time, as he looked up at me, pleading for mercy.

  In the years since, it’s that look I’ve never forgotten, although not because I was disturbed.

  Because I felt nothing.

  When I drag my scalpel down the chest of one of Elena’s attackers in the present day, it’s that feeling I try to focus on. Pushing what’s left of my moral compass to the recesses of my brain, I tap into that chasm that exists within me, using it to stave off the things a normal person would feel.

  Guilt. Worry. Nausea as the man’s flesh opens for me. His eyes are wide and teary as he stares, screaming around his gag, probably pleading for mercy.

  For a moment, I’m tempted to listen to him. To play the part my grandfather wanted me to, the part my sister would be more open to learning about.

  But then I see the ring on his right hand, matching the one Rafael wears, and I’m reminded why that isn’t something I can do just yet.

  Tony had been chilling at the docks a couple of afternoons after I chased Jonas from the bar’s office, and Jonas just happened to recognize him from a picture he’d seen a few weeks ago circulating online, where Rafe and Carmen were trying to look like grieving parents.

  He lured him into a fake coke deal, then bagged him, gagged him, and dropped him on my doorstep.

  And even though I’d resigned myself to an early retirement in both medicine and official business, I couldn’t look the other way when he showed up.

  I needed Rafael to get the message about his daughter: that she belongs to me.

  My incision isn’t deep enough to fully penetrate Tony’s skin on the first pass, but it’s enough to make him a bloody mess as my blade reaches his belly button.

  I reach forward, yanking the gag from his mouth with a bloody, gloved hand. Sweat rolls down his forehead, coating his dark buzz cut, and he sucks in a large gulp of air, on the verge of hyperventilating.

  “Ready to tell me why the don sent you to rough up my wife?”

  He nods, coughing, opening his mouth to speak. But all that comes out is an ear-piercing wail, and I stuff the gag back in his mouth, the muscle beneath my eye twitching. I’m tempted to push the gag back until he’s suffocating on it, unable to even breathe, but I close my eyes and try to calm myself with a few inhalations.

  “I’m going to take the gag from your mouth one more time,” I say finally, exhaling slowly. “And the only sound I want to hear from you is the answer to my question. Got it?”

  Nodding again, he starts groaning, clearly trying to speak. I tug the gag free, leaving one end of the cloth hooked inside his dry lips, just in case.

  “Money,” he chokes out, voice catching from where his mouth is parched. “The don said he needed money, and you’d be more willing to dish it out if he threatened something you care about.”

  My stomach churns, irritation growing into a quiet fury. “His own daughter?”

  “He’s in trouble,” Tony grits, pinching his eyes shut and hissing when I press one finger against a broken rib. “Fuck me! I’m answering your questions.”

  “Too well, I’m afraid.” I dig my palm into his ribs, shifting my weight until they fracture more, and he screams out. “It sounds rehearsed. Like Rafael knew I’d find you.”

  Gasping through the pain, Tony thrashes on the table, straining against the straps keeping him down. “Of course, he knew! That’s why he used Vincent in the first place, to make it easier. Aren’t you fucking known for being able to find anyone?”

  “I’m known for a lot of things,” I say, wrapping my fingers around my scalpel, grazing a red nipple with the sharp edge, not surprised to learn Vincent was a pawn. “Particularly, performing autopsies on the living.”

  “Oh, Christ, no. Come on, I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  I pause, the tip of the blade resting near the linear wound on his chest. “Why’d he push the kidnapping narrative?”

  Tony shakes his head. “Not him, Carmen. She leaked it to the press immediately. Said you’d been fired or something, and were retaliating by taking her firstborn.”

  Scoffing, I roll my eyes internally. Of course, she did. Jealous bitch.

  “What else?”

  Tony exhales, glancing around the room as he racks his brain. “He wants you dead. Even if you pay, he’ll kill you.”

  Smirking, I try to feign surprise. As if I hadn’t known that’d be his plan the second I decided to defer from the mafia.

  You don’t really leave this world. Either you’re in it until the day you die, or you live on the edge of insanity, aware that hits don’t expire. Waiting for them to come for you.

  “Guess I’ll only be paying him a visit,” I tell Tony, unsure why I feel the need to when he won’t be able to relay the message. Dropping the scalpel to the table, I reach down to the floor, retrieve my circular saw, and adjust the scrub cap protecting my hair. “I’ll be sure to give him your regards.”

  Later, after the echo from his screams has ceased its repetitive pounding in my brain, and I’ve cleaned the blood and other debris off the floor, I sever his heart from where it’s cocooned in his chest cavity, dropping it into a plastic biohazard bag along with his thumb, ring still attached.

  After vacuum-sealing the contents, I shove it in a duffel bag and leave it by the outbuilding’s door, ready for Jonas to send to Boston.

  “This is ridiculous.”

  For a moment, my heart skips a beat, wondering if Elena’s seen the headline fronting Aplana’s Sunday paper: SOCIALITE STILL MISSING FROM BOSTON; PARENTS SAY SHE MAY BE IN DANGER.

  I’m not entirely surprised to see it printed there; each time I decline one of Rafe’s messages, I can almost feel him growing more and more desperate, and desperate people will do whatever they have to in order to survive.

  I can only imagine how much money my marriage to Elena hemorrhaged from his bank account. For a man whose funds were already dwindling, I’m sure he’s panicking without my backing.

  Or maybe it’s the heart and finger I sent him, the message clear: I don’t really give a shit if his kingdom burns or not.

  When I glance up, though, Elena’s bent over the garden at the back of the yard, hands on her hips, squinting down at the dirt.

  “I don’t understand how not one of these flowers has bloomed. It’s almost summer!”

  Folding the paper, I place it on the glass patio table, kicking my ankle up over my knee. “Maybe you got a bad batch of seeds.”

  She shakes her head. “That isn’t a thing, Kallum.”

  My name rolling so easily from her lips makes my chest pinch tight, and I get to my feet, walking over to the pile of dirt. She’s not wrong; none of the flowers have even sprouted through, the soil as brown and neat as it was when we laid it.

  “It’s not a big deal,” I say, reaching out to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “When you don’t succeed in one thing, you don’t pitch your towel and stop trying. You move on to the next, until you find what you’re great at.”

  She makes a face. “I already know what I’m good at, but thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  Pulling away, she bends down, sifting her fingers through the dirt, as if searching for a single sign of life. I cross my arms over my chest, watching.

  “Then why is this garden so important to you?”

  Pausing, she glances up over her shoulder, hands clumping in the soil. “I wanted something at the Asphodel that felt like mine. My balcony back home was covered in all sorts of plants, and I’d go out and read, surrounded by the fresh flowers, and just feel at peace. I thought... maybe if I tried to recreate that feeling, I wouldn’t be so lonely here.”

  Again, that pinch flares in my chest, like thorns embedding themselves in my muscles and po
isoning me. She looks away, wiping beneath her right eye with her index finger, and I’m reminded of my mission here.

  That she’s a pawn in the grand scheme of things. An unwilling participant in a game much larger than she even understands. Means to an end.

  Though, that doesn’t stop me from telling her to follow me, as I glide through the back yard in quick strides, eating up the distance to the padlocked gate bordering the beach. She scrambles to her feet after me, curiosity more powerful than self-pity, sticking close to my side.

  Pushing open the old gate, a long strip of worn black stone splits the stretch of golden sand in half, leading a path down to the dilapidated dock. Before the sand, right where it meets the grass, bloom the brightest wild beach roses, painting the area in beautiful hues of pink and purple.

  “Consider this your... Elysium, my little Persephone.”

  Elena beams, sweeping her gaze over the flowers, a genuine smile pulling at her lips. “It’s beautiful.”

  My eyes fall to her, appreciating the view. “Yeah,” I say, and when she glances up, her smile falters, cheeks morphing to match the flowers.

  She looks at the blue water, then grips the hem of her T-shirt between her fingers. “How much of this beach is secluded?”

  “There isn’t another house for miles.” It’s the only reason I feel comfortable letting her beyond the property I can see from the house.

  Pouting dramatically, Elena whips her shirt up over her head, baring the swell of her naked breasts and that little pomegranate tattoo. Immediately, my cock stirs to attention, my tongue eager to run over the line work I’ve practically memorized at this point.

  “Bummer,” she says, hooking her thumbs in the elastic waist of her white cotton shorts, shoving them down over her hips. Untying her hair from the loose bun it’s in, she shakes the dark locks free, completely naked as she backs away from me. “Guess we’ll have to find another way to make it more interesting.”