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Then it was all swept under the rug, and the powerful man who hurt me went on being a powerful man without so much as a slap on the wrist.
The reasons I gravitate toward the sort of depravity that I do is that within the context of fantasy, or pornography, it’s safe.
I can hit the pause button. I can open my eyes. I can stop it any time I want. It restores control to me.
Control over the fantasy means control over the nightmare from my past.
The reason I never explored these dark desires in the real world before, with a real person, should be fairly obvious: I’m not insane enough to go looking for a stranger to chase me, choke me, pin me down, and brutally fuck me to within in an inch of my life.
Or at least, I wasn’t until the night I followed Gabriel Black into Club Venom, and left reality at the door along with my purse. It’s only now that I’m realizing I never dropped a trail of breadcrumbs to find my way back.
Although the truth is, I’m not so sure I even want to find my way back.
“Ms. Yamaguchi?”
I start, my gaze flying from my hands up to the minister standing beside us, smiling curiously at me.
“Sorry,” I mumble, my throat bobbing. My eyes slip across to the monster himself, standing before me.
Today, of course, he’s no monster. At least, not outwardly, to the crowd of people assembled to watch this whole thing go down. Today, Gabriel is every inch the suave, successful, golden demi-god, complete with tuxedo and thousand-watt smile.
They’ve never seen the black and gold horned mask. They’ve never seen him devoid of tux or suit, naked, his muscles lean and coiled, his eyes flashing like a predator’s as he snarls and charges through the darkness.
As he devours my flesh and soul.
I clear my throat, turning to the minister.
“I do,” I murmur quietly.
If you’d thought a contractual marriage like ours would take place under the fluorescent lights of a city hall courtroom, with minimal witnesses, no cameras, and no press, you’d be dead wrong. Since the whole point of this arrangement is to appeal to the voter base and make Gabriel a stronger candidate, this thing is very much the opposite of “private” or “low key”.
I mean, the fucking Mayor is here. So are three sitting and one retired Congressmen, a US Senator, the name partners of two other major law firms, and the heads of a number of incredibly powerful mafia families: Castle James of the Kildare family, along with his wife; Cillian and Una Kildare; Ares Drakos, together with a number of his siblings and extended family; and Gavan Tsarenko, of the Reznikov Bratva.
And about two hundred other people, including press from the New York Times, Washington Post, and the BB fucking C.
Yeah, so, not exactly quiet and understated. At least I feel a whole lot better about the ludicrously expensive Vera Wang, given the press involved. There’ll be some good pictures of it.
“And do you, Gabriel Black, take?—”
“I do.”
We both start at the way he talks over the minister to say his line. Some of the crowd titters, like this is a “cute moment”.
Gabriel clears his throat, eyeing me with cool, sharp, unblinking eyes that seem to pierce through my dress and skin, and into my soul.
“I do,” he says in a more measured tone.
“Then, by the power vested in me by the State of New York, I pronounce you husband and wife.”
The crowd jumps to their feet, applauding.
“You may kiss the bride.”
I’ve already been instructed by Meredith that when it comes time for this part, I’m supposed to let Gabriel pull me into his arms like Clark Gable and kiss me passionately yet chastely for the cameras.
Apparently, there’s a sweet spot, an optimum amount of jaw movement—aka, tongue—that sits best with media audiences. Too much, and you look inappropriate and vulgar. Too little and it seems fake.
If you guessed “focus groups” as to how in the hell she’d even know that, you’d be a winner.
