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Chapter 4
I hada teacher when I was younger who swore that our mindsets had infinite power over our lives. She lived and breathed the notion that time was little more than a social construct, and that people have the ability to create their own realities.
She’d say humans are made up of energy, and that energy has a certain magnetism to it that attracts both what we fear and what we desire, and that it was up to us to reflect the kind of life we wanted to the universe so it would be able to deliver.
Incidentally, not a great look for a Catholic school teacher.
Still, standing at the threshold of forever, staring into the soulless eyes of the man who’s haunted my dreams for the last eight weeks, I can’t help wondering if what Sister Margaret said was true.
In the weeks after Kal left me alone in my bedroom, I must have dreamed a dozen times that he’d come back to steal me away from Mateo, though it never continued beyond that.
Is it possible my nightmares morphed into real life?
I glance at Papá, who seems to look everywhere but at me as the priest goes on his spiel about love, quoting Corinthians as if it isn’t obvious this union is a farce. For Christ’s sake, Kal still has one arm wrapped around my waist, one hand collaring my throat, and yet we’re all acting like this is normal.
Like he didn’t just threaten my family if I didn’t acquiesce.
Betrayal burns the back of my throat, liquid fire scorching a path down my sternum, and I strain against his hold once more. Ignoring the hard length pressing between my ass cheeks, and the way it makes my thighs clench, I try to wiggle a hand free.
He tightens his grip, crushing my hip bone, and I wince. Moving my hand back, I brace the meat of my thumb along his leg, digging my nails into his thigh until my fingertips go numb.
The only evidence that he even registers my attack comes when he forces me to bend slightly, shoving his pelvis tighter into my backside; he’s so hard, I can make out the entirety of his erection, hot and heady as it moves into the crack of my ass, the layers of clothing between us no match for it.
His hand momentarily leaves my throat, eliciting a strange, empty sensation in his wake. He wrenches my fingers from his leg, and pushes my hand to my side, before gripping just below my jaw, tilting my head slightly upward.
“Do that again,” he breathes into my ear, a slight strain lacing his voice. “And I’ll fuck you in front of everyone.”
I scoff, my voice just as soft, just as strangled. “You wouldn’t.”
There has to be a line, somewhere. One that not even Kal Anderson will cross, and something tells me fucking your boss’s daughter—a mafia don, no less—while he watches might be the ultimate form of disrespect.
“I would, and you’d love every filthy second of it.”
Okay, then.
He pushes my chin up more, capturing me with his eyes; they’re so dark, endlessly devoid of color, it’s like staring into two black holes and trying to maintain solid footing. “I’m not your enemy, little one.”
“You’re not my friend, either.”
A muscle thumps beneath his left eye, and his gaze drops to my lips. “No,” he agrees, sliding his hand so his thumb brushes over my mouth, plucking my bottom lip like a guitar string. “I’m your husband.”
Before I have a chance to protest—not that there’s anything that I can say anyway, since I did finish my vows—his hand glides around my head, tangling in my hair, and he crashes his mouth to mine.
I’m so startled by the assault that I don’t react, at first. Kal isn’t a kisser. Even the night he took my virginity, debased me in what I thought was every way possible, his lips never once touched mine.
Sure, they slid across every inch of my skin, caressed my most sensitive flesh, and spoke affirmations to my soul, but he hadn’t kissed me.
Now that he is, I don’t quite know what to make of it.
The kiss is gentle, almost sweet, as he eases me into the language of it, guiding my movements before I can fully relax and take part. His fist tugs on my roots, angling me for better access as he coaxes and teases, and my hands reach up to his chest.
I push, reflexively trying to extract myself, and then he’s shifting, smothering, consuming me with his heat, deepening the kiss. My breath catches in my throat as his tongue pushes past my lips, entwining with my own.
It laves over the backs of my teeth, the roof of my mouth, its tip leaving me tingling.
The arm around my waist crushes me to him, fitting our hips together, and the last remnants of my resolve crumble as I melt into it.
Into him.
