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“Thank you,” I tell her as she sits the cup down in front of me. I watch her pour an obscene amount of honey into her tea, and make a mental note that she likes things sweet. “Now, why don’t you tell me how you ended up here all alone, sweet Clara?”
She blushes, looking into her tea before she starts talking. “I came with my friend Mel, but while she said this was supposed to be a girls trip, some guy I’ve never heard of before met us at the airport. I guess it was her online boyfriend, and she had manipulated me into buying plane tickets and renting this villa so she could finally meet him in person. We’re both students and that man, Paulo, is like a delivery guy, so there was no way either of them could afford to meet up, so that’s why Mel was so insistent we take this vacation. I even told my dad it was a school function and that I really wanted Mel to go, so I wasn’t alone, and he footed the bill for the entire thing.” Clara takes a long drink of her honeyed tea, trying to hide a hurt and embarrassed expression with the mug before continuing. “Mel swore that spending time with me was still the top priority, but Paulo was always around, and worse, he brought his pushy friends every single time. Luigi and Serg, I think their names were.”
I hold up my hand to stop her, sitting my mug on the table with more force than I intended. “What do you mean by pushy, Clara?”
Now her embarrassment morphs to anger, and I love to see the fierceness in her. “They were hitting on me constantly, always trying to touch me and talking about how Italian men are the best lovers in the world. I told them that they looked more like boys than men to me, and they didn’t take that very well. They got angry with me, but it just made them turn up their efforts to seduce me even more. Because what woman doesn’t love a pissy boy that doesn’t take no for an answer?” Clara huffs, sarcasm evident in her voice. “It doesn’t matter anymore, though. Mel and Luigi disappeared this afternoon and haven’t been back since. I’m sure she’s staying with him, and while I hate that I’m alone now, at least it means Serg and Luigi don’t have any reason to be sniffing around here anymore.”
I hide it well, but I’m seeing red and feeling more rage than I can ever remember feeling, even in the most dire of situations with the Camorra. How dare these little pricks try to touch my Clara without her permission? The fact that they pressured her is even worse, and I swear that if there is a way for me to find them and show them the error of their ways, I will. But for now, I have to focus on Clara, and how to salvage the job I was supposed to do while also keeping her safe and binding her to me.
“So you’re here alone?” I ask.
“Yes,” Clara sighs. “But I’m sure you already knew that, considering you broke in and everything.”
“Mm. You’re not wrong, but no one forced your father to borrow that money from, shall we say, less than savory sources. I’m just a cog in the machine, pretty girl, and I’m just here to do my job.”
“Right. What I don’t get is why you’re going easy on me? You don’t exactly look like a guy that takes things easy… ever.”
I raise an eyebrow at her. “And what do I look like to you, Clara?”
“Well… um… big. And scary. And armed.” She sputters, making me smirk.
“You never have to fear me, Clara, but I can’t say the same to anyone else. I’m going easy on you’, as you put it, because I can see the innocence in your eyes, and I don’t want to cause you any hardship, but I can only do that as long as you trust me. Are you ready to hear what I need from you?”
Clara finishes her tea in one gulp, maybe taking some strength from the sugary blend, and sits the mug down, nodding decidedly. “Yes.”
“First things first, and this is the most important rule of them all: Don’t answer the door for anyone but me. My capo might be after your father’s money, but he won’t come himself, and there are many, many more men like me under this thumb that aren’t nearly as nice as me. And I’m a bit of a bastard anyway, so you can only imagine what they are like. From this moment on, I am your only safe contact. I don’t care if the Pope himself is knocking at your door after I leave.” I lean forward, lowering my voice to emphasize my point. “Only for me, Clara. Understand?”
“Y-yes. I get it. What else?”
“Once I leave here, you have twenty-four hours to contact your father and get him to wire the money back to me that he owes, plus the interest. Don’t worry, he has all my information, so you don’t have to remember anything, but make sure to tell him I don’t give a damn where the money comes from, as long as I get it.”
She nods once more, her lips pursing. “I’ll try. It’s a lot of money but…I’ll try.”
“Lastly, don’t even think of leaving the country and trying to fly home under my nose. If my boss finds out that I let you get away like that, it won’t just be you that’s punished, it will be me, too.” I don’t tell her that there’s really no way the Giordano family capo, my uncle, would ever dream of punishing me for anything, let alone something as small as this lovely little woman trying to escape her bonds that she might not even be aware of. Over all my years of work, I’ve learned to identify the soft hearts of empathetic people and use that fact to my advantage, and Clara is an empath if I’ve ever seen one. If I was a better man, I might feel guilty for manipulating her like this, but…well, I’m not a better man. I’m not even a good man.
“I’ll come back in the morning with food for you tomorrow, as well as dinner tomorrow evening so you don’t have any reason to leave. I’ll also give you my private number that you can call if you need anything, as well as the number for a contact of mine in case I fail to come tomorrow, like I’ve said. It’s unlikely that anything will be able to interrupt me, but in my line of work, it’s better to plan for every outcome. I’m sure you understand.”
I don’t think she does actually understand the gravity of the situation, but Clara needs to believe that she’s an equal part in my plans, not someone that I’m trying to keep under my thumb while I consider my next steps. I have my doubts that her father will be able to come up with my money fast enough, but even if he doesn’t, there are other alternatives. I almost hope Paul can’t pay, because it will give me a reason to take his daughter home with me and keep her until he does. Hopefully it will take long enough that I can bind her to me irrevocably, but if it doesn’t then I guess she’ll have to see the crueler side of me earlier than I would have liked.
I watch her fingers tracing the rim of her mug, her eyes lowered towards the floor as she contemplates the situation she has landed in. Poor girl, none of this is her fault, but I swear I’ll make it all up to her as soon as I can. I just have to make sure she never catches me in any of the lies I’ve just told her. They aren’t even true lies, really, just exaggerations. My capo, Uncle Antonio, probably doesn’t give a flying fuck when or how I return the borrowed money to the family coffers, considering the fact that I have more than enough in my own private accounts to cover it if things go south with the borrower, but my uncle makes a convenient faceless threat to keep Clara in line while I figure out my next move.
“Clara,” I say quietly, getting her to snap those green eyes up to meet mine. “I hate to do this, but it is just the way of things. If you disobey me, I will have to punish you. My way. And there can be no complaints from you.”
A few emotions pass over her face; anger, fear, and then a reluctant acceptance. “What kind of punishment exactly?”
I’m pleased by her ready acceptance, but in the face of her family owing me two million dollars, what else can she do but accept my terms? “It will depend on the type of disobedience. I will never hurt you, like I said, but I won’t say that some of my methods don’t leave a bit of sting.”
I almost want her to disobey, so I can peel those leggings down and smack her round ass with my palm until her skin glows red. It takes her a beat, but she discerns the undertones of what I’m suggesting, and she flushes a pretty pink. “That’s barbaric,” she says quietly, looking away from me.
“As I said, it is just the way of things here,” I try to sound apologetic, but I’m not sure if I manage it.
“Nothing in any of the Naples tourist brochures did it mention spanking,” she huffs, blowing a curl out of her face and crossing her arms.
I chuckle to myself. Clara is smart enough to see that she’s backed into a corner, both by her father’s actions and those of her friend who abandoned her, and right now I must look like an unlikely, if scary, ally. “Only if you disobey, sweetheart. I’m sure you can behave.”
She doesn’t answer, nibbling on that lucious bottom lip of hers, and I decide that it’s time to cut this off before her begrudging acceptance morphs into righteous denial. She’s teetering on the edge of it, and while it’s fun to push her buttons and see her get flustered, I have to leave while she still sees everything we’ve talked about as an inevitable consequence, not the personal interest I’ve taken in her.
I rise from my seat and walk over to her chair. She looks up at me and I take her chin between my thumb and forefinger. She’s so young and vulnerable that it makes my newly awakened heart ache, but I have to play this right or I’ll lose her forever. Even though we’ve just met, that is not an option.
