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A creak wakes me from my sleep, and I sit up, yawning from how tired I am still. The moonlight peeks into the room from the balcony while the breeze sways the curtains.
“Just the wind,” I say to myself, my eyelids heavy from how tired I am, but the urge to use the restroom makes me swing my legs over the bed.
I don’t bother flipping on the light. I stumble into a wall, disoriented from being half-asleep, and stub my toe on the corner. “Ow,” I grumble, limping the rest of the way to the bathroom.
I do my business and wash my hands, wiping them on a towel, when a hand covers my mouth.
“Don’t make a sound,” the man warns.
I ram my elbow into his gut which has him release me, groaning from the unexpected punch. I run out of the restroom and fumble with the lock on the front door. The stupid chain. Why did I latch it?
“Damn it. You don’t understand. I’m doing you a favor,” he says, pinning me against the door and something pricks my skin. “You’re okay. Just know you’re safe.” He tries to wrap his arms around me again, but I dip below his arms. He turns around and without hesitation, I punch him across the face.
“Fuck!” he yells. “Why did you go and do that? You’re safe! I’m not going to hurt you.”
I run by him and he snags me by the arm and I slam my head back, smashing my skull against his face.
“Hey, you’re really hurting me here. I’m not going to hurt you. You’re safe, Mable. Safe,” he repeats as if I’ve known him forever.
Safe.
Nothing about this feels safe, but everything about the voice sounds familiar, and there’s nothing I can do about it because whatever he injected me with makes me fall limps in his arms.
I’m at his mercy.
And I get the feeling that no one can save me now.
Chapter Two
Adrian
“I don’t know where he is,” I snap at my father. “I’m not his keeper. He’s a grown man. He can do what he wants. I’m tired of having to chase after him. He’ll come back. He always does.” I rub my forehead as my father curses in Italian before hanging up on me.
Being the one to take over the Benedetti name doesn’t come with fucking flowers; it only comes with headaches the size of mountains. And to make matters worse, I have to get married. According to the old family rules that have been followed for generations, I have to get married by the time I’m forty-one, or the title will fall to the next in line.
My younger brother.
And that cannot happen. I’m constantly bailing him out of jail or bad situations he finds himself in. He hasn’t grown up. He lives life on the whim, consequences be damned. He doesn’t want the responsibility of looking after fifty-plus men. He doesn’t want to keep order. If Otello had his way, he’d toss the rules out the window, let everyone do what they want, and cause havoc.
It would only be a matter of time before all of us got arrested for crimes we’ve committed if Otello were in charge.
Benedettis have always been ruthless. We don’t play by laws or rules. We make our own. If someone crosses us, they die. That’s how it’s always been, and that’s how it will always be.
But I hate this rule of needing to get married. I don’t want to marry a woman I can’t stand. I only have one woman in mind, and I’ve spent years obsessing over her. My heart is hers. No one else will ever compare. The brief moment I had with her all those years ago is better than any moment I’ve had with the women in my life.
I’m infatuated with someone I don’t even know, but I don’t deserve her. Her parents are dead because of me and my family.
I dab a bit of white paint onto the canvas to give the illusion of light hitting her lips and take a step back to admire my new painting of her.
“So fucking beautiful, Mable,” I speak to the painting, wishing the woman on the canvas came to life. I’d give anything to hold her in my arms and to give her the world, but life isn’t fair.
And Mable knows all about that.
I set my paintbrush down and look around the room no one has been in but me. My obsession with her has taken over my life. I’ve painted her thousands of times in thousands of different ways. I’ve painted her naked, imagining what her body would look like laid out on the bed, her long hair spanned along the white pillowcases.
I’ve envisioned it so many times; there are days when I’m not sure if seeing her naked hasn’t happened. I’ve nearly convinced myself that she is mine and mine only.
I sculpted her body from clay, needing to see how her body would look in my hands. I’ve imagined her breasts to be a perfect size, just enough to fill my palm, so none goes to waste. Her waist has a dip, but she isn’t too thin. She has enough for me to hold onto and grip while I thrust in as far as I can and fill her until she drips off me.
