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Seeing my sister and her husband so happy, seeing Lucia lost in her own world and too busy chasing dreams to care what anyone else was doing, I felt so purposeless and absolutely tired. Spending most of my days pining over a man who doesn’t want me back.
Except it sure as shit felt like he wanted me back when he slid his tongue inside my pussy.
Sex, I mentally correct.
Sex and lust and wanting a place to bury your cock are very different things from wanting to grow with another person. Aren’t they? Why would I want Ricardo, anyway? Besides the chemistry and his handsome face, he’s annoying as fuck and thinks he’s always right. Not to mention, he has the emotional vulnerability of a rock, and if he opens his mouth, he’s either arrogant or degrading or both.
Maybe I’m too inexperienced to understand the difference between lust and desire, at least when it comes to him. I let foolish hope and passion lead me down a blind path, and where has it gotten me?
I let out a sigh, disgusted with myself.
The leash I hadn’t known was wrapped around my neck is now firmly in the first of a stranger, someone who manipulated me into giving myself to him because he’d known I was naive.
I refuse to call myself ignorant.
I’ll be able to get out of it. I’ll manipulate Drago, take down his entire empire in the process, and be able to help my family in the process. Done deal, right? If I believe it, then it’s going to work. It has to work.
What other choice do I have?
Absolutely fucking none, so I better convince myself to get with the program. Before I went into the club, ready and willing to strike out, I should have watched every step. Been more careful.
I can’t trust anyone, not even Ricardo. I’ll go along with his plan as long as I am able to but with my eyes open this time, filing away every bit of information I see and hear for later use. And I’ll get out of Drago’s house one way or another.
First, dinner. Dinner with my family and their judgments sharing the table.
I switch off the shower and stand there for a minute longer under the last drips from the shower head. I take a few heartbeats to compose myself before I have to wear the carefree mask my family expects from me. And Ricardo, of course he’ll be here. He doesn’t make a move without his uncle’s permission these days.
Carter practically controls how often and where his nephew takes a piss.
I take my time putting my face on, drawing liner across my eyelids, and blush on the high points of my cheeks. Make sure there isn’t an eyelash out of place or a stray hair as I set the long dark strands into curls.
The woman in the mirror looks like she has it all figured out, but in reality, nothing is right. Nothing is the way it should be if I laid out a vision for myself and my future.
Hazel eyes are narrowed in a smile, lips perfectly pinked, lined, and curving upward.
I shuck the filthy black dress into the hamper and exchange it for red, the color standing out against the gold of my skin and adding life, vivacity, something to take away from the hollow feeling inside.
“Time for dinner.” My reflection mouths the words back to me with a teasing lilt, a flash of mischief.
None of it’s real. Even the contract between me and Drago isn’t real because I never agreed to it. And right now, the fucking bracelet of doom is tucked away at the back of my jewelry box because it makes me sick to look at it.
I push away from the vanity, striding out of the room.
Out into the house I’ve known all my life, the familiar halls and the decadent decor Mom likes to change on a whim. I’m on the complete opposite side of the house from my parent’s private abode, which takes up an entire wing of the second floor. As though they knew one of their daughters would have to stay here with them and so they wanted me to be as far away as possible for privacy’s sake, so I wouldn’t rock the boat.
The boat is rocked. There is no going back now.
A hand curls around the back of my neck, and I stop mid-stride, Ricardo melting out of the shadows as he tightens his grip.
“What did I tell you about staying observant?” he purrs. “Even in familiar surroundings, you have to be sure you see what’s going on. If you don’t, then you’re never going to make it once Drago comes to call.”
Every part of me lights up at the touch, the proprietary sweep of his thumb against my skin. Shit, I am totally sunk.
“I guess you’re going to tell me I’ve failed your test, huh?” I crane my head back to try to catch a glimpse of him, but he’s angled to the point where I can only see his shoulder. “Or maybe you're sneaking around trying to spook me.”
Ricardo takes a step closer, and a whiff of his cologne filters up my nostrils, something spicy and utterly male. It curls around my insides, around my heart, and constricts, squeezing me tighter than a starving anaconda.
“You look so fuckable in your dress, Isabella.”
