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Ricardo faces Drago with a growl in his throat, even though his face remains a mask of composure. “Don’t talk to me like a newb. I understand.”
My hands clench into fists at my sides. The world has crashed down to my feet, and I am a mess of shame and sex hair. Something changed tonight, and rather than worrying about my survival, now I’m wondering how I’m going to recover from the hottest and most humiliating sexual encounters of my life.
“Where do you think we’re going to go?” Ricardo continues.
“As of right now, I want you to both be alert. And Miss Balestra is to let me know what’s going on with the takeover and her older sister's ascension to power.” Drago shrugs, taking a sip of scotch. His mouth is tight as he swallows. “I want to know every single detail as you learn it. Am I understood? That is her task. If I’m not pleased with her information, I’ll let both of you know. You both have my number now.”
I force myself to stand straighter rather than hunching in on myself the way I want to. Curling in a ball while I work through this. It’s too much to process at once.
Ricardo reaches for me and I skid back a step, too focused on the muffled snickers from the others in the room. He grabs me by the arm and practically drags me out of the mansion at his side, fast. Not nearly fast enough. The laughter sticks with me the entire time.
I’d been thoroughly fucked in front of a mob boss and a dead body.
I cover up my choked sob with a cough.
Ricardo’s guards wait for us outside the front doors and one of them steps up to open the car. He practically pushes me into the back seat before he slams the door shut. The vehicle lurches into motion and takes off in my next breath, tires peeling on asphalt.
We survived.
We made it out, and we’re heading home. To what end?
Drago might as well have thrown a literal collar around both our necks at this point. It feels like we’re one step further back than when we set out tonight.
“I hope your plan is ironclad.” Shit, my voice is trembling again.
Actually, every part of me has started to shake.
It shouldn’t bother me as greatly as it does, I try to tell myself because at least it was Ricardo. And during the act, it had been everything I’d ever wanted. Not the right circumstances but does it really matter if it’s the right person?
Afterward, with the curtain pulled back and the weight of the evening on my shoulders, I feel nothing short of used. A little worthless. And I'm grateful that my hair hides my face as we drive home.
No, not home.
Ricardo barks out a demand to the driver, and we take a completely different path away from Drago’s mansion.
Humiliation. That was the only reason for the display, to make us dance for his delight. How am I ever going to get free? And if I try to fight, I have no doubt he will release the video he’d taken of us, and then everyone will see me naked, getting fucked raw on the floor.
There is nothing to say on the entire ride back to Ricardo’s place. He lives in the same compound as the rest of his family, as though his parents are loath to let him out of their sights. The main house isn’t as large as ours, but the guest house is the size of a single-family home in a nice part of town.
Carter used to live in the guest house, I realize as we pull to a stop in front of the smaller house made in the image of its master only feet away. When Carter moved into our place, Ricardo must have taken over his old space, a little more separation from his parents.
The car door opens, although it’s impossible to see the man holding the handle in the dark. There are no lights on inside the small house. Ricardo, however, finds his way unerringly to the door and presses a combination into the lock, his hand locked around my wrist to keep me with him.
It opens without a key, and the scents from inside wrap around me like a warm blanket. Acrid cleaner and musky cologne, and bright citrus.
Not home, I think again, but Ricardo’s palace, the place where he resides and where he takes off his mask. He snaps his fingers, and the men close the door behind him, no doubt moving into position outside. Whether the shifts change sometime during the night or whether the guards eventually take off, content in the knowledge that Ricardo and his family are safe within their walls, I have no damn clue. And I’m too worn out to care.
Every footstep I take is tremulous, my insides jittery.
He flicks on a light in the kitchen and points down the hallway toward one of the two doors there. The first is a bathroom, I have no doubt. The second must be the master bedroom.
One foot in front of the other, my body heavy and numb, and I catch my first glimpse of the overly large bed with its dark sheets and white comforter. It’s almost enough to make me cry out. I end up dropping, hard, on the edge of the bed, the softness of the mattress absorbing me instantly.
I’m motionless for the longest time, utterly numb, with my arms wrapping around my torso as though they will somehow be able to give me some much-needed warmth, but nothing is working. Great sex. Maybe even some of the best sex of my life, but in front of lecherous old men who wanted to be Ricardo. Drago wanted to thrust inside like it was his right instead of my choice, and in the end, all of it was filmed.
Because I made a mistake.
The first chance I get, I’m selling the necklace, and I’ll erase every memory associated with it. Good or bad.
