Page 55 of Mafia Bride
His eyes are on fire. He’s the living embodiment of Hades. He takes me by the throat and pushes me against the filthy alley wall. His scent fills my nostrils and all the air around me.
Rage. He smells like rage.
His nose presses against my cheek and his breath freezes my jaw. He isn’t hurting me, he isn’t choking me, but he’s in control and he wants me to know it.
Why is this suddenly so arousing?
Why did my heart start beating differently, just as fast, but in a different rhythm?
What. The. Fuck. Is. Wrong. With. Me.
“You’ll be dead long before you’re free.”
He means it. I can feel it. This time, it’s not a threat, but a warning. I don’t understand it. He’s threatened me plenty of times.
“Why?” I let out a shaky breath. Each movement of my mouth undulates against his hands. “Why me?”
“It’s always been you, Violetta.”
His lips graze my cheek, my forehead, my nose. He’s activating paths along my skin, mapping the way to my own damn womanhood in electrical current. Intoxicating. Between his hands and his lips I can’t see or feel anything else. We are trapped in this moment between worlds, where only he and I exist.
A whoop of a police car slices cleanly through the moment, and I’m no longer embraced by a powerful lover, but a horrible captor.
Santino takes his hands off my throat and takes a step back. For just a second, one heavy breath, a flash of humanity wipes out the regal rage in his features. Guilt. Like the better part of him caught the demon manhandling me.
Then we both look down the alley to the street, see the police car pass as it whoops again to part the thick traffic, and the moment is fully, completely dead.
“You’re coming with me.”
The Rolls blocks one direction, leaving me with only one way to run.
“Okay.”
Santino turns, arms out. One arm to me, one pointing to the store, commanding me to follow him back inside, back to my prison, back to the life I’d rather die in than continue.
Not a chance in hell.
I fake a step forward, then cut away and run back down the alley. If I run hard enough, if I press enough, maybe I can catch that police car. I can be free.
“No!” Santino barks.
I run harder than I’ve ever run before, not looking back. I’ll never, ever look back. My legs burn, my lungs sting, and still I push.
I make it to the end of the alley.
A black Suburban blocks my way. I bang on the window.
“Help!” Nothing. I bang like I’m going to punch through the glass. “Please. Help me!”
I spin around, looking for another door, another alleyway, anything. All I see is Santino, running towards me with something more than rage.
Is it fear?
Another black Suburban pulls in behind the Rolls, blocking the other direction.
Something is very, very wrong.
I bang on the window, still watching Santino behind me as he stops running, but my fists don’t hit glass. They fly through the space, into the car. For a moment I think I punched through, but it’s just an open window. A hand grabs my wrist.
