Suddenly he was in front of me and took me in his arms. My head fell back on his chest as I looked at him. He put me on the couch. Gianna knelt beside me, squeezing my hand. “What is happening to her?” she cried.
“Roofies,” Romero repeated. “This sick asshole was trying to drag her out.”
Luca lined up in front of my attacker. “Did you put Roofies in my wife’s drink, Rick?”
Did Luca know the man? Confusion darted through my confused mind.
“Wife! I didn’t know she was yours. I didn’t. I swear!” The man’s lower lip trembled.
Luke pushed Romero’s hand away and curled his fingers around the handle of the knife still stuck in Rick’s leg. He turned and the man screamed. Romero held him upright by the arms. “What were you going to do to her once you got her out?”
“Nothing!” shouted the man.
“Nothing? So if my men had not stopped you, you would have simply taken her to the hospital?” Luca’s voice was pleasant, calm, his face devoid of emotion.
Gianna’s grip on my hand was painful. I swallowed and cleared my throat. “I will fuck your tight ass,” I whispered.
Luca’s head turned, then he was at my side, his face so close to mine I could have kissed him. Maybe it was the Roofies but I really wanted to kiss him into unconsciousness at that moment, I wanted to rip his shirt off, I wanted to….
“What did you say, Aria?”
“I’m going to fuck your ass tight. I’m going to make you scream, bitch. I’m going to fuck you damn hard, bitch. That’s what he told me.” Luca looked into my eyes, a muscle in his jaw twitching. Before he could move, Gianna had leapt to her feet and launched herself at Rick. She hit him in the face and kicked him in the groin, and struggled fiercely against Matteo’s grip as he dragged her away from Rick.
“You’re going to die!” she screamed.
Luca straightened and she stopped moving.
“Let me go,” he hissed.
“Do you promise to behave?” asked Matteo with an amused smile.
She nodded, staring at Rick. Matteo dropped his arms and she adjusted her clothes.
“They will make you bleed,” she said coldly. “And I hope they’ll rape your ugly ass with that broomstick over there.”
“Gianna,” I squealed. She walked over to me and let herself fall on the edge of the couch, taking my hand again.
Matteo couldn’t take his eyes off her. “I’m going to make him pay, Gianna.”
“No,” Luca said firmly. Rick looked ready to burst from relief. “It’s my responsibility.”
Matteo and Luca exchanged a long look, then Matteo nodded.
Luca brought his face closer to Rick’s. “Did you want to fuck my wife? Did you want to make her scream?” His voice ripped through my growing dizziness and sent a shiver down my spine. I was glad it wasn’t directed at me. I had been afraid of Luke before, but he had never had a tone like that.
Rick shook his head frantically. “No please.”
Luca wrapped his hand around Rick’s throat and lifted him until he stood on tiptoe and his face turned red. Then he tossed him away and Rick hit the wall and slumped to the ground.
“I hope you’re hungry,” Luca growled. “Because I’m going to feed you your cock.”
“Take the girls to the car, Romero,” Matteo ordered as Luca unsheathed his knife. Romero took me in his arms and walked out the back door, followed by Gianna. Dizziness cloaked my brain and I pressed my face into Romero’s jacket. He stiffened.
Gianna huffed. “Do you think Luca will cut your dick off too because she leaned on you while she was sick?”
“Luca is my boss and Aria is his.”
Gianna muttered something under her breath but I couldn’t make out the words.
“Open the door for me,” Romero said and then I lay down on the cool skin. Gianna lifted my head and placed it in her lap. Her fingers untangled my hair and she rested her forehead against mine.
“That boy gets what he deserves.”
I closed my eyes. I had condemned a man to death with my words. My first murder. “Your bodyguard doesn’t even dare wait in the car with us. Luca is a beast.”
“Romero watches,” I whispered.
“Sure.” I must have dozed off because suddenly the door swung open and Luca spoke.
“What’s she like?”
“Holy crap,” Gianna said, her voice shrill. “You’re covered in blood.”
I opened my eyes, but had a hard time focusing.
“Just my shirt,” Luca said, with clear annoyance in his voice. A rustle was heard.
“You have no shame,” Gianna said.
“I take off my shirt, not my fucking pants. Do you ever shut your mouth?”
“Here, boss.”
Confusingly, I saw Luca put on a new shirt. “Burn it and take care of everything, Romero.
I’ll drive.”
A hand brushed my cheek, and Luca’s face hovered above me. Then he was gone, the door closed, and he slid behind the driver’s seat. The car began to move and my stomach clenched.
Gianna leaned forward, her head between the seats. “You’re a big shot, you know that? If you weren’t married to my sister and weren’t such a jerk, I might consider trying.”
“Gianna,” I groaned. When she was scared, nervous or angry, she never stopped talking, and the more she talked the more abusive she became. And around Luca she was constantly angry.
“What, did the cat eat your tongue? I heard you usually skip everything that doesn’t have a dick,” Gianna said.
Luca continued to say nothing. I would have liked to see his face to find out how close he was to the explosion. Not long before he had killed a man; Gianna really should shut up.
Gianna sat down, but I knew she wasn’t done yet. She would not give up until he could lift it . She entered the underground garage of our apartment building. “This is it,” Gianna whispered in my ear. I wished she would have talked to Luca as reasonably as she talked to me.
The car door opened and Luca took me in his arms. He led me toward the ‘private elevator and entered. The strong halogen lights hurt my eyes but I kept them open to look at Gianna and Luca in the mirror. He leaned in next to him and his expression did not bode well. “Have you ever had a threesome?”
Luca didn’t move a muscle. He was looking at me but I kept my attention on the mirror, trying to send Gianna a silent message to shut up. “How many women have you raped before my sister?”
Luca’s head snapped up, his eyes blazing as he stared at Gianna. I gently pressed my palm against his chest and he looked at me. The tension remained. “Can’t you do something else with your mouth besides yap?”
Gianna straightened up. “Like what? Give you a blowjob?”
Luca laughed. “Girl, you’ve never even seen a cock. Keep your lips shut.”
“Gianna,” I croaked in warning.
Finally we got to the top floor and Luca came out into our attic. He headed toward the stairs leading to our bedroom when Gianna blocked his way. “Where are you taking her?”
“To bed,” Luca said, trying to dodge my sister but she followed his movements.
“It’s full of Roofies. This is probably the chance you’ve been waiting for. I won’t leave her alone with you.”
Luca froze like a wolf about to attack. “I’m only going to say this once and you’d better obey: get out of the way and go to bed.”
“Or what?”
“Gianna, please,” I pleaded with her. She scrutinized my face, then nodded once and kissed me quickly on the cheek. “Improve.”
Luca walked past her, led me up the stairs and then into the master bedroom. The sickness that had been a distant pressure in my stomach turned into an insistent throbbing. “I’m going to be sick .”
Luca took me to the bathroom and held me over the toilet while I vomited. When I was finished, I said, “I’m sorry.”
“What for?” He helped me up, even though the only thing holding me up was his steely grip on my waist.
“For throwing up.”
Luca shook his head and handed me a wet towel. My hands were shaking as I used it to dry my face.
“It’s good that you got some of that shit out of your system. Fucking titties. It’s the only way for ugly fuckers like Rick to get their dicks in their pussies.”
He led me back into the bedroom and toward the bed. “Can you undress?”
“Yes.” The moment he let go, I fell backward and landed on the mattress. I got a laugh , then a new wave of dizziness hit me and I groaned. He leaned over me, his face slightly unfocused.
“I’ll take off your clothes. They smell like smoke and vomit.” I wasn’t sure why he was telling me this. It wasn’t as if he had never seen me naked before. He grabbed the hem of my T-shirt and slipped it over my head. I watched as he unzipped my leather pants and slid them down my legs, his knuckles grazing my skin, leaving goosebumps in their wake. She unfastened my glittering bra and threw it to the floor before straightening up and staring at me. She turned abruptly and disappeared from my sight. Dots danced in and out of my sight and I was on the verge of bursting into another laugh when Luca returned and helped me into one of his shirts. He was only in his briefs. He slid his arms under my knees and shoulder blades, and made me stand up until my head rested on the pillow, then he got into bed beside me.
“You’re impressive, you know that?” I stammered.
Luca scrutinized my face, then pressed his palm to my forehead. I giggled and reached out my hand, wanting to touch his tattoo but misjudging the distance and brushing my fingertips over his abdomen and then lower. He hissed, snatched my hand away and pressed it to my stomach. “Aria, you’re drugged. Try to sleep.”
“Maybe I don’t want to sleep.” I wriggled in his grip.
“Yes.”
I yawned. “Are you holding me?”
Luca said nothing but turned off the lights and hugged me from behind. “You’d better lie on your side in case you feel sick again.”
“Did you kill him?”
There was a pause. “YES.”
“Now there is blood on my hands.”
“You did not kill him.”
“But you killed him because of me.”
“I am a murderer, Aria. It had nothing to do with you.” It had everything to do with me, but I was too tired to argue.
I listened to his breathing for a few moments. “You know, sometimes I wish I could hate you, but I can’t. I think I love you. I never thought I could. And sometimes I wonder what it would be like if you made love to me.”
Luca pressed his lips to my neck. “Sleep.”
“But you don’t love me,” I murmured. “You don’t want to make love to me. You want to fuck me because you own me.” His arm tightened around me. “Sometimes I wish you had taken me with you on our wedding night, so at least I wouldn’t still wish for something that will never happen. You want to fuck me the way you fucked Grace, like an animal. That’s why you told me you would fuck me hard, right?”
My tongue was heavy and my eyelids glued together. I was talking nonsense, a misunderstanding of words I shouldn’t have said.
“When did he say that? Aria, when?”
Luke’s sharp voice could not tear through the fog that covered my thoughts and the darkness claimed me.