Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 87704 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87704 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
If we let her go—when we let her go—she’ll be free to return home. She could meet a kind man named Brad who’ll take her for early-bird-specials and treat her kindly so that she can live out an ordinary, average, uneventful life. But even as I try to picture her there, I can’t. I don’t want to. I’m jealous of a fictional man I created with my own mind. Thinking about her with anyone else makes me sick, even though all I can give her is the darkness of the underworld.
“Antonio,” she gasps as I rasp my tongue harder and faster over her slick flesh. I reach up, taking her tight little nipple between my thumb and forefinger and twist it just slightly. She groans, her grip in my short hair flaring painfully, then she spasms, her body collapsing with her orgasm until she slides down the wall into my lap.
I kiss her open mouth, tasting her whimpers and holding her to me like I’m drowning and she’s the only chance of saving myself.
“Antonio,” she whispers.
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “It’s okay.”
But even as I say the words, I know I’m a liar.
11
AEMELIA
WASHED AWAY
Antonio Venturi, brutal killer, enforcer for his corrupt mafia family soaps my hair like my mother used to when I was a child. He washes me gently, touching my body in a tender methodical way that isn’t meant to be erotic but feels that way anyway. Sitting on his soaked pants, his erection is obvious, but he doesn’t push me to touch it. He doesn’t even hint that he expects something from me in return for what he gave—pleasure so beautiful I now understand why the French call orgasms a tiny death. I watch him concentrate on soaping my feet, sliding his thick fingers between each of my toes like he doesn’t want to leave even an inch of me unwashed, and I can’t understand what’s happening to me.
How is this man so different from my first assumptions?
He could force me to do anything, such is his strength, and I’d have no choice but to bend to his will, but instead, he pampers me, not like a captive but like a princess.
“I think I’m clean,” I say.
He frowns. “There’s one place I haven’t washed.”
He’s right. He licked me there but left washing the place between my legs until last. The way his cheeks turn pink tells me he feels very different about this. “I’ll leave you,” he says, but I grip his arm.
“No,” I whisper, holding my breath as I wait to see what he’ll do next, letting my thigh’s part enough for his hand. I tremble with anticipation, fascinated by his restraint as he goes still behind me. He hesitates; his breathing ragged. I close my eyes, waiting. His fingers are already soapy, so when they part my folds, skimming over my clit, it’s smooth and easy, and I arch my back and hiss at the sensation.
Antonio is slow and tentative, touching me, washing me with reverent but thorough care, and my pussy clenches, craving more. He groans, the sound so pained, it makes me gasp, and then he eases me from his lap, pushing up quickly, his clothes so sodden they drop a rush of water. How is he going to get back to his room without drenching the place? I guess he isn’t worried because he slicks his hand over his face and hair, grabs his shoes from the floor, and disappears through the bathroom door.
Confusion draws my brows together, and I shake my head. So, licking between my legs is okay, but washing me between them broke him? Antonio Venturi is a complex man, and it seems that I am a strange woman. Or mad. Only madness can explain my flip between rage and desire. Or maybe there’s a closer relationship between the two emotions that I imagined.
I pull off my wet nightdress and wring it out before hanging it over the towel rail then I reach for a fluffy white towel. I wrap my hair and stare at myself in the mirror.
When Antonio forced me to look at myself, I hadn’t recognized the woman he gripped by the throat, and now, my reflection is still unfamiliar. My cheeks are flushed, and my eyes are strangely bright. My body feels alive in a way it never has before.
One orgasm? Is that all it takes?
I see a ruthless killer worship at my feet, and I’m suddenly dragged into a deep thrall. His mouth was as soft as the down pillows in the bedroom, his tongue coaxing, searching out my pleasure like he held a map to the shortest path.
I shake my head and look away, following the wet trail he left with the floor mat hooked beneath my foot. The door isn’t locked. It isn’t even shut. Antonio dashed away so quickly that he forgot that he was supposed to secure his captive. In the hallway, everything is quiet. I glance to the left at the four black doors that hold other bedrooms inhabited by other men. I look right into the open-plan living area that seems empty. Where is everyone?