I smooth the bodice with my hands and look at myself in the mirror. I don’t recognize the girl staring back. She looks… serene. Polished. But underneath, I can still feel the fluttering in my stomach. The fear I’m trying to ignore. The tiny hope that it won’t be terrible. That maybe… maybe it’ll be okay.
That maybe I’ll feel something besides pressure and obligation.
I take a deep breath.
This is what you were raised for,I remind myself.Be good. Be graceful. Be ready.
I open the door.
Roberto has changed, too.
My heart stops when I take in his naked chest and the tight black leather breeches. He holds something in his hand. My mind refuses to recognize it until he places the black leather henchman mask on his grinning face. That's when my heart beats so fast I think I'm going to pass out.
"Rob-erto?" I ask with a hitch and a hiccup. This has to be a bad dream. It has to be. A very bad one.
"My pretty little bride," I hear the smirk in his voice. He picks something up from a side table. It's also black. Thin.
I didn't think my heart could beat any harder, but when I realize he's holding a black collar, it does. With a muffled scream, my frozen legs wake up, and I rush toward the door. Roberto doesn't move.
I rip the door open.
Two of his men stand there, like they've been expecting me. The look on their faces, the gleam in their eyes, tells me everything I need to know and don't want to acknowledge.
"Now, come back inside, my sweet little bride." Roberto's voice is cold, "unless you want Pacco and Lennard to hold you down." A lump forms in my throat.
"It's all the same to me. And them." Roberto laughs.
Pacco's and Lennard's gazes are locked on me. A fever burns in their eyes that I've only seen once before. When those men tried to abduct the other girls and me. Slowly, I take a step backward. And another. Until my back hits Roberto's chest. He must have walked forward without me noticing. A small sob escapes me when his hands grab my arms. The door is still open, and Pacco and Lennard stare at Roberto and me expectantly.
"What's it gonna be, little bride. Do you want them to watch?" The cold stiffness of Roberto's mask touches my ear, muffles his voice, but I can still hear a ragged breath coming from him. Feel his arousal against my back.
Brutal palms grab my breasts, squeeze them. "Do you?"
"No-oh, plea-se." I plead, now fully sobbing.
"Maybe not tonight," Roberto pushes me forward, never releasing my breasts, before he kicks the doors shut, first one, then the other.
"You're hurt-ing me," I whisper.
"Oh, baby, you have no idea," he laughs. "Now stand still."
Even if I'd wanted to, I wouldn't have been able to move. I stand still as he releases my breasts, then pulls up my hair. I can hear his deep breathing echoing inside the mask. He fastens the collar around my neck. The slight click is so faint, but to me it sounds like the door to a dungeonclosing.
"Get on your hands and knees," he pants, grabbing the bulge between his legs and rubbing it. "Now!"
I'm too stunned, too overwhelmed, too frightened, too overcome to move. I stare at him with tears streaming down my face, shaking my head, not to contradict his command, but in denial of what is happening.
"No?" The word is distorted, like a chuckle.
His arm swings back, his palm hits my face with so much force, I land on the ground in a pile of satin and tulle. He kicks me in the side. Mercifully, the kick is broken by the satin and tulle, but it's still enough to push the breath out of me.
His hands grab my ankles and flip me over. A scream of pain and humiliation tears from my lips.
"That's it. Scream, baby, scream for me." He pants. "This is going to be the beginning of a long honeymoon," he shouts, pulling on the collar harder, pumping into me, until the world goes black.
Six months before the wedding…
Getting into business with Mario is the game-changer I needed to get my own gig rolling. After Doc Brown stitched me up, Mario takes me back to his place, where he fills me in about his predicament over a glass of bourbon.
