The tension thickens in the air as Stefano scrapes his chair back and storms out of the dining room. The remaining brothers look at me in complete shock, except for Mattia. I guess they didn’t see that coming. A smirk crosses my lips. Another win for Charlie.
I mutter to no one in particular, “Cosa gli è entrato nel culo stasera?”What’s crawled up his ass tonight?
“He doesn’t trust you,” Gabriele says, blunt as ever and not fazed by me talking in Italian as well.
“Yeah, no shit.” My eyes scan the room and lock onto Luciano’s unreadable face.
“You didn’t tell us you could speak Italian, Red.” Mattia raises his eyebrows at me, but I know he knew by the way he looked at me at the first dinner. This must be for show for his brothers.
“My dad made me take lessons from a young age. He was persistent on me speaking Italian fluently.” As I tell them this, a memory flashes.
“Again, Charlotte,” Dad demands on our drive home, making me recite everything I learnt at today’s lesson.
“Uno, due, tre, quattro, cinque, sei, sette, otto, nove, diec.” One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.
“Ciao, mi chiamo Charlotte.” Hello, my name is Charlotte.
“Come posso aiutarla?” How can I help you?
“Hai sbagliato persona.” You have the wrong person.
We have just started to progress from individual words to sentences. Dad makes me go twice a week to learn Italian, and he sits in the back of the room and watches me intently.
“Why do I have to learn Italian? No one else my age is,” I try to argue with him. He’s becoming more agitatedas I grow older.
“Because I said so. Keep going,” he says. After every lesson, it’s the same conversation and the same answer. I stare out the window as we pass suburbia, slowly reciting today’s lesson until nothing makes sense anymore.
“Charlie, helloooo?” Mattia is waving his hands in front of my face, snapping me back to reality.
“What?”
“I said, don’t you think it’s strange your dad made you learn Italian?”
“I always thought it was weird growing up, but now I guess it makes perfect sense,” I say, pushing the food around my plate. I need a distraction away from this conversation, away from the harsh truth that Dad must have been preparing me just in case someone from my mother’s side ever found me. I turn to Luciano. “What’s on the agenda tomorrow?”
“I’m going out in the morning, but you have shooting practice with Mattia in the afternoon,” Luciano says between bites.
“Where are you going?” I prod at him, sipping the wine from my glass.
“Eat your dinner,” he grunts.
Fuck it,I think to myself. Let’s see how long it takes to crack his stoic mask and punish me. I need to distract myself from the thought of shooting a gun tomorrow. Slowly, I trail my foot up his leg underneath the table. His eyebrows shoot up, but his eyes stay down, refusing to meet my eyes.
Next, I “accidentally” let my fork slip out of my hand and it falls under the table. I climb underneath, but Luciano barely notices, too caught up in his own dark thoughts. Before he can react, I sink myteeth down hard on his dick through his pants. His hand yanks my hair back so violently that my head bangs against the underside of the table.
“You okay under there, Red?” Mattia asks. It’s innocent, but he’s wearing a teasing grin when I resurface.
“Yeah, just dropped my fork,” I mutter, rubbing the throbbing spot on my scalp as I sit back into my chair. A smirk crosses Luciano’s lips.
“There were plenty of spare forks on the table, Charlie,” Gabriele states. Mattia and I try to stifle our laughter. Luciano’s eyes flicker with that fire I’m starting to know all too well.
Dessert arrives, and I decide its time to turn up the heat. I moan softly, licking my spoon with exaggerated delight while locking eyes with him. “Mm, this hits the spot.” He downs his whiskey in one sharp gulp but still doesn’t break.
I “accidentally” drop a dollop of melted ice cream between my tits. “Oh shit,” I whisper, feigning surprise as I scoop it up with my fingers and suck it clean. Luciano’s jaw tightens, teeth clenched. He’s starting to struggle with his resistance now.
I stay seated and sip on my wine. One by one, the brothers drift away until it’s just us, the air now thick around us with sexual tension. Luciano stands and hovers over me. He slowly unbuttons his shirt revealing every sculpted muscle. My eyes wander over his tattoos, which now make sense—his dedication to the Cosa Nostra, to the Carlisi family, my family. His eyes lock onto me. “You want to be punished, Principessa?” His voice is rough, sharp, dripping with threat and something darker. His eyes turn a darker shade.
Before I can answer, his fingers lace through my hair and he yanks my head up hard, forcing me to meet his dark gaze. “Kneel,” he snarls at me.
