"Are you okay? Where are you hurt?" he asks, and maybe if I hadn't overheard what I did, or if his mother hadn't gone psycho on me, I might have found it sweet.
"I don't need your pity! Can we just go back to hating each other?" I say, resentment clawing at my insides. He played me. All to save his own skin.
And what do I get? Nothing. No family to turn to—not that I ever had one—and no one to lean on.
A sudden rage explodes in my chest, and as I look down into his face, I only get more frustrated.
"It's all your fault!" I burst out, my clenched fists knocking into his chest. The tears are finally flowing. For all I'd tried to keep my bravado when his mother had attempted to make me miscarry a non-existent child, it all spills out.
"Why me? Why did you have to involve me in your damn problems? Why? What did I ever do to you?" I wail as I keep hitting him. My cries soon turn to hiccups, but I don't slow down, and he doesn't stop me.
No, he just lies there, taking it all, but his inaction only spurs my own.
"Why?" I yell at him, holding on to the lapels of his shirt and shaking him. "Why did you have to ruin me?" Worn down, I finally stop, my palms spreading over his chest, my hiccups an unrelenting echo.
"Shh, little tigress, shh." His hand comes around my waist, and he tugs me to his chest. "I understand it's all very foreign. But give it time. You'll get used to everything." His fingers gently caress my hair, and I'm reminded of what his mother tried to do.
"Why me?" I ask again, my voice hoarse from screaming. Why did he have to mess with my life?
"I don't know what you think you heard, little tigress, but let me make one thing clear." He grabs my chin, forcing me to look into his eyes. "You're mine. You'll carry my name, live in my house, and bear my children. There's no way out. You stopped having a choice the moment you put yourself in front of that bullet for me," he says, his tone serious.
"I don't understand..." I whisper, raising my tear-streaked eyes toward him. "Should I have just let you die?" I ask, bewildered.
"You should have. At least then you would have had a choice. Now…" A cruel smile appears on his face.
"You said we'd be partners, or was that a lie too?" A lot of things are suddenly becoming clear, and I find myself in a worse situation than before—if that's even possible.
"It's good if you keep believing that. But make no mistake, there's no going back," his hand moves lower in a soft caress. "You're mine.'Til death do us part."
"So that's it… you're just using me," I say, deadpan. Why didn't I see this before? It was staring me right in the face. "I'm just a toy for you to do as you please with."
"Sweetheart," he starts, his voice a twisted melody that tugs at my heart, painfully squeezing it, "if I were using you, I would have already fucked you and discarded you… used you like a common whore, no?" Every single word he utters stuns me even more. How is this the same man who took care of me when I was sick?
But he needed me then, didn't he? Now he doesn't anymore. He can show me who he truly is.
"Why haven't you? I think that would complete the humiliation, wouldn't you say? Go on, finish what you started." I push myself up and start tearing at my clothes until I'm standing naked in front of him. "Come on! Do it! Isn't that what you men do? You take and take until there's nothing left. Come, take me and make me hate you even more than I already do," I shout, my voice coming out in painful spurts.
A hand wraps itself around my throat and I'm thrust onto the bed, my back hitting the clean sheets.
"Is that what you want? You want me to take you like a fucking whore?" His voice cracks, the first real emotion I've seen from him all day.
His body on top of mine, he starts unbuckling his pants.
This is it… This is where I lose myself.
I turn my head to the side, not wanting to see him, not wanting to feel anything. My tears fall down my face, stainingthe sheet. And I just lie there, awaiting the pain… the humiliation… the feeling of being used and discarded.
But it doesn't come. Just as fast, he's off me and out the door, slamming it behind him.
I can only turn on my side and curl into a fetal position, finally letting go. My entire body is hurting, but there is one place that eclipses that pain—my chest.
Why did I let myself believe in him? Because I must have, at some point, if I'm hurting this much. But the pain also brings with it a new type of lucidity. I look back on his behavior, the way he'd treated me at thepalazzoand how he'd ensured I didn't make it to my wedding.
He'd planned everything from the beginning.
In the end, I'm still a pawn. I just changed masters.
Enzo doesn't come back to the room, and I don't even want to think about where he spent the night. It's best if I detach myself from him.
