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He gives me the ring meant for him, and I take it with shaky fingers. I stare at the ring clutched in my nerveless fingers. I glance up at him, then reach for his hand and bring it up to my cheek. I see his eyes go wide with surprise, and I think I also see desire flare in their depths. I close my eyes, breathing in the scent of his cologne and steeling myself.
My heart is racing in my chest, I lift my face off the back of his hand and then bite down on it as hard as I can. I taste at the same time as I hear his shout of surprise and pain. I shove this hand away from me, push the bald-headed man down, and make a run for it.
I have no idea where I am running to, but I know that I just have to get away. If I am caught now, I’ll surely be killed. I run past an iron gate, knowing that it’ll be heavily guarded and not a feasible means of escape.
I can hear the distorted sounds of footsteps behind me, but I just look at the path in front of my pounding feet.
There is something warm on my chin. I think it might be his blood, but I don’t stop running to find out because I can’t get caught. If I get caught, he’ll kill me.
I round a blind corner and crash into the stocky man who wanted to watch a hockey game. I fly off my feet, landing on my tailbone with jarring force and crying out as the wind is knocked from my lungs.
“You slippery bitch!” he says, sounding winded.
“Maybe she is a damn spy after all,” I hear the younger man say as he comes running up.
Fists that feel like iron grab my hair and pull me off the ground. My hair feels like it’s going to be ripped out at the roots before he grabs my shoulders and shakes me. I feel my teeth rattle together, and I close my eyes.
“I just wanted to take care of this wedding. You had to ruin it, didn’t you?” he demands. “You will learn that defying me isn’t a wise thing to do, Alyssa,” he promises, fury in his voice.
I don’t know why I laugh. Maybe the emotions of the moment are too much for my brain to handle, or maybe I’m losing my mind. I just know that I’m laughing and laughing, and I can’t stop.
“You think it’s funny?” he shouts at me, giving me one more hard shake.
“Yes, I think it is,” I say wearily. “You think I’m a spy, Giovanni thinks he can sell me to the highest bidder, and really I’m just a nobody who sells drinks in your club.”
This seems very funny to me all over again, and I keep laughing.
“She’s lost it,” the smaller man comments drily.
“She’ll sober up after a few days in the basement,” Antonio says, his voice hard.
I open my eyes and look at him. His rage has somehow made him even more attractive than before, and I lean toward him unconsciously, my body drawn to him even if my mind is horrified that I should feel that way. He resists me leaning toward him, and I frown.
I stop laughing and just look at him, staring at me with desire and rage battling in his gaze. I don’t stop to think about what I’m doing. I simply gather saliva in my mouth and then spit in his face.
His face goes blank for a moment, then he delivers a ringing slap to my face. The pain just adds itself to the chaos of emotions roiling within me, and I start laughing like a crazy woman again.
“That’s about enough of that,” I hear someone say, and then everything goes dark.
***
My head hurts, and I wince as I try to move it. What happened? Suddenly, I remember the sham wedding, spitting in Viper’s face, and then darkness. Someone must have hit me over the head. Probably the slightly fatter man.
I struggle into a sitting position, and it dawns on me that the usually dark room has the lights on.
“You’re awake,” he says. As I become aware of his presence.
He has taken off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. His lean, sinewy forearms flex as he cradles a plate of food in his hands. I notice a bandage on his hand, and I feel a sharp spike of pride race through me. It feels good to have hurt him and seeing the tangible evidence of the wound I inflicted makes pleasure tingle through my nerve endings. It feels a lot like the pleasure pooling in my core at the sight of him.
“I hear you haven’t had anything to eat since you arrived. Pardon me. I don’t mean to be a bad host,” he says.
“I don’t want food,” I snap back, closing my eyes.
“Even though you’ve been the absolute worst wife, and you have assaulted your husband on the day of your wedding, I am a generous man. I won’t hold that against you,” he says.
“Why haven’t you killed me?” I ask.
He chuckles. “What do you take me for? A man who would murder his wife in cold blood? Give me some credit, would you?” he says. He sticks a fork into the food on the plate and cuts down. I realize that it’s a slice of cake.
