Page 56 of Claimed Through Deception

19

Livia

I wake up wrapped in midnight silk.

The scent of spiced bergamot and cedar clings to my skin, a reminder of the hours prior. I blink against the morning sunlight spilling through the massive bay windows. The space beside me is empty, but the mattress still radiates warmth.

My body aches. A dull soreness sits between my thighs, but it brings a rush of heat instead of pain. The memory of his hands, his mouth, the relentless rhythm of his hips drives a flush up my neck. It was intoxicating. It was everything I never knew I craved.

And it feels like a betrayal.

I sit up, pulling the sheet to my chest. I look at my reflection in the gilded mirror across the room. I don't recognize the woman staring back at me. Her lips are swollen, her skin marked with faint purple bruises along her collarbone. She looks claimed. She looks possessed.

The little girl sitting on the top of the stairs, watching her mother bleed on the floor, screams in the back of my skull. I swore I would never let a violent man rule my body. I swore I would keep my autonomy intact. I built a titanium wall around my soul, and I let Niccolò Severato smash it to pieces just because he touched my neck. I traded my independence for a climax.

I press the heels of my hands into my eyes. Guilt rots in my stomach. I need my armor back. I need the boundaries.

I slide off the mattress, my bare feet sinking into the plush rug. I scan the room for the torn black uniform. It lies in a crumpled heap near the foot of the bed, the white apron discarded nearby.

I pick up the ripped cotton. The buttons are gone, the fabric split down the middle. I clutch it to my chest, trying to figure out how to pin it together. If I put the uniform on, I am the maid again. I have a job. I have a role that separates me from his bed.

"What are you doing?"

I flinch, spinning around. Niccolò stands in the open archway of his massive closet. He wears tailored charcoal trousers, his chest bare, the white bandages wrapped securely around his ribs. His obsidian eyes drop to the torn dress clutched in my hands.

"I need to get dressed," I say. "I have a shift. Marta expects me downstairs."

He crosses the room. His strides are long, and purposeful. He stops inches from me, his towering frame swallowing the sunlight.

"Take it off," he commands softly.

"No. It's my uniform."

"You are not a maid," he states. He reaches out, his large fingers wrapping around the black fabric. He pulls it from my grip with effortless strength.

I watch, stunned, as he walks to the massive stone fireplace. The embers from last night still glow a dull, angry orange. He tosses the uniform onto the grate. He strikes a long match and drops it. The cheap cotton catches fire instantly, flames licking up the fabric, turning my only armor into ash.

"You are mine," he says, turning back to face me. "You do not scrub floors. You do not pour coffee. You belong in this room, in that bed."

Panic clogs my throat. The smoke from the fireplace burns my nose. The cage is shrinking, the bars pressing directly against my ribs. I cannot breathe in this suite. I cannot breathe with him looking at me like he wants to consume my bones.

"I need to leave," I blurt out, stepping backward. "I need to get out of this house."

His jaw clenches. The muscle jumps beneath his skin. "You are not leaving."

"I am suffocating!" I shout, the desperation cracking my voice. "You burned my clothes. You keep me locked behind iron gates. I just need an hour. I need to see Sofia. I need to remember what the real world looks like before I lose my mind."

He stares at me, cataloging the frantic, erratic rise and fall of my chest. He reads the claustrophobia tearing me apart. He steps closer, cupping my cheek. His thumb brushes my lower lip.

"You can go to the bar," he murmurs. "But you do not go alone."

An hour later, I am wearing a pair of my own jeans and a simple sweater, sitting in the back of a bulletproof SUV. Another SUV follows closely behind us. Four armed guards flank me.

When I walk into The Neon Crow, the noise dies. The jukebox thumps, but the regulars freeze. They look at the lethal men in tailored suits standing at my shoulders, then look at me like I am a ghost.

Sofia drops a rag behind the bar. Her eyes go wide.

"Liv?" she breathes, rushing around the counter. She stops short when one of the guards steps in her path.