She’s a nobody to me now.
CHAPTER 11
RILEY
His face.His handsome face. Bruised yellow and black, and swollen like a monster’s.
Which is fitting because he is one.
Al never existed, did he? I invited a violent mob boss home, let him fuck me so hard my teeth rattled, and thought that was it. But it wasn’t—he came back. The things we’ve done, how I gave myself up completely to him, thinking I knew him despite not knowing much about his life outside my bed. How could I be so naive? How could I not worry how dangerous he was? How could I trust a complete stranger?
I was chasing extremes—something, anything to spark life into me.
And he radiated power like a lethal warhead.
Reckless, so reckless.
Because Alessandro Beneventi is exactly why you don’t invite strangers home.
Tears wet on my cheeks, I pull my legs into my chest and readjust positions in this cramped cage. I crawled on my knees like an animal for him. Fetched abone. But this wasn’t a game to make me submit.
This was an expression of anger …loathing.
He hates me.
“Won’t you listen to me?” I call out, throat hoarse.
The soft creak of his office chair is the only sign he’s still present.
My throat tightens as I remember Ciro’s lifeless body swinging from the rafters. Will that be my fate? How will I survive?
Panic licks up my spine. Ciroisthe link between us. And Lord knows he has the morals of a hungry pit bull.
Hadthe morals … I cover my mouth to block my cry. This is Ciro’s fault, and his murderer believes I’m involved.
What did Alessandro say earlier? Stop putting on an innocent act?
Does he not know me at all?
Tears fall without censor, and then I’m full-out bawling.
A door slams, a sign he’s left me alone, but caged.
Leaving me to reconcile the man I never truly knew with the monster I don’t recognize at all.
A door crashes open,followed by laughter, and I’m jolted awake. Pins and needles shoot through my stiff limbs as I unfurl from the ball I curled into hours ago and sit back on my haunches. It takes me a moment to catch on to what’s happening. Alessandro enters, but he’s not alone. In tow are two brunettes. Their uniforms unzipped to the navel and breasts bouncing, as laughter accompanies them into the room.
Pain catches me off guard like a punch to the stomach. I never imagined him with other women, not even when he disappeared those few weeks. More stupidity on my part, believing our relationship was exclusive. Thinking—naively andwith little sexual experience—I could hold his interest. That our souls connected on a deeper level.
Wrong, Riley. He has a staff of vicious brunettes on call. Like he’s choosing his favorite popsicle, with each one shaped the same and packaged in white.
The truth crushes me.
We weren’t in a relationship. Our souls didn’t connect in some deep, profound way. I meant nothing to him. My heart squeezes, and I’m helpless to do anything other than watch.
They stop a few feet away.
He pushes them off him. “Chinarsi sulla gabbia.”
