2

FOUR YEARS LATER

YULI

Red ants crawled up her skin and burnt her alive. The paths they burnt led to her heart, and everywhere they touched erupted into a fucking fire. A fire that reached deep inside and pounded to the beat of an elephant stampede. The outside world drowned in white noise. All she heard was the pounding of her craving. All she tasted was her craving. All she breathed was her craving. Her deep, deep craving for the next high.

She wasn’t going to be choosey. She didn’t care what she got into her system as long as she got something in. She needed her shot, and she needed it now. Her fists clenched on the once pristine linen sheets. Now they were crushed and tangled and soaked with her sweat. Her body trembled with an ache for something that was out of her reach. But she held onto her sheets and anchored herself to the bed. Hiding, waiting till the time was right. Until she could escape this hell hole. Escape the fuckers in this house who watched her like hawks and blocked her way to freedom. To get fucked and to get her fix.

Fuck!

What she would do to get what she yearned. She might even inject herself if she needed to. What was the point of hiding anyway when they all knew? But first, she had to wait. Until he left for his office. He pissed her off. Keeping her away from things she loved. Bounding her to that wailing machine. When she made it out of there, she would destroy him. Make him regret the day he decided to fucking tie her down by marrying her.

She should have known. When her father came home gushing about the young consigliere from Sicily. Since when did the Bratva gush about the fucking Italians? That should have set her red flags on alert. But he gushed, and he swooned about the thirty-year-old consigliere moving to Boston to make new bonds and tie clans together. If she had been of sane mind, she would have asked him how that was even possible. But she hadn’t been, and she hadn’t cared either. What did it have anything to do with her anyway? But he kept drooling over the man, and weeks turned into months, and months turned into a year, and suddenly she was in a fucking church, and saying yes to a man with eyes far sharper than a laser beam of a sniper. Just like that, he took away her dream of pumping her body with all the drugs she could find out of her hands.

She had to backtrack. Because of him. But she had done that. If she could hide her little secrets from her father and brothers, she could do it from him. She had to be good. She tried. She really did. She didn’t mind trying for him. He was fucking hot, and impaling his cock in her gave her a different kind of high. One she rode out gladly. Over and over again.

There were no illusions between them. They were more fuck buddies than husband and wife. She didn’t think he even cared for her to begin with. The coldness in his eyes only proved her right. Which made her wonder why he even tied himself to her. But he did. His lifeless eyes and controlling nature followed her everywhere, and the only time his control slipped for even a second was when he was pounding inside her like the devil himself had pushed his cock inside her. The victory in her was so much sweeter when he came, and his control slipped for that second.

Not that she liked him that much either. She liked her men willing and submissive. There wasn’t an inkling of submissiveness to be found in him. He was all dominant and arrogant. Two traits she would rather live without. But still, she tried because she didn’t want to piss off her daddy.

But she was who she was, and there was no changing that. It was great while it lasted, but realistically, for how long was she going to play housewife? His house was dull and reeked of boredom and sullen Italian humour. Her father may have gotten over his hatred of Italians, but that didn’t mean she had to. His staff grated on her nerves like a fork on Mama’s bone china. Rosybell , in particular, was a fucking nuisance breathing down her neck with her fake, motherly love. If she didn't even give a fuck about her own mother, then she wasn’t in need of a substitute. So, she went back to her old ways. She fucked the men she found, and she stuffed what she could find down her body. It felt brilliant. Well, till he found out. He caught on to her faster than her own family, and they were the Bratva.

The pounding in her head clashed with the noises outside her door. He was talking to Rosybell . She tried to still her trembling body enough to listen, but they were going at it again in Italian anyway. She hated the language as much as she hated him. His deep voice whisked through the timber door and thundered into her room. She curled into a tight ball as her body shook even more.

Will he come inside?

If he saw her, he would know. Then he would be mad like the day he found out. The type of mad that made you run towards death and away from him. A dribble of sweat slid down her backbone. She wasn’t sure if she could fight his fury today.

His voice pulled away and drifted down the hallway. Relief poured into her shaking bones. She shouldn’t have worried. He never saw her anyway. He acted like she was a disease he didn’t want to catch and avoided her at all costs. Especially today, he would lock himself up in whatever cave he hid. Oh, poor him! Today was his fucking daddy’s death anniversary. The man didn’t own a heart, but on his daddy’s death anniversary, he acted more vile than his usual self.

Sitting up in her bed, she listened. Blessed silence. She didn’t hear him anymore. She snuck her head between the drapes and watched the men file into the two black cars out front. It was raining outside like a dam unleashed. But all she felt was fucking sunshine because it was going to be a marvellous day today. He took all his men with him.

Scrabbling to her phone, she picked it up and called her man. Greg was the perfect submissive. He picked it up on the first ring like he had waited for her to call just like she had told him to.

“Sweetheart, I missed you.” His voice sent warmth up her chilled bones.

“He’s gone, Greg,” she hissed. “He took all his men with him.” Her nervous giggle filtered through the phone line and infected him, and they both combusted in a fit of giggles. Greg made her happy. Pills made her happy. She fell onto her back on the sheets and rolled around. Her body shook with the effort, and it reminded her of another ache. “I can sneak out when Rosybell starts cooking.”

“Yes. Yes. I have a fix, and we can fuck….” Greg stopped his rattle. “But for how long? When is he back?”

She rocked in her bed. “I don’t know,” she muttered as all the euphoria of a moment ago drained out of her. “I hate him, Greg,” she wailed. “I want to ruin him. I want to take his heart out and squash it with my bare hands. He’s blocking me off everything. He’s keeping me away from you. Why won’t he let me go?”

“It’s because of that stupid baby.”

She shook her head vGregously. He was right, of course. Greg was always right. “Stupid, stupid baby. It’s what’s keeping me from you.”

She rocked harder as her mind went into overdrive. Wasn’t it punishment enough that she was fucking tied to a bed for nine months? Now she was stuck to that wailing machine, and there was no way out. No way out. She hated her father for putting her in that contract. She hated her husband for agreeing to it. She hated him even more for putting his seed in her and destroying her life. There was no way out as long as that wailing machine was around. Unless… unless…of course, there was no more wailing. Then he would let her go. She was sure of it. No more wailing. No more bounds. The more she thought of it the more she was sure of it. “Darling, I have an idea….”