“Stop it.”
“How you let me hold you... hold you open for my brother…”
“Stop it!”
I shake my head, trying to clear it. As he is saying it the images pop into my mind even though I don't them want to. I don't want to see. And yet I do remember it, vividly. I remember being crushed between them and those strong, swelling urges to feel everything, everything all at once…
“No,” I try to say, but it comes out more like a groan. Pressing my lips closed again, I resolve not to say anything else.
“Oh yes,” Alek says in a low voice. He pushes himself up from the table with his palms and begins slowly walking toward me. “Absolutely, yes. I know you remember it too, I can tell by the way your cheeks are flushed. Just the way your mouth is open, Princess.”
Pressing myself back against my chair, I try to stay as far away from him as possible as he comes closer, prowling like a predator. Slowly he walks around the edge of the table until he's hovering over me, one hand on the back of my chair, the other hand toying with the buttons of his shirt.
“You loved it, Princess,” he murmurs. My belly twangs as I see a sudden flash in my mind, the sensation so real and present it's almost like he's touching me now. But he's not; he is still just at the edge of my chair.
His thighs push against the arm rest, gently pulsing his hips toward me and I notice the distinct outline of his erection under the tight cloth of his pants. I suck my lower lip in between my teeth and bite hard, trying to think of something else. Anything else.
“You see, we've got all the time in the world. You will give yourself to me. In fact… I'm gonna make you wait. I will make you beg for it, Marie.”
“I'll never —”
“— you'll beg me for it, Marie. You'll beg us to take you. You know you will.”
I shake my head back and forth but I can't take my eyes off the bulge in his trousers. He slowly drops his hands and strokes against the fabric there, outlining the thick shape that I can see so clearly in my mind’s eye. I know what that feels like, pressed up against me. And with Roman just feet away, I can feel his gaze burning into me too.
Clenching my thighs together, I try to hold back the gush of wetness in my panties. I'm afraid that they can smell me like wild animals or something. I'm afraid that they know that my body is like some kind of traitor.
“I don't… I won't…”
Alek smiles at me slowly, his lips stretching over his perfect white teeth. As I watch, his tongue comes out and slides slowly over his bottom lip, just wetting it. He's like a magnet, drawing me in. My heart is racing and my breath is powder in my throat. What is he doing to me? All of this is wrong, so wrong…
"Marie! Marie!” A voice comes from the front hallway. I hear the front door bang open and heavy heeled footsteps. Alek pushes himself back from my chair and crosses his arms over his chest while Roman stands up so fast his chair falls over backward. I shoot out of my chair too with my arms out. “It's Aunt Millie! Jesus, you guys. What are you gonna do? Shoot her?”
Roman jams the heels of his hands against his eye sockets. “You should tell your friends not to just come barging in here. Shooting her was actually the first option. Maybe next time.”
I stab the air in his general direction with one finger. “You just keep your mouth shut. You're not shooting anybody in my house, you got that? Absolutely nobody.”
“Aw, dumpling,” Alek purrs. “I love it when you’re sassy.”
Just as I'm turning around, Aunt Millie hobbles into the dining room on her wide set bowlegs. She's panting and red-faced, apparently exhausted from the effort of climbing up the front stairs with the giant casserole in her hands.
Rushing forward, I take it out of her grasp. “Aunt Millie! I didn't know you were coming…”
“Where's Nuncio?” she demands in a huff. “I almost had an attack coming up those steps. You don't take visitors? You don't know how?”
“Oh, um... You're so right, Aunt Millie. I'm so sorry. It's just that Nuncio —”
“Nuncio's not here anymore,” Alek interrupts.
Aunt Millie's coal black eyebrows go up at the edges sarcastically. She moves her lips around like she's tasting something sour in her mouth. “And why not?” she says, her eyes going up and down Alek’s body suspiciously. She seems to pause when she gets to the middle part, the part where I'm terrified to think that he still has an obvious, throbbing erection.
Oh my God. Please, no.
“Well,” I start uncertainly, “it's just that —”
“She has better security now,” Alek nods.
Aunt Millie clucks her tongue and shakes her head, rolling her eyes. I hear Roman behind me, growling ominously. Seriously, growling. Like a dog or something. I spin around to give him a warning look and he flinches back, confused. Then I turn back to Millie and plaster a smile on my face.