“In two days. In my city. I want you to bring him all the way to Vegas. You get Serafina. I get Scuderi. I want her fiancé there as well. I’d like to meet him in person.”
Dante was silent. “We will be there.”
“Nino will send you the details. I’m looking forward to meeting you.” I hung up, but the triumph I felt lasted only a moment. My eyes found the door behind which Serafina was hiding.
Two more days.
Then I’d set her free.
It would be up to her if she flew straight into Danilo’s cage ...
My chest constricted but I pushed past the sensation. Serafina was never meant to be mine.
I stood, and tearing my gaze away from the door, I left.
CHAPTER 19
SERAFINA
“Wear this,” Remo ordered, throwing my wedding dress down on the bed. I stared at the white layers of tulle, at the blood stains and the tears. I hadn’t seen it in almost two months. It didn’t feel like something I’d ever owned. Nothing I was meant to wear ever again.
“Why?” I asked.
Remo turned toward me, his dark eyes hard. “Because I told you to do it, Serafina.”
Not Angel. Serafina. What was going on? I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”
He moved closer, glaring down at me. “Do as I say.”
“Or what?” I said harshly. “What could you possibly do to me? You have taken everything from me that mattered. There’s nothing left for you to take, to break.”
Remo’s mouth turned cruel. “If you really think that’s true, then you are weaker than I thought.”
I swallowed hard, but I didn’t put on the dress. We both knew I was so much stronger than he’d ever imagined. Maybe that was why he kept doing this, pushing me away.
Remo reached for his knife and pulled it out with a bone-chilling clink of the blade against the sheath. Goose bumps rose on my skin, but I stood my ground because if I knew one thing it was that Remo wouldn’t hurt me. Not anymore, not ever again.
Whatever twisted bond had formed between us, it prevented him from causing me pain.
Gripping the neckline of my nightgown, he sliced through the fabric with a sharp slash of the knife. The shreds pooled at my feet, leaving me in only my panties.
His dark eyes roamed over my body, the knife still clutched in his hand, and my core tightened with need. He gripped my hip and wrenched me toward him, his lips crushing down on mine. I gasped as his tongue conquered my mouth, teeth clanking. He backed me up against the bed until I fell back. He slashed through my panties with his knife, and the closeness of the blade caused a shiver to pass down my spine. Remo towered over me and freed his erection, his eyes furious and hungry and terrifying.
Holding his gaze, I opened my legs for him because I was lost, had been lost from the moment Remo had laid eyes on me, and as I looked up at him, I knew without a doubt that he, too, was lost.
The corners of his mouth lifted as he lowered his gaze to my center. He got down on his knees, pushing my legs even further apart. Remo buried his face in my lap. I arched up, my nails digging into the crisp sheets, my gaze finding my torn wedding dress. Remo’s mouth claimed me relentlessly, with tongue and lips, bites and licks. There was no escaping. He wouldn’t let me. He made me surrender, not with force, not with violence ... He dove in, swirling until I was a slave to the sensations he created. My orgasm crashed over me like an avalanche, but my eyes remained locked on the stained white fabric of my dress—a sign for my honor, my purity.
Both lost.
Both taken ... No. Given.
Remo’s mouth traveled up my stomach, licking and nibbling, tongue flicking my nipple. He bit down lightly then soothed the spot with an open-mouthed kiss. His body covered mine, his palms pressed into the bed beside my head, the knife still clutched in his grasp. For a moment our eyes locked, and I hated him, hated myself, hated us both, because hate became harder to hold on to each day that I spent with him.
We both needed our hate, and yet it was slipping through our fingers like sand. There was no way to contain it. Lost. His dark eyes reflected my inner turmoil. Losing ourselves to each other.
My gaze returned to my dress when Remo thrust into me in one all-consuming merciless stroke. His mouth pressed up to my ear as he slammed into me angrily. “When I saw you in that dress, I knew I needed to be the one to rip your innocence from you. I knew I needed to be the one to make you bleed. Who knew you’d make me bleed in return?”
I shuddered, my throat tightening even as my body throbbed with traitorous pleasure. Finally I tore my gaze from the dress to glare up at Remo—my captor, my nemesis, my ruin ... and yet, despite what he’d taken from me, hatred wasn’t the only thing my weak, idiotic heart felt. But that was a truth I would take to my grave.
“I hate you,” I whispered as if saying the words aloud would make them true.
Remo’s eyes bore into mine, filled with emotions, his mouth twisting in a dark smile because he knew. He moved closer, tongue sliding along the seam of my lips. “Nothing tastes sweeter than your lips, even when they’re spewing lies, Angel.”
His next thrust hit deep, and I could not hold back. Blinding pleasure rushed through my body. My lips parted but I swallowed my cry. I wouldn’t give it to Remo. Not today. He bit down on my throat, and the force of my orgasm doubled. The moan clawed itself out of my throat. He couldn’t even allow me that small victory. His own face twisted with strain as he kept thrusting, shoulders flexing. He kissed my mouth softly then my ear, and I knew he would deliver words meant to break, words worse than any torture could ever be. I’d known it from the moment I’d seen his cold face this morning.
“You wanted to know why I need you to put on your wedding dress,” he rasped as his thrusts became less controlled.
My chest tightened with dread.
Remo kissed my ear again. “You see, I arranged a meeting with Dante for tonight, and I promised to give you back. Danilo will be there as well, and I thought he’d appreciate finally seeing you in your wedding dress. Even if I stole what you promised to him.”
Shock and fury crashed down on me, and I slapped Remo hard. He gripped my wrist and pressed it into the mattress over my head as he thrust into me again, eyes staking claim on me over and over again, taking more with every thrust. But he couldn’t lock me out anymore, because I, too, had laid claim to a part of him.
His body tightened, coiling tight with pleasure, and as always, my own traitorous body submitted to him again. I cried out. Remo linked our fingers, pressing them deeper into the mattress as his mouth found mine for a kiss full of anger and dominance. When he finally stilled on top of me, my eyes moved up to my dress.
“You are mine, Angel. Body and soul,” he rasped. And God help me, he spoke the truth.
When I put the dress back on, it felt like a sacrilege wearing something so pure and white. Goose bumps rippled across my skin when the heavy fabric settled around my legs. I stared down at the layers of tulle, the blood stains and tears. Had I really chosen this dress? Had I ever felt comfortable wearing it?
Remo regarded me with a hard expression. “I still remember the first time I saw you in it.”
I didn’t say anything.
Remo reached for my engagement ring on the nightstand, and the little hairs on my neck rose. He stopped right in front of me and took my hand then slid the ring on with a twisted smile. “This marks you as Danilo’s, doesn’t it?”
I stared at him fiercely, unyieldingly because he knew the mark he had left went deeper than an expensive ring. Something in Remo’s eyes shifted, a flicker in his harsh mask, yet he still held my hand. He released me abruptly and stepped back. “Danilo will be delighted to get you back.”
“I’m not the girl I used to be.”
Remo’s gaze hit me like a sledgehammer, but he didn’t say anything, even though I wanted ... needed him to.
Up until the very end, I was convinced Remo would keep me. I kept denying the truth until I was faced with the result of my sins: the exhausted faces of my family and fiancé.
They waited in the abandoned parking lot. Dad, Dante, Danilo. Samuel wasn’t there, and I knew it was because he would have lost it. Behind them on the ground lay a tied up man, probably Fabiano’s father. His back was turned to me so I couldn’t be sure.
Their eyes were drawn upward toward one of the buildings, and when Remo pulled me out of the car, I found the reason why. Nino was perched on the roof as a sniper. Fabiano got out of the car as well, his own gun drawn.
Remo led me a few steps away from the car. Then he stopped. “You were very ill-advised attacking our territory, Dante,” he said pleasantly, his grip on my hip tight as he held me against his body. My eyes lingered on the ground because my guilt sat so heavily on my shoulders I couldn’t find the courage to meet the gazes of the men who’d come to save me. The white fabric of my dress seemed to mock me, and I focused on the bloodstains.
Bracing myself, I finally raised my head and wished I hadn’t.
Nothing had ever hurt worse than the look on Dad’s face. He took in my bloody dress, the bruises on my throat where Remo had marked me over and over again. Remo had made his claiming of me as apparent as possible, flaunted it in front of everyone, and it had the desired effect. Uncle Dante, my fiancé Danilo, and my father regarded me as if they had been gutted. Remo’s ultimate triumph.