Page 23 of Beautiful Torment (Empire of Kings #1)

ABELLA

A fter a full day of eating, drinking, sun, and jet lag, I end up crashing after our early dinner. But even with a sleeping pill, I fall into a fitful rest, tossing and turning as the wedding looms over me like a doomsday clock.

For a while, it seems like I’m trapped in dream after endless dream, trying to alter my destiny as I walk down the aisle to a man I don’t love. I wake several times with a racing heart and an urge to flee, though I know I wouldn’t make it out of the resort.

I respect Matteo. I care about him as a friend. But I don’t want to marry him.

As I drift back to sleep, his image is replaced by a haunting pair of dark eyes cloaked behind a skull mask.

A charge pulses through the air as rough fingers caress the length of my jaw, disorienting me. It doesn’t feel like a dream when I blink, and he’s still there, towering over my hotel bed.

“Hello, cara .” His thumb brushes my lips, stealing the breath from me when they part.

“Who are you?” I force the words from my dry throat.

“Have you forgotten?” His fingers drift down to my chest, pausing to graze my nipple. “ Il tuo re .”

Your king.

A current of electricity passes through my body, branding me with those words. It triggers a sharp, violent ache inside me.

I want him to possess me.

I want him to take me away from here.

But when I blink again, he’s gone.

I sit up and glance around the empty room in confusion. Moonlight filters through the gauzy curtains, a light breeze blowing in from the sliding door. I left it cracked, knowing there are at least ten guards outside. Now, the room feels stifling.

As I ease my legs over the edge of the bed and rise to my feet, the summer heat clings to my skin. It’s only five a.m., and the sun hasn’t risen yet, but my curiosity won’t be sated until I get answers. I have to know if he was really here.

I wrap a silk robe around my nightgown and cinch it around my waist, then slip on a pair of sandals. When I step out the sliding door and into the courtyard, my presence startles the guards.

“You need something, Miss Moretti?” Nicky asks.

“Was he here?”

“Was who here?” he echoes.

I blow out a breath and shake my head. Of course, he’s not going to answer. A quick glance at the other guards confirms they won’t either. It only escalates my frustration.

“I’m going for a walk,” I tell them.

“Sure.” Nicky shrugs. “Let’s go.”

There’s no point in telling him I don’t need him to watch over me. It’s nonnegotiable.

“Can you just stay back a bit?” I ask. “I need to clear my head.”

“No problem,” he says. “You lead, I’ll follow.”

I take that small amount of freedom and walk through the courtyard, slipping down a narrow path to the front of the resort.

For a while, I wander aimlessly until I find myself on the long, cypress-lined drive.

This place is huge, and I’m not exactly sure where the boundaries are, but I figure if I walk the entire perimeter, maybe I’ll get a glimpse of the man I’m searching for.

Nicky’s footsteps are quiet and steadfast behind me, keeping enough distance so I don’t feel suffocated.

“Where’s your boss at?” I ask, trying a different approach to my earlier question.

“Seattle headquarters,” he replies smoothly.

“I don’t mean the head of IVI security.” I glance at him over my shoulder, lowering my voice. “I’m talking about Angelo, and you know it.”

“How should I know where he is?” He smirks. “I don’t keep tabs on the guy.”

“Of course you don’t.” I roll my eyes, but before I can say anything else, a commotion up ahead catches my attention.

“Best to keep moving.” Nicky appears at my side, following my gaze to the group of guards who have gathered near the fence. “You don’t need to see that.”

Ignoring him, I weave between the trees and stop short when I see the figure illuminated by their flashlights.

Strung up by his neck is the lifeless corpse of the same guard who was staring at me earlier. Only now, where his eyes were, there’s nothing but two gaping holes.

“Miss Moretti.” One of the startled guards takes notice of my presence, his flashlight blinding me as he and his crew assemble to obscure my view. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Story of my life—I’m never where I should be. But my morbid curiosity has me in a chokehold, and instead of leaving, I blurt out a question I’m certain they won’t answer.

“Who killed him?”

“Get her back to bed.” The guard ignores me, speaking directly to Nicky.

Nicky reaches out to pull me in the other direction, and I jerk away.

“I can move on my own, thank you.”

Heading back toward the hotel, I increase my pace to put space between me and my handler. He keeps his distance, leaving me to mull over the thought playing on a constant loop in my mind.

Did someone kill that guard because of me?

My sandals slap against the gravel road until eventually, I realize Nicky’s footsteps aren’t behind me anymore.

Just as I’m turning to glance over my shoulder, someone snatches me from between the trees, yanking me sideways and pulling me from the view of the main road.

I let out a startled yelp as a solid chest meets my back and a gloved hand settles over my throat.

“Where do you think you’re going?” The low, gravelly voice brushes against my ear, sending a full-body shiver through me.

“Show me your face,” I demand.

A dark laugh stirs the loose strands of my hair as he breathes me in. “I’m not your lapdog of a fiancé, Abella. Your orders won’t work on me.”

“I need to know who you are.”

I need to know if you’re him.

His hand scrapes down my throat, gliding beneath my silk robe to stroke my breast. I bite my lip, arching into the touch as pleasure ricochets through my body.

It isn’t rational that this man can have such a maddening hold over me. But as I wait for another scrap of his attention, I know that’s exactly why I came out here. He recognizes the part of me that I’ve hidden away for so long. The woman with needs she can’t verbalize in the world she lives in.

I was taught to be quiet, polite, and demure.

Smile and look pretty. Don’t ask for much.

Sex is for your husband’s pleasure. Mafia princesses aren’t supposed to harbor fantasies or tell the men how they’d like to be fucked.

Every desire I’ve ever had has felt forbidden, but this man knows them all.

And in every interaction, he gives them to me.

It’s the way he commands me, his roughness, his possession. If he told me to, I’d strip naked right here and give him what’s only meant to be my husband’s.

But he doesn’t.

Even as the length of his erection presses into my back, hot and impossibly hard, he releases his hold on me and whispers in my ear.

“Goodnight, Abella.”

By the time I turn around, he’s already gone.

“Sooo…” Gabi uses an empty cocktail glass as a prop for her phone, allowing us all to see Chantel on the video call. “How was your date?”

“Oh, you know...” Chantel drapes herself across a red velvet chaise lounge and takes a sip of her wine.

She’s the picture of retro glamour in a black, structured corset, cheeky panties, fishnets, and a garter belt.

As the vampy-goth friend in our group, her signature look earned her the stage name Dollface at her job as a Burlesque dancer.

She’s drop-dead gorgeous, insanely talented, and a little bit theatrical.

We all stare at her as she leaves us hanging, which she often likes to do. It adds a dramatic flair to our conversations.

“We live vicariously through you,” Valentina reminds her. “Come on; put us out of our misery, and give us the juicy details.”

Chantel examines her blood-red nail with a bored expression. “I invited him over, and he fixed my leaky faucet.”

“Is leaky faucet code for something?” Gabi frowns.

“I’m not sure if you need a plumber, a priest, or a gynecologist,” Val says.

“It isn’t code.” Chantel smirks. “He also fixed the banister, a loose tile, and a cupboard that never closed quite right.”

“So, in other words, you invited him over to do maintenance.” I laugh.

“It’s a soft launch.” She twirls a piece of black hair around her finger. “If he passes the fuck boy test, I’ll hard launch him.”

“Right into your vagina?” Val teases.

“If he’s lucky,” Chantel muses. “It has great reviews.”

“It must be so liberating to date who you want.” Gabi sighs.

“It can be,” Chantel answers softly, all too aware that none of us will ever have the same amount of freedom. “But there are a lot of assholes out there, too.”

Her voice betrays the lingering hurt from her on-again, off-again relationship with a man from The Society.

Her position in IVI is a complicated one, being that she works for them under contract.

She’s not a member, and her ex is expected to marry for business rather than pleasure.

Though she’s one of our close friends, she’s not part of the same world.

If she were, then she’d be able to be here with us right now.

“Enough about me,” Chantel says. “How’s the bride-to-be?”

“I’m fine.” I shrug.

Gabi and Valentina exchange glances.

“It’s not too late to change your mind.” Val lowers her voice. “We can find a way to get you out of here.”

I smile at her optimism, hoping more than anything she can hang on to it when it’s her turn to marry.

“Right now, I couldn’t walk out of here if I wanted to.” I lift my nearly empty wine glass and swallow the rest.

Sensing my mood, Chantel nods and changes the subject. “Where are the rest of the girls?”

“Gone to bed already.” Gabi yawns. “There was a little too much excitement today.”

“Such as?” Chantel asks.

“Abella has been filling us in on her stalker.” Gabi glares at me, clearly still upset about the confession I made earlier. In my defense, we were on our third bottle of wine for the evening, and it just sort of slipped out.

“You have a stalker?” Concern settles over Chantel’s face. “How long has this been going on?”

“A while, apparently,” Gabi huffs. “I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell me.”

“I didn’t want you to worry about me.”

“What if this is connected to…you know?” Gabi asks.

Grant Ellison.

“It’s not.” I shake my head.

“How can you be sure? You could be in danger, and we’d have no idea?—”

“It isn’t like that,” I tell them.

“So, what is it like?” Chantel asks.

“It’s…” The words get caught in my throat as I try to figure out how to explain this. “I don’t know...intense.”

Three wide sets of eyes stare back at me. “Did something happen, Abella?” Chantel leans closer, clearly invested.

A flush spreads down my neck as Val chimes in.

“Oh, something happened, alright.”

“Please do explain.” Chantel raises her brows. “I’m dying to hear this.”

I pour another glass of wine, the bottle glugging out the last of its contents. “Okay, I’ll tell you, but don’t judge me.”

“I would never,” she swears.

I give her the condensed version, explaining how the masked man showed up at my building in tactical gear, cut the power, and caught me in the rooftop garden.

“This sounds like a plot from one of my favorite movies,” Gabi quips.

Val side-eyes her, and I continue.

“His goons asked me a bunch of random questions about Matteo, and I said I wanted to deal with the masked guy because he was in charge. So he came over, pulled my head back, said something dirty, and then…”

I close my eyes, heat rushing up my spine as I recall what happened next.

“And then what?” Gabi prods.

“Stuff happened.” I leave out the part about dangling over the roof of the building. “And he made me come…after I begged him. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“A lot,” Val supplies.

“So what kind of skull mask are we talking here?” Gabi’s face takes on a dreamy expression.

Val shoots her a look.

“What?” Gabi replies primly. “You know I have a horror kink.”

“God, you’re all deranged,” Val tells us. “May the Lord save your souls.”

I laugh at her holier-than-thou attitude. “Oh, please. Do you think I haven’t seen what you read?”

Her cheeks flame red. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Okay, but he didn’t hurt you, right?” Chantel redirects the conversation.

“No,” I assure her. “He terrified me, but he didn’t hurt me.”

“Do you think he’s hot?” Gabi interjects. “I bet he’s hot.”

“Does it matter if he’s hot if he’s a psycho?” Val asks.

“I don’t think he’s a psycho,” I argue. “He’s just a little…unhinged.”

“You might as well call a kidnapping an extended date,” Val says.

“Just promise us you’ll be careful,” Chantel pleads. “This definitely sounds hot, but also…dangerous. We need to figure out who this guy is.”

“I’m not sure it will matter after tomorrow,” I admit. “I’ll be married, and I doubt he’ll get within ten feet of me again.”

Chantel nods, seemingly sensing my discomfort. “It’s getting late there, and you have a big day ahead of you.”

“I know. We should all get to bed.”

“We’ll do another video chat tomorrow from the bridal suite so you can hang with us while we get ready,” Gabi tells her.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Chantel promises. “Love you, babes.”

“Love you,” we all echo back.

Gabi disconnects the call and turns to me, ready to pepper me with a thousand more questions.

“Well, goodnight.” I spring to my feet, surprisingly agile for the amount of wine I’ve imbibed. “I’ll see you both in the morning.”