Page 18 of Until You Break

EMILIO

The bed was empty when I opened my eyes. Only the dent in the sheets and the faint clove-and-steel scent said he’d been there at all.

Married. Bound in law, in blood, in body. A word I never chose, but he wore it like a victory and carved it into me until I couldn’t forget it.

My muscles ached, sore in places I hadn’t known could bruise.

When I sat up, the pull low in my body reminded me exactly where he’d split me open, raw and unignorable.

My legs trembled when I tried to swing them off the bed, soreness dragging heat back into my cheeks.

Every shift reminded me I was stretched, marked, used.

The mess had dried tacky on my thighs, shame clinging with it.

Shame curled sharper than comfort, but still I felt it: the way my body throbbed with the memory of him.

I tugged at the cuff of my sleeve and stared at the pale lines underneath, at the places I’d hurt myself, marks of a habit that felt like control until it didn’t.

The lamp in the hall left them ghost-pale; in daylight they’d be darker, angry.

I pressed the skin between my fingers until the ache of pressure was something I could name.

If Damiano saw those marks, he would own them too.

He would know where I chose to hurt and when, and he would use it the way he used everything: as leverage. The thought made bile climb my throat.

I took a hot shower, then dressed slow, fingers clumsy on buttons, half-expecting the lock to hold when I tried the door.

It didn’t. Open, easy, as if I was meant to walk free.

The hallway buzzed with morning: music drifting from somewhere unseen, the scent of espresso and sugar thick in the air, sunlight catching on polished marble.

People passed and nodded, guards, cousins, servants, smiling like I belonged.

I caught whispers too, low but sharp, the curl of glances sliding off me the second I looked.

They’d seen me with Damiano last night. Already they’d rewrite captivity into devotion, humiliation into romance.

A mafia palace wrapped in domestic warmth. Too much contrast. Too much ease.

I found the kitchen first. A tray of fresh scones steamed under linen, jam pots lined like soldiers.

I stole one, still warm, crumbs sugaring my fingers, and poured coffee black from a silver pot.

Normal. Almost. Through the open glass doors the garden spread, lemon trees glittering.

And there, Damiano with the two old women I’d seen yesterday.

Shawls bright as banners, voices carrying like they owned the sun.

The summer heat pressed down even in the shade, lemon trees throwing bright shards of light across their shawls, perfume mixing with warm citrus air.

His head bent toward them, black shirt gleaming in the light, as if he’d never left me at all.

Damiano looked up, like he’d felt me staring through the glass. His smile was small, crooked, private, the kind that said he knew exactly what I’d been thinking in the empty bed. He lifted a hand, not a wave, just a summons, and turned to the women beside him.

“Nonna. Aunt Cosima.” His voice carried, meant for me as much as them. “Meet my husband.”

Their heads turned in tandem. Two queens on a garden bench, shawls bright as flags, eyes sharper than knives. The cane tapped once, claiming me. Perfume, powder, saint candles drifted across the lemon trees, gossip layered in the air.

“Finally.” Nonna’s cane tapped like a gavel. “Last night was a proper wedding. I thought I’d die before I saw one again.”

Cosima’s smile spread slow, wicked with delight. “And up close, you’re so handsome, bello. Even more than I expected.”

“He looks like his mother.” Nonna’s tone softened just a fraction, pride and warning in equal measure. “That same light in the eyes.”

Sadness tugged low in my chest, sharp and quick, like someone had brushed a bruise I’d forgotten was there.

I forced a polite nod, a small curve of my mouth, armor thin as glass.

Heat climbed my neck. Their laughter pressed like hands against my skin—familiar, invasive, the kind of attention meant to parade rather than protect.

“Good morning. And thank you.” My voice sounded steadier than I felt, breath shallow against the weight of their eyes.

“Morning, caro.” Nonna’s cane tapped once more. Her gaze shifted back to Cosima. “Marcella outdid herself. Two families tied, one city shocked, and my grandson finally leashed. Yes, my daughter-in-law really knows how to play politics and war at the same time.”

Their smiles carried approval, but it felt like permission stamped on a leash.

Their laughter trailed as they moved down the path, chatter light as birdsong, echoing like judgment.

For a second, I imagined Mama here, sitting under these same trees, sketching on her lap.

Your mother once drew in this garden too, I could almost hear Nonna say, though she hadn’t.

The ghost of it stung sharper than her cane.

Damiano let them go, then turned his eyes back to me.

He didn’t watch them leave. He watched me.

“You slept.” The words landed like a verdict.

“I was unconscious with style.” I tried for humor, but my lips trembled around it.

His gaze dipped to my mouth, one second, two, enough to make everything in me miscount. A grin tugged at his lips, hungry. “Perfect.”

“I didn’t ask for your evaluation.” My pulse betrayed me, thudding quick.

“You don’t have to. You give everything away.”

“I give you nothing.”

His smirk sharpened, criminal. “We’ll disagree later. Come.” He gestured toward the house.

“I wasn’t asking to be escorted.” My arms folded tight across my chest.

“You’re not.” He was already walking. “You’re obeying.”

We climbed the stairs. Every landing brought another cousin, a guard, a servant, each one stopping to congratulate Damiano with bows or kisses to his cheek.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, again and again, a steady pulse of messages and calls.

He ignored none of it, only tightened his grip on my wrist when someone lingered too long.

I thought of my own phone, gone since the day they threw me into the van. Messages from Enzo had been waiting then, lighting up the screen. I still wondered what he’d sent, what words I never saw. If I’d ever know.

Damiano led me back into his suite. The bed still looked the way I'd left it, slept in, blankets tucked to the side. Morning made everything different. Sunlight flooded the glass terrace, gilding the floor, turning shadows into weapons of light. The same room but sharper, hungrier, more his.

A record player perched near a low shelf.

Damiano was already at the desk, phone pressed to his ear, voice low as he spoke to someone I couldn’t see.

Business, another cousin, another deal. He didn’t look at me, and that silence pressed harder than his eyes.

I drifted to the record player because sound could make a room less sharp.

I fumbled the vinyl, set the needle. It scratched, popped once, dust, static, and then a smoky trumpet slid out, slow and honey-low, like an apology.

I found a pencil and a sheet beside the turntable.

The paper’s tooth bit back, graphite silvered my thumb, little moons on skin.

My hand moved before sense could catch it.

A few quick leaves, a spine of branch. A curve that could have been glass or a cage.

A shadow that might have been him if I was cruel to myself.

A soft murmur reached me, so close I startled.

“You draw when you think no one’s looking.

” I turned and realized he was off the phone, device still in his hand but silent now, his attention entirely on me.

Shame flickered sharp in my chest, the private moment of drawing snatched away, exposed under his gaze like everything else he claimed.

“I do here. Not in Paris." The memory made my chest clench with a feeling of a missing. College felt like another life, rain on café glass, the sharp scent of turpentine, freedom I’d carried like a passport.

Damiano’s grin cut sharp at the mention, like he’d tasted freedom on my tongue and wanted to ruin it. “Paris,” he murmured, savoring the word. “Another life. This one’s mine.”

He closed the distance the way only he could, unhurried, unapologetic, inevitable. He plucked the sheet from my fingers. When I reached, his ring grazed the corner of my mouth, cold shock, the metal tasting like minted fear.

“Pretty.”

The word curled like ownership, not praise.

“It wasn’t for you.” My throat went dry, voice rasping.

“Everything here is for me.” His tone was lazy, certain. “Especially the things you don’t offer.”

“Give it back.” Heat flared in my cheeks.

He didn’t move. “You draw your prison and call it leaves.”

“You call a house a trap and call it love.”

His mouth tipped. “Language is mine. You can borrow it when you behave.”

“Go to hell.” My breath came sharp.

“After dinner.”

He held the sketch up to the light, considering the blur I hadn’t meant to make. “Is this me?”

“It’s a mistake.”

“Mm. Most of mine are beautiful.”

I reached for the paper. He let me almost touch it, just long enough to catch my wrist when I did.

“Careful, piccolino.” His voice slid under my shirt, quiet, invasive.

Heat flushed my throat. His thumb pressed once, deliberate, as if mapping where he’d cut me open if I tried to pull away.

“The more you make yourself at home, the harder it is for me to imagine you anywhere else.”

“Imagine harder.” His breath grazed my cheek, warm enough to make my skin prickle, the closeness crowding out air. A shiver ran down my spine, traitor heat chasing it, too close to fear, too close to want.

He laughed under his breath, sharp and low. “Come closer.”

“No.”

He didn’t pull. He made stillness feel like rebellion.

“Closer.” Softer. Dangerous.

I took the single step because defiance needs air. He stole it.