Mafia Captive (20 page)

“Go ahead and check out the toy box. Everything I keep in there is made of materials I can clean. It’s all been sterilized, so it’s safe. Except the rope, but all the rope is new.”

The giant black leather container was Pandora’s box with all the evil of the world inside. Vibrators, dildos, handcuffs, ropes, anal plugs, containers of lubricant, and a few things she didn’t recognize.

While the box was open, Faith imagined she heard screaming inside her head. Noise and warnings and anxiety swirled around her like invisible smoke. When she shut the box, they stopped. She turned to find Leo sitting on the red leather couch against the wall, his arms spread along the back, and she wondered for a second exactly how long she’d been staring into that box like some brainless zombie.

“Come here, sweetheart.”

Making one foot move in front of the other felt like breaking out of a block of solid ice.

“No. Come on your knees.”

She might have hesitated, except that crawling was so much less taxing than walking at the moment. She felt lightheaded. It required less force of will to travel across the floor on her hands and knees, no matter how demeaning it might be.

Maybe she could still get out of this. Would he allow her to make the choice to stop everything? If she stopped it, though, she might remain celibate the rest of her life, cloistered away in the glassed-in room with all the sunlight but no real warmth. How would she live, never being touched by this man? But how would she live down here letting him use all those things on her?

When she reached him, he stroked her hair and she leaned against his leg, trying not to cry. The last time she’d been this upset had been the night he’d brought her home. The difference now was that she knew what he would do, and it wouldn’t be a one-time thing. This was something he
needed
.

“Why do you want this, Faith?” He continued to stroke her hair while he spoke in a soothing, low tone as if he were hypnotizing her. If only he had that power, everything would be easier.

“I-I want you, I-I want it to be real. I can’t live a lie every year for your family, indefinitely. It would break me.” There was a sad kind of pity on his face. When he caught her studying him, she looked back down. She couldn’t look him in the eyes and still force herself to say the rest. “And you said you couldn’t be vanilla. Y-you said you had to have the whole package.”

“You watched me send Caprice away. Are you sure this isn’t about your fears? I told you that she and I were never going to be an item. She’s not what I want in my life.”

“If not Caprice, it will be someone else. What then?”

“I would never put your life at risk.”

“Can’t you trust me and let me go? Don’t you know me well enough to know I’ll never say anything?”

“I may believe that, but Angelo won’t.”

She knew she might be digging a hole, but she had to say it. “I don’t believe that’s the reason you’re keeping me.”

He laughed. “What other reason could there be?”

Faith went quiet. There was no way she could put it into words, and if she succeeded she would only feel foolish when he laughed at her. Again. Maybe it was about Angelo and not being able to let an innocent bystander die. But he had to know that keeping her in a cage wasn’t much better than a quick death.

“Go move your things back to your room, Faith. We aren’t doing this.”

“I-I’m sorry if I offended you.”

“You haven’t offended me, but we both know you don’t want this.”

“I want
you
.” Even as she begged to be his, part of her hoped he would send her away and spare her.

“But not enough for this. I can see it written in your body language. This isn’t for you. Go before I change my mind.”

She hesitated.

“Go!”

Faith fled out of the dungeon. She didn’t stop until she reached Leo’s room. Whatever his reasoning, he didn’t want her. She’d practically thrown herself at him, and he’d pushed her away. What the fuck kind of magic powers did Caprice have that made it possible for her to seduce Leo when Faith couldn’t manage it? The other woman wasn’t even that pretty.

***

Leo cursed at the empty room.
She said yes, you dumbass,
said the demon on one shoulder, who looked more like Angelo than Leo in his smooth Armani and scar-free face.
She’s too scared for this,
you did the right thing,
said Father Leo on the other shoulder.

In reality, he knew she wouldn’t talk. She wasn’t the type who wanted to be a hero or get involved with the police. Given all the time he’d spent with her, and the time Angelo had spent with her, he was certain he could convince his brother that she was safe to release into the wild.

But she was
his
. Even if he could never bring himself to break down and use her in the way he wanted, he’d grown used to thinking of her as his to protect and own. Even if he never whipped her or tied her up or fucked her, he owned her more than any woman who had ever been in this dungeon, and he couldn’t bring himself to let that go. She was all promise and possibility—the only thing standing in his way was himself. And some day that barrier would crumble and he’d be free to have her.

Faith was his only chance to feed the urge that lived underneath every other urge. To own a human being was the driving need that underscored everything else. He couldn’t bring himself to give that up, no matter how many weak rationalizations he had to make. He could never let her go.

It was like owning an exotic bird. The idea wasn’t enough, a picture wasn’t enough, visiting one at the zoo wasn’t enough. It had to be there, in his home, in his possession.

Leo turned out the lights and locked up the dungeon, then he went back upstairs to his office and opened the black leather journal. He’d made lists of alternatives. There were kink clubs he could go to, people he could meet for casual flings. Ways he could do this that didn’t involve Faith losing parts of herself she could never retrieve or him traveling further down a path of no return—sins that even a priest couldn’t absolve him of.

A relationship with someone else was out of the question. No matter how obedient any potential sub was, letting her find out about Faith would be an extra complication he didn’t need. What if Faith got fed up and tried to get help? He could trust Demetri and the rest of the staff. They’d been with the family for over a decade. He couldn’t trust any random, kinky woman.

And subs were perceptive. Sometimes too perceptive. They spent all their time studying their dominant, learning to be receptive and available to his every need almost before he knew it himself. That kind of observation didn’t create a fertile environment for lies. Whoever he brought into his home as more than a casual spank and fuck would figure out there was more to the Faith situation and his complicated tangle of feelings than whatever he would say. Then there would be jealousy and drama.

Whatever he did had to stay contained and emotionally distant with all the parameters laid out clearly in the beginning. It couldn’t be another Caprice. He tried to push down the voice in his head that said he couldn’t be happy with a woman who couldn’t give him everything. And everything included her heart.

***

A month passed in frosted hell. Faith had been on the phone with Leo’s mother more times than she could count, planning a wedding she didn’t care about. More than once, Gina had remarked that she didn’t seem very excited. Faith had told her she didn’t like big events—all the people and expectation made her nervous. All she cared about was marrying Leo. This satisfied his mother.

She and Leo had been eating meals together in the smaller kitchen. Demetri and the other staff left them alone during these times, so either she cooked or Leo did, alternating between Italian and American cuisine.

Faith surprised him one night with cannolis for dessert. She’d noticed how much he’d liked them at Christmas and had gotten Gina’s recipe one afternoon during a marathon wedding-planning conversation.

When she’d brought them to the table with his coffee, his face had lit up. His hand had inched across the table closer to hers before he’d abruptly pulled it back. After that, he’d stopped eating meals with her. When she tried to engage him, he claimed he had to work late and would grab something later.

It didn’t matter what time of day she went to the kitchen, he wasn’t there. Either Leo was fasting or Demetri was informing him of her movements in the house so he could avoid her. He’d felt something, and he was scared.

Scared he’d hurt her? Scared he’d love her?

Either he was scared or she made the world’s worst cannolis.

Once a week, a different woman would show up at the door. The woman would be dressed in some slutty black leather number with what looked like a dog collar on, smiling demurely as she stepped into the house and lowered her gaze.

Faith wasn’t sure where he was getting these women. Was there an escort service that supplied women who liked to beg and be hit? She tried to be okay with it. After all, it was obvious these women meant nothing to Leo. But he hadn’t done this before Christmas. Whatever he’d done with Caprice had reawakened something he could no longer keep in a box on the back shelf.

It was early February, and the Christmas décor still hadn’t been taken down. Faith was starting to wonder if Leo loved Christmas so much that everything stayed up year round. The doorbell sounded, and Faith hid behind the large tree in the entryway. It was Friday evening at 7:30. Like clockwork. It was the same time but a different woman every week.

Demetri answered the door to reveal an exotic Asian woman. The same woman who had been here the previous week. Was he getting attached? During Christmas with the Caprice debacle, if Caprice could have been trusted, Faith could have coped with being in a tame relationship with Leo while someone else handled his darker needs. Now, though, something had shifted. Even if some other woman
could
just be a toy, Faith no longer liked the idea of sharing.

Demetri took the woman’s coat and stepped out of her way. “You know where to go, Miss Lin.”

“Yes. Thank you.”

Faith wasn’t sure if Leo was already in the dungeon and she didn’t want to risk their paths crossing, so she waited a while longer behind the tree.

“Miss Jacobson,” Demetri said, coming to stand in front of her. “Where on Earth will you hide when I take down the tree?”

So it
did
come down at some point during the year.

“I’m sorry. Excuse me,” Faith said, trying to brush past the butler. But he blocked her path.

“You know he doesn’t care about these women. He wants you.” The man had never been so overt about anything in all the time she’d been there. He’d been nothing but professional, but something must have been building and stewing. He’d probably calculated his odds on getting fired for this one were slim.

“Then why is he avoiding me? Why is he parading these women in front of me?”

Demetri smiled and shook his head. “I’ve known him since he was a boy. My guess would be that he doesn’t trust himself around you. And for your second question… he has to be in control. He won’t give up his territory for your convenience.”

It was the most Demetri had ever said to her at one time. For weeks now, she’d thought the man was only capable of speaking in one-sentence bursts. She tried to brush past him again, but still he refused to move.

“It’s none of my business, but do you mind if I ask you something?”

It didn’t appear he was going to let her pass him otherwise. So it was either answer his riddles or knock down the tree and climb over the other way. “What?”

“It’s clear to me that Mr. Raspallo isn’t the only one harboring some feelings. Why aren’t you the one with him instead of Miss Lin?”

Faith blushed and became intensely interested in a red-and-white glass ornament that looked like old-fashioned, wrapped candy. The silence stretched between them. Demetri’s post at the Raspallo estate had made him infinitely capable of waiting.

“Y-you know what he’s into?”

“I’ve seen the dungeon.”

“I’m sure Leo thinks I’m a prude, but I’m not into all that. And it isn’t like I pursued him. It’s not as if I’m here by my own choice.”

“Do you think he’d throw you down and pick the most painful implement he could find and go at you full force?”

“Maybe. I don’t know what he’d do.”

“He cares about you. He’d go slow. If you were willing to try it.”

The conversation made her want to disappear. Leo’s dungeon and his activities therein weren’t spoken about. By not speaking about it, it could be part of a dim dream world and nothing more.

“But he said if I say yes, my consent isn’t revocable. I can’t change my mind later. So if it’s too much, I can’t ever get out. The only safety I have right now is saying no and hoping he honors that. If I say yes, I don’t have any more choices ever.”

Demetri laughed. “That’s what he thinks. The truth is, from the moment you stepped into his life, he couldn’t stand for any harm to come to you. That sadistic side of him you’re so scared of isn’t all he’s about. He’s a healer and protector. He would do anything to not damage you. If you couldn’t handle it, he’d stop. He doesn’t want to be played with. He needs someone who belongs to him completely, like you do. He’s had too many woman who came here and then tried to control things, giving and taking consent like submission meant nothing to them. It’s the reason Miss Lin is the only one so far who has made it to a second visit.”

Faith didn’t reply, but if what the butler was telling her was true, the Asian woman was the first true threat.

Demetri excused himself and left her alone with the tree. When he was far enough away, she slipped off to the dungeon. Maybe she
was
a masochist. If she didn’t like pain, why did she keep going back there every Friday to listen in on what happened with Leo and the others? She wasn’t a voyeur. She didn’t get a burst of excitement from watching or hearing other people going at it. She just couldn’t stand not knowing the status of things.

Despite how much she protested and denied, she knew if things went far enough, she wouldn’t be able to prevent herself from begging Leo to do what he wanted with her to keep the other women away. She couldn’t understand how any of this had happened, how he had transformed into someone she had real feelings for. All the time spent getting to know each other to trick his family, all the public affection and time spent with others and the meals they’d made together, had created a crescendo of need she could neither explain nor deny.