Ruin (Songs of Corruption #2)(27)
Author: C.D. Reiss

She was going to be the death of me, and I was suicidal. I would kill for her, or I’d be killed by her, but no matter what, someone was getting anointed in oil and put in a pine box. God willing, it would be me and not her.

I kept the top up and the windows closed after the church. I was still at a rolling boil, and she sat back and said nothing, about that or anything, as I drove her up the hill to my little Spanish house. It was in slightly better shape than when she’d seen it last. The walls were plastered, but there was dust everywhere. The kitchen had been ripped out and the bathrooms were down to the bare necessities, but the bedroom was beautiful in spite of all the mess.

I’d tried to integrate her into my life before, but with half measures. I’d introduced her, thinking it would shield her, and it did, as long as my crew was my crew. Once that broke, she wasn’t above getting hurt for betraying us, nor was she considered one of us. I was back to square one, and only when she admitted to seeing the future mayor did I realize how vulnerable she was.

I’d protected my wife. I’d protected her life, her virtue, and her ignorance. In the end, only her virtue survived, and I knew in that church basement that it was the most useless of her qualities. Only her life had been worth saving, and I’d failed at that.

Had Valentina known about my history, my father, and the world I’d turned my back on, she might have been more careful. She might have known what to look for. But I’d treated her as if she’d been an amusement park: a separate world, free from reality, where I could pretend I was something I wasn’t.

I didn’t want that for Theresa. I couldn’t leave her. I was not a good man. I wasn’t even decent. But with her, I could find an honest place in the world. Because she was worldly and sophisticated but still virtuous, I knew she could teach me to be the same.

In the seconds when I held my Theresa’s jaw and she kept a firm grasp on my wrist and looked at me without fear, I recommitted to my plan to become a better man. I would have her and leave the life my father had denied me and that I’d rushed into despite him.

She was the only one who could take me there but only if her eyes were open and only if she wanted us as much as I did.

I didn’t even want to think about it, but I had to. Tomorrow. Now, I was drunk on her scent, smelling the orchards of my youth, when I was just a fatherless child and not the end of a long line of bastards.

twenty-one.

theresa

We snaked up a familiar hill. He’d been quiet the whole drive, only acknowledging me by taking my hand and squeezing it. At a red light, he looked at our hands together. I wanted to ask him what had changed, but the light went green, and the car took off.

The only way out is through.

I didn’t know what he’d meant, but in saying that, he’d changed. He got tender. He kissed my lips and said, “Come home with me?”

I didn’t know where that was, but it could have been old Napoli for all I cared. I would have gone anywhere.

“I’m sorry, Antonio. I wasn’t trying to cause you trouble. I was trying to help you and Katrina both.”

He didn’t answer explicitly. He could have said it was all right. He could have shrugged or kissed me again. In the end, I let him take me to his car.

“Why here?” I asked when we stopped at the end of the drive at the Spanish house on the hill.

“This is my house.” He opened my door and led me out of the car and up to the house.

“I thought the place on the east side was where you lived.”

“Before this house, I had the small place for me.” He unlocked the door and swung it open. “I got this because I realized I wasn’t in this country temporarily. I was never going back, so I thought I’d settle in. Act like I really lived here.”

“I like it.”

“Good.” He put his hand between my legs, wedging it. He bunched my skirt in his fist and curled a finger over my crotch. “Because I’m about to fuck you in it. You ready to scream?”

“I think we should talk,” I said, not really meaning it. I wanted him to take me before he could tell me something I didn’t want to hear. My legs opened to take his hand, and my skin tingled.

“After. We have plenty to discuss after.”

“Capo,” I whispered.

“Sei mia.” He got his finger around my clothes until he found where I was wet. “Questa è mia.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. My hair was still a nest of wind, and it stuck to my lips when I spoke.

“This”—he slipped his fingers over my pussy—“is mine.” He put his other thumb in my mouth before I could answer, pressing my tongue down. “La tua bocca è mia.”

I nodded and pressed my lips around it. He tasted like church when he slid his digit from between my lips. When it was out, I said, “My mouth?”

“Mine.”

I couldn’t take it anymore. I unfastened his pants and we kissed. I was at his command, no matter what he wanted, no matter what his plan.

He pushed me to my knees, and I collapsed to a kneeling position, looking up at him when he put his thumb back in my mouth. I stroked his cock, so thick and ready, the thumb a small piece of flesh in comparison. “La bocca,” I said.

“La mia bocca,” he replied. “My mouth. È tua. Is yours.”

“La mia bocca è tua.”

“Excellent. Now I’m going to use what’s mine.”

I opened my lips, and he took them.

He was cruel. He put his cock in my mouth and held my head still while he pushed forward, down my throat. He shoved past my gagging, past my breath, and I let him. When he let me go and drew back, I sucked in air, paused, and then looked up at him.

“La mia bocca è tua.”

I opened my lips to let him take me, let him fuck my throat raw. He took a handful of hair and pulled me forward, sliding his cock in my mouth, stroking the bottom of it on my tongue.

“Sei mia,” he growled between his teeth then pumped down my throat again. The bottom half of my face dripped with spit and throat gunk, but still, he kept his cock in my face. It was uncomfortable, painful, degrading, and yet my nipples hardened and my panties were soaked with wanting more.

When he was as big as I’d ever felt him, and his firmness matched the weight of my ache, he took his cock out of my mouth and held it there, the tip almost touching my lips.

“Apri,” he said, eyes at half-mast. “Open.”