Page 1 of The Beast's Broken Beauty

Chapter one

Isabella

"Letmetakecareof you," Antonio growls against my neck, his voice rough with command. His fingers are slick with lubricant, working between my legs with the confidence of someone who knows exactly what my body needs. He always keeps it close. For me. "Sei così bella quando ti arrendi, Bell'cenda. So fucking beautiful when you surrender."

Steam fills the shower like something out of one of those romance novels I used to hide under my mattress. The water pounds hot against my skin while I'm backed against the freezing tile. Like an Instagram-worthy hot-and-cold therapy, except way more X-rated. I'm caught between wanting to slap him and needing him deeper. Between hating him and craving him. Between the ballerina who survived cancer and whatever mess I've become now.

His scarred hand moves between my thighs like he's got a roadmap to every sensitive spot I have. And doesn't that just pissme off? That he still remembers exactly how to touch me, while I've spent three months trying to forget.

"I don't need your help," I say, teeth clenched, but my stupid hips have other ideas, grinding against his hand like they've declared independence from my brain. My body's the ultimate traitor, responding to his touch like he never threw me in this prison, like he never broke my heart.

"But you do," he commands, pushing another finger inside me, stretching me with a gentleness that somehow hurts worse than cruelty would. His thumb circles my clit with maddening precision. "Your body remembers who it belongs to. Who else makes you feel like this? No-fucking-one."

And that's the worst part. It's not just that he's good at this. It's that heknowsme. Knows exactly how slow to go because of the early menopause. Knows which areas lost feeling from chemo. Knows I get dizzy if my head tilts back too far. And he never treats me like I'm broken.

The shame of wanting him burns hotter than any fever I had during treatment. "I hate how much I still want this," I confess, my voice catching as I feel him hard against me, intimidatingly thick. "How much I still wantyou."

His eyes—dark and hungry like a predator's—lock onto mine. "Good," he says, voice dropping an octave lower. "Hate me. Curse my name. But don't fucking lie to yourself about who owns this pleasure. About who knows exactly what you need."

When he pushes inside, the stretch burns despite all his preparation. He's too big, too much. But he doesn't just ram into me like some porn star. He adjusts his angle, watches my face, finds exactly the position that makes stars explode behind my eyelids. His hands grip my hips with bruising force. "Mine," he growls. "You'll always be mine."

"Tell me you feel it too," he demands, each thrust hitting deeper now. His hand tangles in my short curls, tugging until Ihave to look at him. "Dimmi la verità. This madness between us. Tell me you wake up needy for me like I wake up hard for you, aching to be inside you."

The truth slips out before I can filter it: "Every night. I dream of you every damn night."

For just a second, his rhythm falters, and I catch a glimpse of the real Antonio. The one who played piano while I danced, who kissed my mastectomy scars like they were something beautiful instead of evidence of everything cancer stole from me. But then his eyes harden again. He lifts me higher against the tile, drives deeper, and any hint of the man I once knew disappears.

"Come for me," he commands, voice like gravel. "Let me watch you shatter. Let me feel that tight pussy squeeze my cock. Now, Isabella. Give it to me now."

And like my body's been waiting for permission, I shatter.

The orgasm rips through me, electric and overwhelming. I'm pretty sure I'm screaming as I dig my nails into his shoulders, as waves of pleasure crash through me—

Then I wake up.

Gasping and tangled in sweaty sheets. My thighs pressed together, aching for something I shouldn't want. My tank top twisted around my waist, and my heart hammering like I just did a full ballet routine.

God, I hate this. Three months locked in this glorified dungeon, and my subconscious is still betraying me with X-rated dreams about the man who orchestrated my misery.

The shame hits like a sledgehammer. I don't just dream about sex with Antonio. I dream about how he made me feel whole again. How for those brief hours on our wedding night, he made me forget all the ways cancer changed me. The early menopause. The scars. The nights I cried silently because my body didn't feel like mine anymore.

He made me feel beautiful again. And that turned out to be the cruelest lie of all.

Salt crystals cover my window like nature's version of those overpriced artisanal decorations Naomi used to love. Mediterranean spray thrown up during storms, not delicate like Chicago frost but angry and wild. I trace the patterns with my finger as I count the days like a prisoner scratching tallies on her cell wall.

Ninety-two. Ninety-three. Ninety-four.

Three months in Antonio's fortress. And somehow, he's still under my skin. Still inside me.

I sit at the desk.

The pen rolls between my fingers like an unfamiliar prop. My hands remember elevés and arabesques but struggle with this simple act of writing. I press harder against the paper, leaving indentations like scars.

Dear Naomi,

I've rewritten this letter six times. Keep ripping up pages, starting over. This room's floor is a graveyard of crumpled confessions.

Remember that day in the hospital when I couldn't hold the water glass because the chemo had destroyed my nerve endings? How you guided my hand, steadied the rim against my lips, then promised, "Your body will remember itself again"?

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