Page 34 of The Brutal Arrangement

“Wait. Please.” Her quiet protests annoyed me, and I hauled her toward the elevator faster.

“Shut the fuck up,” I growled as we entered. Releasing her seemed to give her the idea that she could hide. Plastering herself against the other wall, she shrank and hunched her shoulders.

“I don’t want this. Please. I don’t want to do this. Where are you taking me?”

“It’s too fucking late. We’re married.” The doors opened to my apartment, and I took hold of her again to pull her into my room. Not bothering with the lights, I pushed her toward the bed.

“No! Please don’t!” She tried to step away from me, panicking, but I caught her with a hand on her upper arm. “I don’t want this.”

Neither did I, dammit.

“Too bad.”

She cried out with alarm as I towered behind her, trying to shove her onto the bed.

“Please. No!”

I was sick of her protests. Snatching my loosened tie off my neck, I grunted at her wrestling to get away. I slipped the silk length around her head, gagging her until her stubbornness was nothing more than muffled mumbles.

“Too bad,” I repeated.

I had to do my duty, whether she wanted me to or not.

WhetherIwantedto or not.

If my brother, my boss, expected me to be rough with my wife so I could get answers out of her quicker, then that was what I’d do.

13

LUCY

No!

I shook my head, bringing my hands up to shove this gag off my mouth. He was too fast, though, grabbing my hands and wrenching them down.

No! This isn’t supposed to be happening!

Katerina told me. She lied to my face that these brothers were “decent” criminals. She had looked me in the eye and told me that the Ivanov brothers would just accept me and dismiss me.

I wasn’t supposed to be raped.

I wasn’t supposed to be taken in the most literal sense of two people coming together in a union.

I’d been able to talk myself into dealing with this because I had been told I wouldn’t be expected to sleep with my husband.

And here I was.

Trapped and caught in the worst way imaginable.

He stood behind me, his thick arms around me as he fought with me. Holding me against his rock-hard chest, he didn’t let me escape. With both my hands in one of his, the skin so gritty and rough against mine, he forced my arms up and out of reach of my face.

I had to get this gag off and scream. It built inside me, roaring to rip free. But I couldn’t release it. It was stuck in my throat, wedged there as my mouth was stuffed. No matter how much I resisted and bucked, twisted and squirmed, I couldn’t get out of his grasp.

Panic pushed my heart to race faster, and I couldn’t suck in a deep enough breath with this gag. Dizzy and delirious with this need to get away, I was torn with the urge to sob and shout for help.

No help would be coming. Even if I could call out for anyone, I doubted these Mafia men would save me.

Ripping off my veil, he still couldn’t see me. It was too dark in here, and somehow, not having proper light to witness this horror made it worse. That white, gauzy layer became another binding on me. Too quickly and with too much ease, he coiled the veil around my wrists and secured them together in a harsh cuff.

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