Page 32 of Until You Break
He kissed me.
His mouth came down like a velvet weight, heavy and consuming. He pressed me into the space between his chest and the altar, breath warm and close, a constant, smothering pressure that blurred the edges of the room. His lips were wet and insistent, tongue searching my hesitation and erasing it with slow, expert drafts. The cuff of his sleeve scraped my jaw; metal warmed against my skin. Heat pooled behind my eyes. Phones flashed, lenses blinked, a chorus of tiny lights and clicks stabbed at the dark. Glass chimed against glass as if the sound couldpretend this was joy. In the flare, my father’s face stamped itself behind my eyes and stayed.
“Look at him,” someone whispered.
“I am,” Damiano said against my lip, the words for my father, the intimacy for me. His thumb found my pulse and pressed until my knees had to remember the floor.
I kept my hands down. He smiled when I did, a small razor pressed edge-first into patience. When he let go, it wasn’t mercy. It was staging.
“To Riccardo,” he added, calm as a metronome. “I’ll teach him to kiss properly too.”
Laughter, too sharp, scattered like coins.
He smiled against my mouth when I kept my hands at my sides. I felt it, approval sharpened to cruelty. He let me go when he wanted and stopped my step back with a re-claiming thumb at my throat.
He didn’t look away when he spoke to my father. “I’ll make sure he learns to dance, Riccardo. Among other things.”
Laughter again, sharper.
Luca clapped once, a showman calling his stage. “Ladies, gentlemen, criminals of taste, welcome to the union of Bellandi Logistics and Valenti Bad Decisions.” He flicked open a card he absolutely hadn’t written and read. “Program: vows, kiss, exchange of threats, light refreshments, then dancing. Safety briefing, no confetti, no grenades, keep hands inside your own suit unless invited.”
A ripple of ugly amusement. He bowed to my side of the room. “Relax, cousins. We checked, kidnapping is only tacky if the tailoring fails.”
He lifted his glass higher, grin feral. “To the happy couple,” he said, absurdity dressed in velvet. “To our dear brother, who kidnaps prettier than most men court. To his husband, who just made history by saying yes under more safeties than a papalconclave.” He lifted the glass higher. “If anyone objects, speak now or forever hold your tongue… or I’ll cut it out for you.”
A beat.
His eyes slid to me, wicked. “Smile, or they’ll think Damiano married a corpse. To the clarity of a good morning.”
Damiano’s thumb still marked my throat when he turned me a fraction, guiding me from the altar as if the ceremony were finished and the next act already waiting. I could hardly believe it.
I had just been married.
CHAPTER 11
EMILIO
“To the married couple!”
Alessandro flicked ash into his glass, then raised it toward us. “To the Bellandi heir and his bride,” he said, voice smooth as smoke. Luca’s knife tapped once against his plate, sharp and approving, like a gavel sealing the vow. A hundred glasses lifted in answer. Champagne burst. Glitter rained from the balconies like confetti at a coronation. Children darted under tables, chasing one another with stolen strawberries. Someone fired a cork into the chandelier.
Damiano held my hand in plain view, the Bellandi heir parading his prize. His grip was firm, steady, deliberate. And though guards flanked me, no one acknowledged them. My captivity had been rewritten into devotion. Into a marriage I hadn’t chosen. But the ring burned like proof anyway.
The ballroom glittered under chandeliers, silk-draped tables stacked with towers of caviar and oysters. Smoke curled from cigars. Women in velvet lounged across the arms of men in tailored suits. The champagne never stopped. Neither did the surveillance.
Damiano didn’t release me once. He walked beside me like I was already his property, his arm slung around my waist inopen possession. Every few steps, his mouth brushed my throat, my jaw, the curve of my shoulder. A kiss. A scrape of teeth. A murmur meant for my skin, not my ears. None of it subtle. All of it deliberate.
I burned. With shame. With something worse. The suit felt like armor that didn’t belong to me. Too tight. Too sheer. Every line of me showed through. I hated it. Hated him. For making me feel it more.
I tried to pull my hand free once, jerked hard enough that my knuckles popped. A guard moved instantly, hand brushing his holster. Damiano only smiled and drew me closer, forcing my fingers to lace with his.
He walked slightly ahead, like I was his shadow. He greeted no one. Only touched me. He kissed my fingers, slow. Then my wrist. Then the corner of my mouth. He didn’t care who saw. He wanted them to.
“Every part of you tastes better when you’re scared,” he whispered. “Keep shaking for me,piccolo. I’m going to make a masterpiece out of that mouth one day. When I break you in that bed upstairs, I’ll keep the lights on so the walls remember too. You’ll scream, and every guest here will know it’s for me.”
I wanted to spit at him. I wanted to tell the room this wasn’t real. That I wasn’t his. That I’d never be. But my throat stayed tight, and the shame burned worse for it.
I’d only ever been with girls. Predictable. Practiced. None of them had made me tremble. And then there was him. Danger wrapped in velvet. Command without words. The fire I wasn’t supposed to crave. He looked at me like he already knew. And the heat in my gut wasn’t confusion. It was recognition. I wanted him. And the shame of that want burned deeper than anything else.
