Page 34 of Until You Break
“No?” he said. “Then why are you so hard for me right now?”
“Fuck you.”
“I know,” he said. “That’s the part you’ll miss when it’s gone.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know how you taste when you’re shaking. I know how you breathe when you’re about to beg.” His gaze dropped to my mouth. “That’s all I need to know.”
“One more roll of my hips,” he growled, “and you’ll come in your pants in front of your whole legacy.”
I yanked away. A guard shifted instantly, hand at his sidearm. Damiano didn’t signal. He just caught me again, grinding his claim against me in front of them all.
“Say it,” he whispered, hot at my ear. “Sayamore miofor them.” The demand froze my tongue. Panic locked my throat. When I stayed silent, his grip tightened until I rasped the words out, shame catching in every syllable.
“Chin up,piccolino,” Damiano murmured. He pressed my stance wider, trousers pulling tight, the outline of my arousalmore visible with every sway. His thumb tipped my jaw higher. “They’re watching.”
And they were. Faces turned. Wine glasses caught midair. My uncle’s gaze cut through, disbelief sharp. Nonna leaned toward Luca, voice low enough to carry only to him. “Bellandi theater. But the boy bleeds honest.” Luca’s knife tapped once more in answer, steady and cold. A phone flashed once, catching me arched against him, my humiliation immortalized in pixels I would never reclaim.
The thought crashed over me, what the gossip would sound like tomorrow. My name dragged through whispers in every hall. My ruin rehearsed in mouths that would never let me forget.
The crowd clapped. They laughed. He bit my shoulder through the shirt, then lingered, sucking a bruise into my skin. Possessive. Erotic. A mark that would last.
My hips jerked forward. Grinding harder against his thigh. Betrayal. Another ripple of laughter cut through me.
“You’ll remember this dance.”
Then he caught my wrist and forced it higher, palm against the hard plane of his chest, right over the thud of his heart. To anyone watching, it looked like I’d reached for him willingly. Applause swelled.
“You think this is what power looks like?” I hissed. “Making someone unravel in front of strangers?”
“No,” he said. “Power is making you want it. And you do.” His hand pressed flat to my spine, forcing my hips harder against his. “Feel that? You’re leaking for me in front of your father. Staining your fine suit for everyone to see. Every twitch of your cock is a confession.”
Then he rolled his hips slow, angling me so my cock dragged against his thigh, friction sharp enough to make my breath stutter.
The music swelled. My chest heaved. Heat licking up my neck, pooling low, undeniable. I could see our reflection in the shine of the parquet floor, his mouth at my throat, my body arched against him. Shame written in the line of my hips.
“And look,” Damiano whispered, lips grazing my jaw. “They’re all watching you fall.”
And I would remember. Every detail already burned into me. The press of his hand at my back. The heat of the ring against my skin. The scent of his cologne laced with sweat and wine. Irrevocable. Terrifying. Intimate. Like something inside me had just started to live. Or die.
His breath curled against my mouth. “This is just the beginning. Upstairs, I’ll make sure you never forget who owns you.”
Terror. Heat. Need. I couldn’t breathe. And under it, the ache of Mama’s absence, a ghost threaded through the shame.
The night wasn’t done breaking me yet.
My ruin was already written, and it was wearing his name.
CHAPTER 12
DAMIANO
“Watch your papà leave,piccolino,” I murmured against Emilio’s ear as the guards moved in.
Riccardo stiffened when they took his arm, the sight of Bellandi men herding him like a debtor twisting deeper than any blade. His sons flanked him, Enzo rigid, Salvatore’s eyes hunting exits, but there was no dignity in the walk. Not at his own son’s wedding. Not when every glass in the room tilted to watch, laughter and chatter cutting short into a hush edged with hunger.
I kept my arm heavy across Emilio’s shoulders, hand curved possessive at his throat. He flushed from the dance, from my kiss, from the strain under his trousers he couldn’t hide, and I let the room see it. Let them wonder whether his father noticed his boy trembling in my hold while he was marched out the door.
