Page 28 of The Marriage Debt

"What are you doing, Mateo?" I breathe, voice barely a whisper.

“I’m only doing what you want me to,” he says, ripping the front of my shirt open. My chest exposed to the night air, I shiver, but I don’t shy away when he reaches for the front clasp of my bra and undoes it.

“Are you going to destroy my jeans too?” I ask him, watching as he admires my peaked nipples before sitting straighter to close his lips around one and suck.

“Maybe,” he says. His roughened fingers trail down my stomach and very, very slowly undo my fly. His lips move to the other nipple, sucking hard enough to leave a mark. I moan as he slides his hand into my pants and finds the damp spot on my panties. “You’re already wet. You don’t want these clothes on… Do you?”

My cheeks are on fire. Mateo's touch is deft, and I can't think straight. He lowers his mouth to my collarbone as his fingers move inside my damp underwear, teasing me mercilessly. "No," I gasp out, arching my back to seek more contact. "I don't want them on anymore."

Mateo rips the rest of my shirt off me and growls in frustration as he tears his own shirt off too. His sculpted chest contracts, and bruised skin glistens in the overhead light as he stands and pulls me to my feet with him. He grabs both sides of my pants and pulls them down, thankfully not destroying them, but he takes my panties with them and I’m left standing there in just my bra which is hanging open in the front.

“Now, where were we?” he asks, worshiping one nipple, then the other.

“We were here,” I manage. My voice is barely recognizable as my own, so breathless and needy. Mateo looks up at me through heavy-lidded eyes and smirks. His hands cup my ass firmly, lifting me then lowering us both back onto the chair. His hard dick presses against my core, and he works to loosen his fly. When he pulls it out, it slides through my moisture and rubs my clit, making me pant softly.

“Better?” he says.

I can only nod as he guides himself to my entrance and pushes inside without waiting, searing me with his heat. My walls clench around him, and I bite down on my lip to muffle my cry. He doesn’t do it gently, either. He fills me completely, rocking his hips against mine, his mouth finding mine again, devouring it hungrily as if he might never get enough. At this angle, he’s so deep I think he may push right through my cervix. The pressure is intense, and I shudder and claw his shoulders.

“Too much?” he asks, but I can’t even whimper at him. “Good…” he groans, driving into me harder. “Now rub your clit.”

His order makes me tense. His voice is so dominant. It makes me want to obey him. I reach between us and find the bundle of nerve endings and press on it, smearing my own moisture around. Mateo slides a hand up my back and tangles his fingers in my hair and pulls it until my neck cranes backward and my neck is exposed. Then he rakes his teeth across my jugular and bites down hard.

I scream, but it comes out all wrong, a muffled cry of both pain and pleasure. My vision whites out for a second, and I clench around him, but he just drives in harder, pumping in slow, steady thrusts.

The sky overhead blurs, my coil is tightening, and when he nips at my chest, then bites a nipple, I feel a surge of arousal pulse through me. That's when it hits me all at once, my orgasm crashing bodily into me, ripping through my body like a tidal wave. I arch my back and scream out as everything goes white-hot around the edges. Mateo pulls my hair harder, bites my flesh until his teeth break the skin, and his hand comes down hard on my ass.

The jolt only makes the orgasm more intense. I’m shuddering, ready to fall off his lap if not for his holding onto me. I convulse and genuinely don't know how long it lasts, but when it’s over, I slump against his chest, panting. His sex drains from me. I didn’t even feel him blow, but it’s there, slicking the space between our bodies, and I’m naked, straddling him.

I straighten, looking him in the eye, and there's a silent knowing between us as I stand and he pulls out. "I'm, uh…" I glance at the door, and Mateo grabs his shirt, handing it to me. I slide my arms in and wrap it around me, snatching my jeans off the stone.

"I should…" I back away, feeling his cum drain down the inside of my leg. Mateo watches me with eyes of steel as I slip back to the door. His dick is still out, gaze trained on me, and I'm the one running away again.

You'd think I'd have learned by now.

14

MATEO

We reach the safe house just after three. The sun's still up, but the street’s already half-shadowed, narrow enough that nothing cuts through except a sliver of light between the rooftops. Rafe pulls the car to the side without needing to be told. The building looks like every other one on this block—unmarked, paint chipping near the gutters, second-story windows fogged from age and disuse.

We use the back entrance. The door gives with one solid kick, the lock brittle from salty air and time. Inside, the air smells like old plaster and engine grease. The floorboards groan beneath us, but we move quietly, being careful. There's no alarm system or cameras. Places that are protected too well don’t get used. This place was meant to be temporary—disposable.

The first floor is empty. A mattress on the floor, a broken chair, a bucket of cigarette butts in the corner. Rafe opens the door to a storage room and shakes his head. Nothing. I check the kitchen. The cabinets have been gutted, drawers loose. A half-empty bottle of water is on the counter. It’s still cold.

They were here recently.

We move to the second floor. The stairs creak, but Rafe takes them two at a time. The hallway is narrow, doors on either side. I check the one at the end while he starts with the left. Inside is an old metal desk, filing drawers stacked on top and a plastic crate tucked under the window.

He calls me over a minute later. The second door he opened leads to a windowless room—just a table, a folding chair, and a set of shelves mounted to the far wall. The shelves hold two boxes with no labels or locks. Just two cardboard containers like the kind you’d find in an office supply closet.

The first is filled with maps. Southern Italy, mostly—transport lines, old smuggling routes, contact points near the coast. Nothing we didn’t already know. But the second box is different.

Photos—dozens of them—some printed in color, some in black and white, are stacked in envelopes. One of Lila at the open market near Trastevere. One of Lev outside his old school in Monteverde, backpack slung over one shoulder, hand gripping the strap like usual. There’s another—blurred, grainy—of me walking into the courthouse. Not from the front, from a rooftop or a second-story angle. Someone tracked all of us.

Rafe flips through the stack, his jaw clenched tighter with each photo. There’s a pattern. The angles, the composition, the way we’re all shot from a distance. They've been surveilling us, gathering intel. They're the kind of images you catalog before you make a move—not the kind you leave behind unless you're startled away.

At the bottom of the box is a plastic sleeve with a printed document inside. Anton’s will.

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