Page 26 of Ruthless Silence
My fingers won't stop trembling as I pick up the ring. The metal is warm from his pocket, and I hate that this detail matters. Hate that I notice. Hate that my body still feels the imprint of his pressed against mine, his cock hard against my stomach, his thigh between my legs.
I slide it back onto my finger, the weight familiar now after eight days. Mrs.Rosetti. The name that's supposed to be my revenge, not my confusion.
From somewhere deep in the house, piano music begins again. But this is different from his usual midnight compositions. Darker. Angrier. Full of the same frustration that's eating me alive. The notes crash and collide, violent and beautiful, and I recognize the feeling in them. Want. Desperate, unwanted, undeniable want.
He's playing what just happened between us. Translating our dangerous moment into music that makes my chest ache and my pussy throb.
My legs won't hold me anymore. I sink into his desk chair, still warm from him, and the leather smells like cigarettes and sandalwood. My body remembers his heat, the solid wall of him pressed against me, his thigh between mine. I press my own thighs together, trying to stop the ache building there.
This wasn't the plan. Santo Dio, this wasn't the plan.
He was supposed to be cruel so I could hate him properly. Instead, he's patient and complex and plays piano to keep from touching me without permission. Instead, my body betrays me every time he's near, growing wet with want for my enemy.
The music builds, passionate and tormented, and I know he's struggling with the same fire that's consuming me. We're bothburning in this beautiful prison, circling each other like fighters who've forgotten why they're fighting.
My hand slips beneath my dress before I can stop myself, finding the wetness he caused. I touch myself in his chair, hating that it's his face I see when I close my eyes, his hands I imagine replacing mine. The music crescendos as I work my fingers faster, and I bite back his name when I come, my body shuddering with release and shame in equal measure.
Eight nights married, and I'm further from killing him than ever. Because now I know what his body feels like pressed against mine. Now I know his heart beats as fast as mine when we touch. Now I know he wants me too, and that knowledge is more dangerous than any weapon.
My fingers trace the ring, around and around, as his music fills the house with dark confession. Tomorrow I'll try again to hate him. Tomorrow I'll remember why I came here.
Tonight, I sit in his chair with trembling hands and the echo of my shameful orgasm, listening to him play his want into the keys, both of us drowning in desires we never asked for.
12 - Ana
“Mrs. Rosetti cannot wear same five dresses forever,” Maria declares, pulling me through the boutique’s glass doors before I can protest. “Is embarrassing for family.”
Day nine of marriage, and I've surrendered to Maria's relentless kindness. My exhaustion makes fighting pointless anyway. My limbs feel like they're moving through honey, each blink lasting longer than the last. Two guards follow us inside, trying to look casual while their eyes scan every corner. One positions himself near the entrance, the other drifts toward the back. Even shopping requires an armed escort in the Rosetti world.
The boutique smells like expensive leather and roses, all cream marble and soft lighting that makes everything look like a dream. Or maybe that's just my sleep-deprived brain creating halos around the chandeliers. Maria chatters in rapid-fire Italglish, her hands waving as she describes every dress that catches her eye.
"This one! Perfect for dinner parties. And this, Mr.Dante will die when he sees you."
"I don't dress for him," I mutter in Italian, but my traitorous fingers linger on a red silk dress anyway. The fabric feels like water, cool and smooth against my skin.Madonna, when did I start thinking about what he'd like?
"English only," Maria scolds, although if they could speak in Italian, it would everything easier. Just another arbitraryrule in the Rosetti household. "And of course you no dress for Mr.Dante," Maria says, her smile knowing. "But try it. For Maria, yes?"
The changing room mirrors reflect a stranger. The red dress clings in ways my simple clothes never do, transforming me into someone who might actually belong in Dante's world. I turn, watching the silk move like liquid sin against my body. The exhaustion makes me honest with myself. I'm imagining his hands on this fabric, imagining his eyes darkening when he sees me.
My fingers move in the mirror, signing to my reflection: "You're losing yourself."
But I tell Maria to wrap the red dress anyway, along with three others she insists are "essential for proper wife." The boutique adds them to my new accounts. Inheritance I never knew existed, explained in Dante's careful handwriting while I sat in his chair, surrounded by his scent.
The boutique door chimes as we exit onto Michigan Avenue. My arms full of shopping bags, the exhaustion making them feel like weights. Then the guards tense, and my body recognizes danger before my tired mind catches up. Their hands drift toward concealed weapons, bodies shifting to flanking positions.
Three men approach through the afternoon crowd. My blood freezes, then burns, then freezes again as I recognize the one in front. Giuseppe.Dio mio, not Giuseppe.The man who taught me to load a gun on my twelfth birthday, who called me 'little warrior' and snuck me chocolates during family meetings.
"Ana Moretti," Giuseppe says, his voice carrying across the sidewalk as he continues in Italian. "Not Rosetti. Never Rosetti."
The words sting. My exhausted mind scrambles for English, fails, stays in Italian: "The marriage is done, Giuseppe. The peace is signed."
His weathered face twists with disgust. "Your father rolls in his grave, knowing his daughter spreads her legs for his killer."
The crude words from this man who bounced me on his knee make bile rise in my throat. Maria gasps beside me. One guard steps forward, but Giuseppe's hand moves to his waistband, revealing the gun tucked there. The other two men flanking him mirror the gesture.
"We don't recognize this false peace," Giuseppe continues, his voice rising. "Romeo Moretti deserves better than a whore daughter who betrays his memory."
Each word lands hard. My hand trembles with the need to reach for my thigh, where Papa's knife should be, but I forgot to strap it on this morning. Maybe I really am forgetting who I am. Three guns against nothing but exhaustion and shame.
