Page 10 of Dance with the Devil

She had known that and she quickly bowed her head.

“Do you want to die?” he asked.

“No, I don’t want to die, I just don’t want to force a man to … you know, stay with me, if he doesn’t want to.” She nibbled her lip, hating the way he looked at her.

Draven shook his head. “If I didn’t want you, Maria, I wouldn’t have chosen you. I don’t do anything I don’t want.”

“You wanted me?”

“Is that so hard to believe?”

“Yes.” She cringed as she said the truth.

“I know your family fucked with you. I don’t know the ins and outs of it, and to be honest, I don’t give a fuck. They threatened my family, which made them my enemies. They’re dead now, so you need to stop believing the shit they said. It’s not true. Now, eat your food. We’ve got a restaurant to get to.”

“But, wouldn’t I need to eat there?” she asked.

“I’m about to show The Boss that you’re no longer a virgin, and you are my wife. If you think you’ll still have an appetite after that, then go ahead, wait until then to eat.”

She reached for another slice of toast and took a bite of it.

“There, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” he asked.

In that moment, Maria didn’t know if she liked Draven or not. He was an impossible man to understand.

****

Draven had never given a fuck about the bloody sheets tradition. He’d been present at several ceremonies, but had nothing to say about them. What was the point? It was a stupid, fucked-up, not-worth-his-time tradition. He didn’t care if a woman was a virgin or not.

To him, he saw it as an unfair trade. The men got to sleep around, get to know what they liked in the bedroom, while the women had no choice but to steer clear of men. Most of the women in their circles were kept away from men.

Even Maria had been kept away from men. He knew he shocked her with his responses, and she wasn’t quite sure how to deal with him. Again, he didn’t give a fuck. That wasn’t on him.

The Boss was more than pleased to see the bloody sheets. Draven knew there was a chance he’d have killed Maria if she’d not been a virgin. Actually, Draven wouldn’t have allowed that.

Even if Maria hadn’t been a virgin, Draven would have wanted to keep her. There was something about this young woman he couldn’t forget. She was under his skin, and he didn’t like that. He was also curious about her, which irritated him.

Women were not supposed to linger on his radar. There had never been a woman he’d been interested in. He liked to fuck and leave. There was no time for small talk. No time to make friends. He wasn’t looking for a wife.

Maria had changed all of that.

The Boss had ordered for them, and like Draven predicted, she pushed her breakfast around her plate. Antwone had invited several capos and their wives for this part of the tradition.

Draven wasn’t expecting it. He figured it would be him, Antwone, and Maria. He understood why he was doing it, showing something good, something pure from Maria. With her family being completely blacklisted, people would avoid her. She was still the enemy but as his wife, they had to hold a level of respect. Her having been a virgin also showed she stuck to their traditions.

It was all fucking messed up, but Draven didn’t have time to deal with that now. He had no choice but to leave his wife to the pack of wolves as he went into the private office of the restaurant to talk with Antwone.

“You had to bring the capos?”

“For her own good. Do you think it was going to be as easy as telling people to accept her.”

“You’re The Boss. Your word is law.”

“Yes, and people still see her as the enemy. She was their child, and a lot of people will believe that the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”

Draven shook his head.

“I’m not the one who made the rules,” Antwone said. “There are many men who’d have slit Maria’s throat from ratting out her parents.”

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