Saved: a dark romance Read online

  I don’t know how to feel. I’m so…numb.

  And then my skirt goes up, his warm hand moving up my thigh. My head rolls back and lands on his shoulder. His hand fiddles behind me and then he guides himself against me. He slides right inside. He hisses, his muscles tense against my back.

  He grabs my hip and uses it to hold me there while he fucks me hard and fast against the wall, biting the back of my neck, both of my hands planted against the wall, his left hand still against my left hand, his fingers woven with mine.

  I’m feeling so much right now. Remorse. Sadness. But as his hand releases my hip and slides into the front of my panties, it takes very little for me to explode on his fingers. He bites into my shoulder as he comes inside me, pinning me to the wall so hard with that hand that I cry out in pain.

  He yanks my hair back hard and kisses my jaw and then my mouth.

  He stops, breathes deep, and then he lets go of me, does up his pants, and rights my panties and skirt.

  “This moment of honesty changes nothing, Holly. I can’t ever give you the life you want.”

  “Do you know what I want?” I ask softly, yet challengingly, slumping against the wall, tears in my eyes.

  He sighs, “Yeah, I do.”

  “Oh really? What?”

  He leans forward and puts his mouth to my ear, “To make me happy.” He kisses the hinge of my jaw, lets me go, and walks away. I stay planted against the wall. Both palms flat. He goes back outside.

  And my heart hurts. Because that’s still true. If he were happy, I know I could be. I put my forehead against the wall in front of me and let out a big breath.

  A Holly decoy died? I can’t process it. He must love me to keep me safe like this, to put others in harm’s way. I hate that I’ve been alone, not knowing what was happening, that someone died to keep me safe. Fuck, this hurts so much.

  “I’m sorry,” I say to the ceiling, to the heavens, to the girl who was in my place. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  I was alone in ignorant bliss for two years while my sister was a sex slave. I’ve been just as ignorant here while a girl lost her life.

  There’s nothing I can do about it. I only know what he allows me to know. But he takes the time to give me little hints here and there about how he feels. The tattoo of my flowers. The decoy. Keeping me safe. Coming to see me on my birthday. The tears he’s cried into my neck, the words whispered against my skin in a language I can’t decipher. The few times he’s let his guard down and shown me he cares through saying things I don’t think he means to say.

  All I can do is keep believing. Keep hoping. And do what I can do to make it easier for him when he allows me to. So, I go the rest of the short distance to the refrigerator and survey the contents so I can make my husband breakfast.

  I fill and put the kettle on for coffee - Eli and Tash only do instant, and I then start making some scrambled eggs and toast some of the bread Tash baked yesterday.

  Before I walk it out to him, I go to the bathroom to clean up. He’d been leaking out of me. As I’m cleaning up, I wonder how many women he’s been inside of for the last nine months. My heart hurts. Did that decoy fill the space in his life, too? Did he touch her blonde hair and kiss the back of her neck? Did he suspend anyone from the ceiling in his bedroom? Did he fuck them and call them his little flower?

  Did he visit the basement and undo his pants while he was down there? I feel myself spiraling into the depths of despair. I see flashes of other blonde girls choking on his cock. I choke on that thought and a sob escapes.

  I dash the tears off my cheeks and carry his plate and coffee cup out.

  There’s a little picnic table outside that Eli built. I watched him put it together through my window. I serve our breakfast there.

  Alessandro was looking out at the water, sitting on the rock he first found me at earlier. As I put things down, Alessandro gets up and comes and sits.

  “Milk and sugar?” I ask, passing him his coffee.

  He shakes his head, takes a sip of his coffee, and makes a face of distaste.

  And then he takes another sip and starts to eat.

  I go back to get my plate and sit across from him.

  He devours his plate of scrambled eggs and then slathers mixed berry jam on his toast.

  We don’t talk. We just eat in silence. I have a hundred questions, but I’m not sure they’d be welcome. So, I sit, watching him eat.

  His expression is hard until he catches me looking at him. He doesn’t smile, but his eyes warm a little and it makes me feel a pang of something more than a little bit painful.

  “What’s on your mind?” he asks.

  I’m a little surprised.

  “A bunch of things.”

  “Like?”

  “Who’s El Diablo?”

  “Not talkin’ about him.”

  I stare.

  He sips his coffee and gives it a dirty look, like he’d forgotten it was subpar.

  He leans over and starts eating from my neglected plate.

  He has his fork almost to his mouth when I ask,

  “Have you worn protection when you’ve fucked other women? You know, since you’ve fucked me bare twice since last night and you had a Holly decoy?”

  The eggs fall off the fork. He puts the fork down.

  I’m staring at him with challenge in my eyes but my heart is aching and racing, waiting for his response.

  “I have another Holly decoy. She’s in your room now.”

  My heart hits the bottom of my gut.

  “But, there’s been no one else. Told you, I’m all yours. No one but you until I use you all up. And I haven’t used you up, Holly. Not yet.”

  I crumple. My body, my mind, my face. And then I’m in his arms and he’s carrying me inside, putting me in bed, and holding me close, whispering Spanish to me, kissing me, and then he’s undressing me.

  And I cry in his arms, in his mouth, wishing I’d found a way to learn Spanish. Because I wanna know what he’s saying to me and I know that’s why he won’t let me learn. Because he needs to keep his secrets. If I understood what he was saying, he wouldn’t be able to say it. But if I knew the words, maybe I could help. But maybe they don’t matter. Maybe all that matters is that I don’t give up on him, as much as loving him hurts.

  Alessandro

  I don’t know when my luck is gonna run out with her. This can’t last. This feeling like I can’t do wrong enough to make her hate me.

  Like she should. Like I know I don’t really want.

  I’ve given her the wrong impression here in Tasmania. Holding her, comforting her, telling her things to make her feel better. This is gonna set up false expectations. I move to pull away.

  “Stop,” she says, “Don’t take you away. I feel you retreating.”

  I freeze.

  “Please don’t. Just hold me a while. Until it’s time for us to go.”

  “This isn’t how it is,” I say.

  She looks at me with what might be actual understanding.

  “Please? I know but just… please? ‘Till we go?”

  I settle in and hold her against me.

  “Alessandro?” she asks.

  “No questions. Don’t,” I say.

  “Okay. I trust you. Okay? I’ll try really hard to just trust that you’ll do what you can for us. For our future.”

  “No, Holly. Don’t trust me. Don’t think anything I’m doing is gonna give you a happily ever after. It’s just not poss---”

  “Shh.” She kisses me and then whispers against my mouth, “I trust you. I love you. I do. I’ve never stopped. I was mad at you but I never stopped. I won’t stop. Okay?”

  Fuck. She’s got my dead black heart in her fist. Her small but mighty fucking fist. She almost makes me believe. Almost.

  I don’t say anything. I just close my eyes. She peppers my face with soft little kisses, running her fingers through my hair, and then, lying on me in that little bed, she shifts half off and her hand trails dow
n to the tattoo of the panther and her flowers. I watch as she lovingly strokes them with the pads of her fingers.

  “I love this, that you put this here for me.”

  “It wasn’t for you. It was for me.”

  She looks back up at my face. She doesn’t say anything, but I can tell by her eyes that she understands. She’s young, she’s naïve in many ways, but she’s got wisdom, too, this girl.

  Noise breaks the spell she’s cast over me.

  Our ride, the boat I told Eli to send, it’s here.

  Costa Rica

  Holly

  Costa Rica is pretty. And lonely. But, after all, I’m no stranger to loneliness.

  We’re at a beautiful place on the beach. When I say we, I don’t mean Alessandro and me. He brought me here and then he left. We didn’t talk on the way, he was quiet and broody the whole boat, then plane ride, then jeep ride here.

  There were four men here, including Rocco, when we arrived. Alessandro walked me up to one of the four bedrooms upstairs and sat me down.

  “Rules. Don’t leave. Don’t take the locket off. Push the locket if there’s an emergency. If anything happens to Rocco, push the locket. Chuck is my number two man here. Anything happens to Rocco and Chuck, you push it and then push it again five minutes later. But if you have to push it twice, you fucking run. Sewn in under the mattress label at the foot is your passport and a credit card. Pin 4321. Fly to Melbourne and wait in a hotel near the airport. I’ll come to you. Make sure to use the credit card to check in so I can see where you checked-in to narrow down your geo location to the precise address. When I’m done with this, I’ll be back for you. Don’t try to shed the locket and lose me. I’ll hunt you down. I’ll spend every dime I have, every ounce of energy in my body to find you.”

  My blood chills, but I get mad, “You think I’d leave you? Are you crazy? Have I given you any indication that I’d ever leave you?”

  He laughs and looks like he wants to kiss me or something. He doesn’t.

  “And don’t hope. Don’t bother.” He’s trying to suppress a smile. But I’m still angry.

  “And what if I do?” I snap.

  He laughs full out and grabs me and plants a hot and wet kiss on me that leaves me speechless. He starts backing up, finally, leaving me feeling scattered sitting on the big king-sized bed.

  “What happens then?” I finally ask, softly.

  He stares for a minute, standing against the door, looking like he’s weighing something out.

  He’s not saying anything so I finally ask, “Does this, whatever you have to do, when it’s all done, does it mean you can let go?”

  “Let go?” he returns.

  “Of your anger. Of trying to make me think you’re a bad guy.”

  He laughs again.

  God, I would love to make him laugh like this every day. But it’s at my expense, so I glare.

  “I am a fucking bad guy, Holly. Don’t kid yourself about that. This gets done, I get to move on. But it does not change one single thing, except that I can move on without his bullshit weighing on me.”

  “Who is he?” I ask.

  He shakes his head, “It doesn’t matter. He’s done. I’ll get him and then he’s not my problem any longer.”

  I shiver.

  “When this is over, I’ll come get you and then we move on.”

  We. We.

  Oh, thank God.

  I think he sees my relief. His expression hardens even more, but I don’t know what it means.

  “Back to Mexico?” I ask.

  “No.”

  “Where?”

  “We’ll see.”

  Hope springs. A fresh start. I wonder if I can talk him into Portland. Or somewhere close to there.

  He sees the hope on my face and decides to squash it.

  “You still don’t get it. You’re not getting a fairy tale, Holly. I’m not off to slay the dragon and then ride off into the sunset with you on the back of my white horse. He’s done and then I finish using you all up.”

  “What?”

  “I told you.” He folds his arms across his chest with a shrug.

  “You married me.”

  “As a means to an end, as a means to build an alliance with the Ferranos instead of putting them on my enemy list. Nothing’s changed.”

  “Bullshit.”

  He raises his eyebrows.

  “Bull. Shit. Alessandro,” I hiss.

  “You’ll see,” he shrugs. “Can’t cry that I didn’t warn you.”

  “Okay, why keep me at all? You’ve fucked me. You’ve broken me. Why? Why do you wanna keep me?”

  “You’re mine. You gave yourself to me. But even if you didn’t, you’re mine. Until I’m done.”

  “What if you’re never done?”

  “Then you’re in for a lifetime of hurt and disappointment. Or you get fed up and murder me in my sleep.” His expression goes dark and for a minute he looks like he’s miles away.

  “You gave yourself to me, too, you know.” I sniffle. “And that means you’re mine, too.”

  His eyes dart back to me. “Yeah, I did. And I told you exactly what you were getting. You just chose not to believe it. One day you’ll see. Sadly. Stay in this room. I’d prefer you stay in here most of the time, but the only room in this house that’s off limits is the Master, in case the people who own the house decide to come. Be good or Rocco has authority to lock you in.”

  He leaves. He leaves just like that. I watch, out the window, as he goes. He talks to Rocco a minute and then he pulls away in the jeep.

  He’s deluded. He’s lying to himself. One day he’ll see. I vow it. The mixed messages I get aren’t because he’s trying to mess with my head on purpose. His head is the one that’s truly messed up. He’s wrong about himself, and sometimes he forgets to hide how he really feels about me.

  ***

  It’s been me and four guards, one of them Rocco. It’s the other three to keep me safe from whoever El Diablo is and Rocco keeps me safe from them, I guess, because he watches me closely. I stay on the upper floor of the house mostly, other than to cook and clean. It’s a beach house and I don’t get to go to the beach, but there’s a pool on the rooftop and a big fenced-in terrace.

  The one guy, Chuck, was doing the cooking and the food was terrible so I offered to cook and Rocco allowed it. I’ve been enjoying experimenting and the four men seem to appreciate it.

  When I go downstairs or outside, they’re usually playing cards or watching sports in rotation as they watch the property perimeter in shifts. Sometimes one or two of them go fishing in the fishing boat or one will take off in the kayak. There are always two of them here inside and Rocco is almost always one of them.

  A few days after Alessandro left, I figured out that this is Tommy and Tia’s house. And that gives me even more hope. The fact that I’m here and we’re not using the master must mean things didn’t go to war with Dare over my disappearance.

  Everything was covered, closed up when we got here, but I found several framed photos in a drawer, including a framed wedding photo that had a memory stick with it. I popped the memory stick into the computer, and it’s got hundreds of photos of the Ferrano clan here at this house.

  No pictures of my sister so it was pre-Angie, but there’s a lot with Dare from the wedding and what looked like a family vacation here and obviously this was before Angie and Dare met.

  He doesn’t look happy. He doesn’t look like the Dare I see with my sister. He kind of looks more than a little bit scary. Like Dario Ferrano’s angry twin.

  And that makes me break Alessandro’s ‘hope’ rule, which I’ve never even tried to adhere to. I break it more than usual after seeing the photos, because it looks pretty much like Dare wasn’t happy until he found my sister. The Dare I know is protective and undoubtedly a badass, but he’s a happy man. The Dario Ferrano in those pictures doesn’t look at all happy.

  And maybe I can make Alessandro happy, too.

  After Alessa
ndro left, Rocco saw me on the computer looking at the pictures. He saw Dario’s face on the screen.

  “Don’t worry. Your sister knows you’re safe.”

  “Oh?” I asked. And then he sat with me and told me that she knows he had to stash me somewhere safe.

  I expressed surprise that we were here and Rocco told me in not so many words that Alessandro is in some sort of alliance with Dare and Tommy, that they’re helping him with a problem. I opened my mouth, about to see what other info I could get from Rocco, but he lifted a hand.

  “No questions, Mrs. Romero. I gave you that to put you at ease about your sister. That’s all you get.”

  I can’t access the internet from the computer. It comes up with internet options for TCaruso and VCaruso to login. I’m not sure who those people are, but since there’s no phone here that I’ve been able to use, I can’t call her to tell her I’m okay.

  When I was in Portland, after he left me and put a knife to Will’s throat, I’d gotten well-acquainted with how to call emergency services from Mexico (911, just like at home) and I made sure to memorize Angie’s and Dare’s cell phone numbers.

  I’m under guard. I don’t wanna go anywhere. But, I would like to talk to my sister.

  I ask Rocco if it’s at all possible to talk to her.

  He tells me it’s not safe for me to reach out to her. But, he tells me that if we’re here longer than three months, he has been given the okay to talk to Dario about arranging for Angie to come stay for a few days with me here.

  It’s something to look forward to. And something to dread. I miss her like crazy, but I have a feeling she’ll have even more hate for him now that he’s kept me away and out of contact for nine months.

  I spend my time the only way I can. I swim in the rooftop pool. Rocco doesn’t let the other guys use it so that whole rooftop patio is all mine and gives me fresh air whenever I want. Rocco has a room on the main floor and there’s a Winnebago outside that the other guys live in when they’re not on shift. A couple of days after we arrived a shipment of art supplies arrived. And it makes me smile, because he’s done this for me again. He knows I need to do it and so he always makes sure I have my art supplies.