Sold To The Devil's Son

The Wedding Night

The Wedding Night

He came to her door a little after eleven, the way he'd told her he would, and Alessandra was already awake, already dressed for it in the sense that there was no dressing for it at all — she'd changed into the nightgown Teresa had left folded on the bed because staying in her dinner clothes felt like a small, useless rebellion not worth the energy, and she'd sat by the window since ten watching the dark garden and waiting for the knock she knew was coming.

She didn't answer it. He came in anyway. That was the arrangement, she understood — not a door she got to keep closed.

He'd changed too, shirt open at the collar, and he crossed the room without saying much of anything.

"Alessandra."

She didn't answer. She'd found her spot already, before he'd even come through the door — a knot in the wood grain of the headboard, small and dark, easy to hold her eyes on. She went there now, up and away, the trick she'd built over a lifetime of practice. It didn't stop anything from happening. It just meant whatever happened next would happen to someone who wasn't fully home to feel it.

He crossed to where she sat on the edge of the bed and didn't wait for an invitation she wasn't going to give. His hand came up to her chin, tilting her face toward his, and she let him do it because fighting was a waste of energy she couldn't afford to spend tonight.

"I told you in the car what to expect," he said. "I meant every word."

"I know."

"Then stop looking at that spot on the wall and look at me instead." His thumb pressed gently at her jaw, redirecting her gaze to his face. "I want you present for this. Not somewhere else. Here."

She met his eyes. That was the first mistake. His eyes were dark and focused.

"I'm not going to be gentle with you tonight," he said. "I want you to understand that going in. This isn't about what you want. It's about what's owed. But I'm not going to be cruel either, if you don't make me."

"What does that mean?"

"It means if you fight me, I'll hold you down. If you stay still, I won't have to." His hand moved from her chin to the back of her neck, fingers threading into her hair, not pulling, just — holding. Claiming. "I'd rather not have to hurt you. I'm telling you that so you know it's a choice you get to make. Not whether this happens. Whether it happens with your body fighting me or not."

She held his eyes. Didn't look away. "I'm not going to fight you. I'm not going to make it easier for you either."

"Good." He leaned in, and she felt his breath against her throat, warm and close. "I don't need easy."

His mouth found her neck, and she felt herself go still under it. His lips were warm, then hot, then wet as his tongue traced a path from her jaw to the hollow of her throat. She felt the scrape of his teeth, just barely, and then his mouth closed over her pulse point and she felt him take not quite a bite, just a kind of pressure that told her he could if he wanted to, that the restraint he was showing was deliberate and had limits.

He pulled back and looked at her. "The nightgown. Off."

She reached for the hem. Her hands were steady, which surprised her. She pulled it over her head and dropped it beside her on the bed, and then she was sitting there in nothing but the necklace she'd been wearing since morning and she felt his eyes move over her, slow and assessing,

"You're beautiful," he said, no warmth in it, just fact. "You probably know that. But I don't think you know what you look like to me right now, sitting there like you're waiting for something worse than this."

"What do I look like?"

"Like you've already decided you're going to survive me." His hand came up to her breast, palm flat against her skin, and he watched her face as he touched her. "I don't know yet whether that's true or not. Neither do you. But I can feel your heart going fast under my hand, and I know you feel this too — you just don't want to admit it yet."

She felt it. Of course she felt it — the warmth of his palm, the way his thumb found her n****e slowly and deliberately, the way her body responded to the touch even while the rest of her was trying to stay somewhere else. She felt the heat building between her legs, unwanted and unwelcome, a traitorous response to the man who owned her now.

He leaned in and took her mouth the same way he'd taken everything else tonight, just claiming it like it was already his. His tongue pushed past her lips and she let him, didn't kiss back, didn't pull away, just stayed still and let him take what he wanted from her mouth. He tasted like wine, like the dinner she'd barely touched.

His hand moved lower, sliding down her stomach, and she felt the heat of his palm against her skin, the slow way he traced the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist, learning her body with his hands while his mouth worked her throat.

"I want you to feel this," he said against her skin. "I want you to remember it. I want you to know that this is what it means to be mine."

His fingers found the heat between her legs, and she made a sound she hadn't meant to make — small, helpless, the sound of her body betraying her resistance. He felt it, she knew. He felt the wetness there, the proof that her body was responding to him even while her mind was trying to leave the room.

"See?" he said. "You feel it. I knew you would."

She closed her eyes. Couldn't help it. The sensation of his fingers against her cunt, the slow, deliberate way he touched her, the heat building in her core, the betrayal of her own body responding to someone she hated — it was too much to keep her eyes open for.

"Open your eyes, Alessandra."

She opened them.

"Good. I want you to watch me. I want you to see exactly what you're feeling right now. Don't look away."

She held his eyes as his fingers moved against her wet slit, slow and steady, learning the rhythm that made her breath catch, the pressure that made her thighs tense. He found her c**t with his thumb, circling it with devastating precision, and she felt her hips twitch.

"That's it," he murmured. "That's what I wanted to see."

His fingers slid lower, pressing into her entrance, and she gasped at the sudden intrusion — one finger, then two, stretching her open in a way that made her walls clench around him. He worked them inside her with a slow, relentless rhythm, curling them just right, and she could hear the wet sounds of her own arousal, obscene in the quiet room.

"I could make you come," he said. "Right now, in the next few minutes, I could take you there whether you wanted it or not. Your body would do it. It's already getting close. I can feel you squeezing my fingers."

She didn't answer. Couldn't. Her breath was coming in short, sharp gasps, her hips moving against his hand despite every effort to stay still.

"But I'm not going to." He pulled his fingers out, and she felt the loss of them like a physical thing — the absence of that heat, that pressure, that building wave she hadn't asked for and didn't want but that had been there anyway, undeniable and unwanted. "Because I want you to understand something: this is never going to be about you. I could give you pleasure or pain, whichever serves my purposes better. Tonight I want you to remember that pleasure is just another tool I own. Tonight I'm using it differently."

He pushed her back onto the bed, and she went, didn't fight, just lay there looking up at him while he undid his belt, watched him free himself from his trousers. His c**k sprang free, thick and hard, the tip already glistening, and she felt something cold and certain settle in her chest.

This was the moment. There was no getting around it.

He came over her, settling his weight on her body, and she felt the heat of him against her thigh, the heavy length of him pressing against her cunt. His mouth found hers again, harder this time, more demanding, and she let him kiss her while his hand guided the head of his c**k to her entrance.

"You're going to feel this," he said, pulling back just enough to look at her. "I want you to know that too. I'm not going to make it fast or easy. I want you to remember the exact moment you became mine."

He pushed into her, and she felt everything.

The pressure first, the impossible stretch, the way her cunt resisted even while he drove through it. The pain — sharp and immediate and more than she'd expected, a burning that made her breath catch and her eyes go wide. She made a sound, small and hurt, and he heard it, she knew he did, but he didn't stop. He kept pushing, burying his d**k inch by inch inside her until she felt his hips flush against hers.

"f**k," he breathed. "You're so tight. So f*****g tight."

"Breathe," he said. "Just breathe through it." Like it will get easier.

He was wrong. It didn't get easier. It got deeper, fuller, the sensation of him moving inside her, the slide of his c**k against her walls, the impossible fullness of him claiming every part of her. She felt the stretch, the burn, the strange pressure of him so deep inside her she couldn't separate it from the rest of her body anymore.

He moved slowly at first, giving her time she didn't ask for. She felt every inch of him, every slow withdrawal, every deliberate thrust back inside — the drag of his shaft against her sensitive walls, the way the head of his c**k hit something deep inside her that made her breath catch.

Her hands came up to his chest, not pushing, just — there, touching the warmth of him through his shirt, the solid muscle beneath. She hadn't meant to touch him. Her hands had done it without permission, seeking something to hold onto in the middle of all this.

He looked down and saw her hands on his chest.

"You're touching me," he said. It wasn't an accusation. It wasn't approval either.

"I didn't mean to."

"I know." He covered one of her hands with his, pressed it flat against his chest. "I told you I wanted you present for this. That means feeling everything. Feeling me. All of it."

He thrust harder now, the rhythm picking up, and she felt the heat building in her core again despite herself — the same traitorous response to the man who was claiming her. She felt the pleasure that had been building before his fingers had stopped, and she felt it building again, too fast, too strong, and she didn't want it, didn't want to feel this with him, didn't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing she felt anything at all.

"Don't," she said, and she heard the break in her own voice, the weakness she'd been trying so hard to hide. "Don't make me —"

"Make you what?"

"Feel this."

"Too late." He leaned down, mouth at her ear, voice rough and low. "You're already feeling it. I can feel you gripping my c**k. Your cunt knows exactly what it wants, whether the rest of you does or not. That's what I meant when I told you this was real. Every time you tell yourself you feel nothing, this body of yours is going to prove you wrong."

She turned her head away, and he caught her chin, turned it back.

"Look at me."

She looked. Caught his eyes, dark and focused. He saw her, not the payment or the debt settled, but the raw, defiant, broken thing she was trying so hard not to be.

"I see you," he said, and the words landed like a blow she hadn't braced for.

He drove into her harder, faster, the wet sounds of their bodies slapping together filling the room. She felt the tension coiling low in her belly, felt herself getting close in a way she couldn't stop, didn't want, but couldn't resist.

"Let it happen," he said. "I want to feel you come apart around my c**k. I want to know you felt this. I want it burned into you."

"Please," she gasped, not even sure what she was begging for.

"Please what?" His hand found her c**t, rough and demanding, circling it in time with his thrusts. "Please stop? Please don't stop? Tell me what you want."

"I don't — I can't —"

"Yes, you can." He thrust harder, deeper, and she felt the head of his c**k hit that spot inside her again, making stars burst behind her eyes. "You can. You will. Come for me, Alessandra. Now."

She shattered around him, her cunt clenching and pulsing, the orgasm tearing through her like a wave she couldn't fight. Her back arched off the bed, a broken cry escaping her lips, and she felt him follow, felt the heat of his release filling her, the way his body tensed and released, the way he drove deeper one final time and groaned her name against her throat.

When he pulled out, she felt the loss of him like a physical absence, felt the emptiness where he'd been, felt his seed leaking out of her onto the sheets.

He stood up, dealt with himself with quick, efficient movements, and she didn't move. Couldn't. She lay there on the bed, the nightgown still crumpled beside her, the necklace still around her throat, feeling everything and nothing all at once.

The door opened, closed, and she was alone.

Alessandra lay still for a long time, staring at the ceiling, feeling the wetness between her thighs, the ache in her cunt, the phantom memory of his hands on her skin. The scent of s*x hung heavy in the air, mixing with his cologne, and she could still feel the ghost of his weight on top of her.

And then, slowly, the numbness cracked.

Not into grief. Not into the tears she'd been refusing to give this house all day. Into something sharper and more useful.

Rage.