Taken by the Mobster

Chapter 3: The Contract

POV: Bella

"Take your hands off me! You're hurting me!" I said, swallowing hard as his eyes stayed locked on mine. Suddenly, a mocking smile appeared on his lips, but the rest of his features remained extremely cold.

"Not as much as you hurt my brother, I can guarantee that, miss," he replied in a near whisper before finally releasing me. The pain from his fingers throbbed inside as he moved away, grabbing his drink again.

"What happened to Anton?" I asked immediately, anxious, feeling my heart race faster with each passing second, my muscles growing tense and desperate.

"Forget that name, here you must call him Vincent!" he said harshly, before walking to the window and examining it, touching the glass once more before downing the rest of his drink in one gulp. "And since you seem so interested..." he stopped speaking and slammed the glass down on the counter, spinning on his heels to face me. "Your boyfriend is in a coma. My men don't know when he'll wake up."

"No..." I whispered, feeling my eyes blur, unable to blink, the headache becoming secondary.

"What happened that afternoon?" he asked arrogantly. I couldn't focus, my body was paralyzed. A solitary tear slid silently down my face as I stared into the void, making his words more real. It wasn't a nightmare: Anton was unconscious, and part of this situation might be my fault.

Leo kept repeating the same question, while all I could do was hate myself for not remembering. My chest ached incessantly, and suddenly, my lips felt the trails of countless salty tears sliding down.

"I don't know... I don't know..." I replied weakly between tears and pain, even though I didn't want to seem so vulnerable in front of him. I didn't know how long I tried to wipe them away while he assessed whether I was lying and my heart was breaking.

"This is a waste of time," he murmured to himself, maybe concluding that I wasn't lying. With a few steps, Leo approached and threw some papers on me. "Sign the documents and end this quickly," he ordered.

I should scream, argue, call him heartless, but as the tears began to dry up, I felt my voice trapped in my throat, my muscles too weak to react. At that moment, nothing could be worse than losing Anton.

I couldn't think of anything when I lifted my fingers and touched the paper. The sheets were lined up and stapled together. Under different circumstances, I would read every inch of those lines, but not now. My eyes scanned hastily over the many letters there, barely paying attention to any of them, except for one word written in bold, finally allowing me to discern something.

"Marriage... What... What does this mean?" I struggled to murmur, my eyes swollen and stunned. The world spun around me, breathing became increasingly difficult. A bigger lump formed in my throat, my fingers gripping the paper tightly.

"The newspapers reported the accident before I knew. Vincent is not unrecognizable. Our enemies know who he is, and it won't take long for them to find you, nor for you to reveal who I am like a scared little dog." His words echoed in my ears, until I finally managed to turn my gaze to him. "You're going to marry me in a contract that will be annulled as soon as my brother wakes up." He gave the final word while calmly watching me absorb the disgust of his words.

Leo was proposing marriage when I hadn't even seen how Vincent was. I wanted to laugh, as if it were all a joke, but I knew it wasn't; this man was insensitive, and that was becoming a fact to me with each passing second I listened to him.

"You're insane if you think I'll agree! I would never marry a delinquent like you! I love your brother!" I spoke loudly, almost screaming, trying to prevent him from seeing me so vulnerable again. He laughed, this time letting the sound escape, as if I were pathetic, while I heard his footsteps approaching again, this time slowly.

He was still smiling when he was too close to me, and his head shook negatively as his tongue wetted his lips, before sliding his hands to my face and gripping it tightly on the sides, forcing me to look at him.

"Delinquent? Come on, girl, you can do better... I'm a criminal, the worst you'll probably ever meet." He slid a finger to a last tear daring to fall, wiping it away, while keeping his eyes fixed on mine. Then, his fingers moved like a caress to my bare neck, aware that he was giving me goosebumps; that was his fun. Leo pressed, making my already irregular breathing become scarce.

"Besides, criminals like me never take no for an answer." He got even closer to my body, brushing his nose against my skin until he reached my ear, where he whispered in my lobe. "Are you willing to die? It would be a pleasure to see you suffocate and then make a hole in your mother's forehead while your sister screams in despair until my men shoot her too," he said, his tone of amusement being whispered.

I closed my eyes for a few seconds; nothing in his words could hurt me more than him mentioning my sister. He knew everything about me. My heart seemed to actually stop for a few seconds when I remembered the day I left home with just a backpack, after being evicted by my mother. It had been so long, and yet, it still hurt as much as the first day I had to leave my sister.

Leo was playing dirtier and dirtier at that moment, and I had no more alternatives. In one last blink, aware that time was running out, I decided to give in.

"I... will... sign..." I responded with difficulty, so low that I doubted he had heard, thanks to the unbearable beeps of my fully accelerated heart. Instinctively, I reached my hand to his around my neck, feeling the bruises between my fingers, which were still not healed. He didn't care about the pain my touch probably caused; Leo was used to it. I felt his calm breath in my ear.

"I think we're starting to understand each other," he whispered before loosening his grip completely and pushing my hands away from his.