Sold To The Devils Heir

Isabella

Twenty-two was the night I first met Enzo De Luca; hardly old enough to understand the actual weight of the planet I had been born into. He was only a figure murmured in dark corners, his name passed about like a secret, tinged with dread and longing; he was not meant to be in my life. But my life changed permanently when I saw him-that is, really saw him.

And much of what scared me was not him. That was the side of me longing for him.

I had come upon him in the most unusual manner. Though there were sections of the home I had been advised to avoid, my father's estate was constantly alive with murmurs of mafia business and violent dealings. I need to have paid attention.

But that evening, my curiosity won out. Cigars and costly whiskey hung on the walls, and muted laughing floated over the vast hallways. 

It was late, far later than I ought to have been prowling about. But something had attracted me to the guest wing I never explored at the rear of the home.

I heard it at that point.

It was first simply the gentle murmur of voices, nothing uncommon for the guys my father connected with. But suddenly one of the guest rooms' damaged doors let out the clear sound of a woman's shorted moans. My heart thumping in my chest, I stopped. Though every instinct urged me to turn around and leave, I was unable.

For I could hear his voice.

I had only heard it once, in passing, while my father had been speaking to him in the study-low, dominating, with a trace of menace. Enzo de Luca. Though I understood enough to be terrified, I had no idea why he was here or why my father was interacting with a man like him.

I ought to have turned away, but instead I drew nearer.

I could see them through the barely open door: Enzo, his black hair ruffled, his powerful hands clutching the hips of the lady in front of him as she wrung beneath his grasp. His shirt unfastened. His motions were methodical, measured, exactly like everything else about him. Love and tenderness vanished from the picture. Just sheer, relentless force.

"Tell me what you want," he said, his voice full with directive power.

The woman gasped; her words were almost clear as she whined, "You... I want you."

He laughed, a dark, delighted sound that made my back tremble. Then, ask for it.

She really did. And he took more the more she pleaded. < His slow, deliberate motions were every reminder of who was in charge. Their body noises, and her reaction to him-that was unlike anything I had ever seen.

I couldn't stop looking away. Though I didn't want to say it, there was something about his handling of her that made my skin quiver and caused something deep inside me to stir. I found it terrible. I detested what I was seeing; despised that part of me questioned what it would feel like to be in her position. Under him.

To be his is the way.

I didn't know I was breathing until he turned to face the door, his eyes locked with mine for the shortest of a time. Nearly halted in my heart. He spotted me. His lips opened to a grim smile, but he continued not stopping. If anything, his motions grew more forceful, as if he were performing for just me.

My heart beating, my cheeks flushed with a passion I wanted not to admit, I staggered back. I should have left sooner rather than later I ought not to have seen.

But it was already too late. The harm was done.

Years turned by after that evening. Despite the developing bonds between our families, I had avoided Enzo. But Enzo's presence lingered in my consciousness, a continual, terrible reminder of what I had witnessed even as I sought to separate myself from the gloom of my father's reality. What have I experienced?