His Promised Sin

ARIA’S POV

"You're not God, Nero."

My voice sliced through the silence of the Moretti estate hallway. The chandeliers flickered like they could sense what was coming. I stood there in heels that should have made me feel powerful but all I felt was rage and he also did, as I saw the war in his eyes.

My husband.

Nero Moretti didn't flinch at my statement. He never did as he stood all powerful,dressed in his black suit, loosened tie, clenched jaw. He looked like the devil himself and those cold grey eyes that used to make my knees weak now made my blood boil.

He took one step forward. Then another.

"And you're not a child, Aria," he growled. "So stop pretending you didn't know exactly what you were getting into."

I laughed but there was no humor in it. "What I got into? You mean the marriage I was tricked into? Or the contract I signed blindfolded with a man who turned out to be the Don I was supposed to marry?"

His lips twitched with something that looked like the ghost of a smirk. "You didn't seem so reluctant when you were on your knees begging for my hand around your throat."

Heat flooded through me. Embarrassment mixed with something worse. Need. 

Damn him!

I slapped him.

The sound echoed through the hallway like a gunshot.

He didn't move or even blink. His tongue ran slowly along his bottom lip, tasting the blood I'd left there.

"You think a slap is going to fix the fact that you're mine?"

"I'm not yours," I said. "You don't own me."

He grabbed my wrist faster than I could blink and yanked me flush against him. My breath caught. His scent wrapped around me and I hated that it sent heat rushing through my body. Dark spice, leather, something utterly male and seductive.

"You signed yourself over to me the moment you walked into Crimson Vault."

"I didn't know it was you," I whispered.

"And now that you do?"

I hated that my heart was racing. That his heat seeped into me like wildfire. That my body remembered the nights he'd wrecked me, worshipped me, broken me in the most delicious ways.

But I also remembered the betrayal and the secrets.

I yanked my hand away. "You lied to me. You took away my choice."

His eyes flashed. "I gave you exactly what you needed."

"No. You gave me what you wanted."

He grabbed my waist and backed me into the nearest wall. The cold surface bit through the silk of my dress. "You wanted it too. Don't pretend otherwise. Every moan, every whimper, every time you melted under me. That wasn't a lie, was it, piccola?"

My hands slammed against his chest. More to stop myself from falling than to push him away.

"Stop calling me that," I said. "You don't get to use pet names when you've broken everything."

His grip tightened. Not harsh, just possessive. And I hated how my body leaned into him despite everything.

"I remember how you begged," he murmured. "Should I remind you?"

"You're sick."

"Maybe. But I'm the sickness you keep crawling back to."

He brushed his lips against my neck. Not a kiss, just the whisper of a deadly promise. I flinched, not from fear but from the way my thighs clenched.

"I see the way you're trembling," he said, voice low and smug. "Not scared. Wet."

My eyes fluttered shut. Damn it.

"You don't get to do this to me," I said. My voice broke somewhere between anger and longing. "You don't get to… to pull me apart just because you can."

"But I do. Because no one else knows how to shatter you and still keep every piece. Just for me."

His tongue flicked against the shell of my ear and I sucked in a breath.

I shoved him back an inch. He let me. Barely.

"You don't get to seduce your way out of this."

His lips were at my ear now, breath warm against my neck. "Then stop me."

I should have. I wanted to. But the ache in my core betrayed me. My skin was already buzzing from being this close to him. He kissed down my neck slowly and I bit my lip hard enough to draw blood.

"Tell me to stop," he murmured against my collarbone. "And I will. But lie to me and I'll make you pay for it."

My fingers curled into his shirt.

I wanted to scream and maybe even cry. I wanted to tear him apart.

But instead I gasped, "I hate you."

He laughed. Low and dark. "No you don't," he said and then he lifted me.

My legs wrapped around him on instinct. His hand found the slit in my dress and pulled it apart, sliding up the bare skin of my thigh. I moaned before I could stop myself.

"You hate how much you want me," he growled.

"I hate what you did," I snapped even as he ground into me.

He kissed me then. Brutal and hungry like he was trying to devour the fight out of me. And I let him. God help me, I let him. Our teeth clashed, tongues battled, hands roamed like we were trying to destroy each other with pleasure.

Then suddenly he stopped. His breath was ragged against my mouth.

I blinked up at him, dazed.

"Put me down," I whispered.

His expression shifted, becoming deadly and unreadable. He stepped back and placed me gently on the floor.

"What? What is it?"

He didn't answer.

Instead he pulled a small object from his pocket and tossed it at my feet.

I stared down. A tiny black drive.

"What is that?"

"Everything your father didn't want you to know."

I looked up at him. My heart thundered in my chest.

"What did you do, Nero?"

He met my eyes. His voice was ice cold. "What he did, Aria. What your family did."

He turned and walked away without another word.

I stood there in the hallway, burning and shaking, staring at the thing that was about to ruin everything