CHAPTER 15

I keep walking trying to follow in his footsteps through all the corridors that lead you know. This man just drags me not caring that the heels barely let me walk. He stops in front of a wooden staging, from which comes incessant laughter and squeaks of glass when rosar in the toasts.

It opens without further delay revealing a large oval-shaped wooden table, around it several men of different ages toast and laugh as they expel the smoke from their cigarettes. The unpleasant smell of tobacco increases my desire to vomit already in force with fear.

__ Ad arribato it tuo gift (Your gift has arrived) __ Tulio announces pushing me in.

My foot fails due to the abrupt and high height of my shoes, sending me straight to the ground. I hit my head taking a strong pain. I touch that area and feel relieved to see that there is no blood. But my legs and elbows also took a good part of the blow.

I look at my attacker with all the anger that I can. He is an animal for treating me like that, I want to remove the smile with which he looks at me, but something, or rather someone, takes those thoughts away from me.

A hand reaches out in front of me, waiting for me to take it. That gesture, that hand, the memories of a similar scene arrive. I discard it instantly, that is the past and here is the present.

The hand disappears from my sight until I feel it in my arms and with a single movement, I stand up. I come face to face with the man who surpasses me despite my recently acquired height.

He furrows his bushy eyebrows at me, but his black eyes regard me with disinterest. His deep, penetrating gaze imposes his presence, forcing you to look away from him and avoid his cold, uninterested scrutiny. But I refuse to do so, I stand firm and hold his gaze without showing the fear I feel.

His manly features are firm and beautiful, but of a beauty full of lethality, everything in his person screams power, respect and fear. His perfectly combed dark hair, his impeccable and elegant suit screaming luxury.

It's him, the masked one, it took me a while to recognize him, but if it's him, just not the man who picked up the dirty, scruffy girl from the ground. It's that other part of him, the one that praised me with the same disinterest that he now looks at me at the party with Leceth. He is Mikael, the man they had to deliver me to, no question.

__ It's Suhaila Korkmaz __ Tulio speaks from my back __. Her brother just brought her in as agreed.

He looks at him seriously, all those present contemplate the scene, now waiting with more attention when they hear my name. I can recognize more than one of them from the party, they keep looking at me like that night, with lust hidden behind their kind smiles. Despicable pigs that only see in a woman a vessel in which to empty their sexual desires and with imposed force glorify their manhood.

__ Why did you bring him here? I said I was busy __ his cold, demanding voice bristles at the beauty of my skin.

__ I thought you would want to see your toy __ Tulio snaps as if I were nothing more than that.

If that idiot thinks I'll let him treat me as he pleases, he's wrong. It is time to put him in his place. I whip around to face him.

__ I'm not anyone's toy, idiot __ I face him in perfect Italian. Expressions of astonishment and bewilderment soon appear alongside the murmurs.

__ What have you said? __ Tulio's eyes widen with anger ready to look at me __. You better remember your place or ...

__ Or what? __ I challenge him with mockery crossing my arms __. You better remember yours, don't forget that I'm Suhaila Korkmaz. And as for you __. I turn to Mikael __. I am not your toy or anyone else's, less a trade commodity. You have no right over me, for your sake understand it from now on.

All men snort in outrage at such inappropriate behavior as a woman for them. I'll show you what's wrong with those pigs.

Mikael lets out a pedantic smile, I glare at him, but I only get him to get closer to me, he leaves his face inches from mine.

Have you not heard of respect for personal space?

I blink uncomfortably as I feel his breath hitting my face. I tilt my head even further back, trying to put distance, but he only eliminates it by slowly moving closer to me.

__ I thought you didn't speak if you weren't given permission __ he whispers arrogantly. He watches me curiously like someone who looks at a fairground monkey who does a trick that his master has not taught him. His comment makes everyone present laugh.

Idiot, I'm not going to make fun of them and less for a sexy smile.

Hot, did I really just think that? I want to slap myself right here.

__ I speak when I want to, so you better get used to it __ I smile when I see his dislocated eyes looking at my resolution.

All his attention is focused on me almost making me cringe in my place. I bet that look has made more than one tremble with fear, if not before they have run terrified at everything they give. The weight he drops when he looks at me is almost tangible in a crushing way, long after he would have faltered, but not today, not ever again.

__ Repeat what you said __. I freeze to hear it, if before I thought it was intimidating it is because I had not listened to it in an ultra intimidating way.

I open my lips ready to blurt out the last extant expletive, but ... nothing, nothing comes out. My mouth gasped like a fish and my brain refuses to transfer coherent information to my sharp tongue.

Seeing that no peep comes out of my mouth, he gives me a funny look of tolerance before turning and looking around, still unable to believe what I said before.

Everyone laughs at his comment or rather, at my lack of response to him. Well, they want me to respond, because if you want a show, it's time to give it to you.

I take courage, that is, the two grams that I have left. Show time.

__ I speak when I feel like it. If you are deaf, I can repeat it to you __ I reply with all the sarcasm I have.

Everyone in the room is silent, I can swear I just heard more than one gulp. Apparently the novelty is not only that being a woman he speaks like that, but that, for some reason, nobody talks like that to him.

Well, let him get used to it.

He turns at a dizzying speed and with each step as he approaches me he speaks __. No, you are the deaf one. You are mine now, you belong to me whether you like it or not.

Every step he takes I back him up, I'm stuck to the wall with nowhere to go. I have run like prey between the jaws of a lion.

__ I am not your property, I do not belong to anyone __. I lift my chin, meeting his fierce gaze that boils with anger.

__ You are a gift to close a deal, whether you like it or not. You will do what I tell you, get used to the idea __ sentence as if there was no possibility that I could object to it.

His breath full of indignation pushes me to want to run away, I cannot escalate his anger with mine, he is like a machine of overwhelming perpetual outrage that threatens to consume everything in its path.

__ And do you think that because Leceth gave me to you I will do what you say? Do you think that's why I belong to you? __ He ​​watches me as if the answer is as simple as drinking water.

But even with water you can choke.

__ Yes, you are mine __ sentence without more.

I laugh as loudly as I can at his answer. He really can't believe such stupidity. It is one thing that he has to be here and another is that I am going to obey him.

__ That's what you want __. They all look at me like I'm a moron.

Plus he lets out a wide and sincere smile that plays on his features. That is really scaring me.

His left hand clings to my waist, enclosing my body between the wall and his, pushing me with his hips. He tangles his free hand in my hair forcing my neck to take a painful position that leaves my skin exposed in that area at his mercy.

He slowly caresses the exposed skin with his nose making my heart almost explode. His lips reach my ear, while whispering against me __. You have been given in marriage to close an agreement, you are here today as an incentive. You are my anticipated gift to do with you what I please ... I can take your body right now in front of everyone if I want to, I can turn your days into an incessant misery of humiliation if I please, starting now ... So start behaving as you They have taught or I will have to punish you, and it will not be in an exciting way.

Each word plays inside me like daggers that pierce and twist, destroying my strength and displacing it out of fear. His breath collides constantly on my skin, his hand runs over my hips calling his dominance.

__ Now you are mine, your skin belongs to me, you belong to me. You understand? __ demands making his words vibrate in my body.