Torn: Mafia's Captive Bride

“This is supposed to be a what?” Elle asked the beautician.

“A Brazilian wax,” the woman said. “That’s what you ordered.”

Elle’s cheeks reddened, her hazel eyes avoiding the woman’s. Sometimes Elle wished she could tell someone –anyone– that she had very little say over her decisions.

“And it takes off…everything?” Elle asked.

The woman blinked, not understanding Elle’s confusion. It was no surprise to Elle that this was what Jules wanted, what he had ordered for her. Their wedding was fast approaching, and although she wanted her first time with a man to be perfect, she struggled to find that balance between pleasing Jules and sacrificing her own desires.

Still, he loved her. Maybe.

“Does it hurt?” she asked.

The woman didn’t hold back her laughter. “Honey, if you don’t want to do this, it doesn’t have to happen.”

Wasn’t that the story of Elle’s life?

Things happening even when she didn’t want them to?

Elle didn’t want to work as a secretary during the week and a warehouse associate on the weekends, but that happened because, well, bills. She was still paying off community college. Much of the misfortune Elle had experienced had started early in her life.

Elle’s father had left her and her mother when she was just a toddler. She only heard that he was a petty criminal. Her mother died not long after. Though she was too young to remember how her mom had passed, the loss still left a scar.

What twisted the knife deeper was that, somewhere in the world, her father was alive, and he didn’t want her.

She became a ward of the state - passed around from one foster family to another, until she landed with the Martels. However, Elle was just another government paycheck in their eyes. They started with verbal abuse and graduated to forcing her to be their maid.

The only Martel that still remained in Elle’s adult life was her foster sister, Stephanie. Though Stephanie was a bratty, compulsive liar, they had developed an odd friendship as teens.

When Elle got into community college, Stephanie introduced her to her future fiancé, Jules, an older businessman who Stephanie ‘met in some weird-ass club.’

But it wasn’t long before Elle discovered the depth of Stephanie’s depravity. Stephanie became a scam artist, swindling empty nesters out of their retirement. She often catfished disabled men, lying to them in order to steal their money. Elle didn’t have the courage to confront Stephanie about her scams. Instead, she tried to avoid her, but it was hard. Stephanie was the closest thing Elle had to family.

But with Jules it would be real, he would become her real family. At twenty-one, many people thought she was too young to be getting married, but no one truly understood the lack of love she’d felt in her short life. Most people at the age had some semblance of family, either blood relative or friends, but Elle had neither. All she had was Jules.

Marrying him would finally allow her to have the family she’d never known. Even if that meant pouring hot wax on her skin ripping off every piece of hair on the most sensitive part of her body.

As the beautician grabbed the hot wax off the table, Elle’s stomach dropped.

“I’ll take a raincheck,” Elle mumbled.

On the drive back to Jules’ house, she practiced what she would say to him. While they hadn’t had sex yet, he still tried to touch her in more ways than she was comfortable with. She wondered how long she could keep him off her before he noticed she hadn’t gone through with the wax. She’d definitely need to man up and get it done before her wedding night.

She sighed, her hands tightening on the steering wheel. Was this how she was supposed to feel before her wedding? She wished she could say what she felt was excitement, but it was more akin to dread. She’d thought about breaking it off with Jules many times, but she’d just never found the courage.

Every time they fought, every time he pushed her, she’d cry and leave, but then he’d show up with roses and kisses, full of guilt and more loving than she’d ever seen him, and there she would be again, back in his arms, craving his touch. Craving his attention and affection.

That was love, she told herself. Passionate and chaotic.

She let herself into Jules’ house as quietly as she could. She knew he appreciated his alone time and she was back way too early. Hopefully he’d be busy and wouldn’t notice her. She didn’t want him being mad at her for disturbing his alone time–or worse, have to explain why she didn’t finish the appointment. She promised herself she’d go back before their wedding night.

As she closed the front door, he paused at a strange sound floating from down the hall. It sounded like…bed squeaks.

Elle’s heart started pounding, her breathing becoming shallow. The sound of moaning floated out of Jules’ open bedroom door. She knew she should just leave, tell herself that Jules had a couple friend visiting for the weekend, that they’d probably taken a moment alone while Jules was out for lunch. But she didn’t leave.

She felt like she was a fish caught on a hook, quickly being reeled in toward the open door.

The gasp caught in her throat. Jules was standing on the edge of his bed–the bed she slept in almost every night–his bare ass facing toward the door, thrusting forward and backward, his hands gripped around the hips a woman crouched over on the bed. But not any woman. Elle’s heart plummeted. Her foster sister, Stephanie, was having sex with Elle’s fiancé.

As Jules yanked Stephanie’s hair and slapped her ass, she shouted in pleasure, screaming Jules’ name. Elle couldn’t hold back a gasp of dismay.

Stephanie glanced back. “Elle! What the fuck?”

Jules spun around, his eyes first widened in shock, then quickly narrowed in the way they always did when he got angry with her. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

Elle couldn’t speak. As Jules stormed towards her, Elle’s entire body tensed as she prepared for him to raise his fist.

Instead, he paused, glaring at her. “Come back in an hour.”

He slammed the door in her face.

Elle couldn’t even remember driving home, her sobs shaking her entire body, her heartbreak distracting her from the fact that she never came home after dark, unless she was with Jules.

Since her building had no parking, she had no choice but to park two blocks from her apartment, and she was halfway on her walk home when she came to, aware that her sadness had taken over her better judgment. She paused in the street, clutching her purse to her chest, as she realized how silent the street was.

Even during the day, muggings were common in her neighborhood. But at night, it was another story altogether. And like the quiet before a storm, she knew something bad was about to happen.

The gunshots ricocheted through the air from what felt like every direction. She heard the sound before she saw the gangs. They surged forward into the street, and knowing she would end up in their line of fire if she tried to run. She collapsed onto the ground in fear for her life.

Realizing she needed to get off the street, she bolted for an alley and quickly discovered she wasn’t the only one in the wrong place at the wrong time. There were only two people in the alley, an older man, clearly from one of the gangs, and a young boy who couldn’t have been older than fifteen. The man grabbing him was nearly twice his size. They were off to the side, away from the gunfire. As the boy’s attacker raised his gun, the kid lashed out, fighting back.

Elle saw the moment the attacker dropped his gun. Maybe it was due to heartbreak, or maybe she was just plain stupid, she lunged forward, snatching the attacker’s gun off the ground.

His teenage victim, the young boy Elle had wanted to protect, darted off into an alley, but Elle’s relief was outdone only by her fear.

She realized her mistake when the man turned on her. She was only five feet four inches, and although working for her foster family her whole life had given her a fair amount of muscle, she was nothing compared to him. Desperate, she fumbled for the gun. She tried to pull the trigger–but having no idea how to even hold a weapon, no less shoot it. The man lunged at her, knocking the gun out of her hands.

He grabbed her by the shirt, ripping the buttons off, revealing the lace of her bra.

“Dumb bitch,” the man growled. “You’re hot, but you’re stupid. And I’m going to show you what happens when women try to stand up for themselves.”

“No, please,” Elle pleaded, but it was no use.

The man’s large hands clamped around her neck, and she could smell the cigar smoke lingering on his fingers.

Suddenly, the teenage boy appeared from the alley, but this time he wasn’t alone. A tall handsome man was beside him. Elle’s attacker never saw it coming.

The handsome man lifted a gun into the air and Elle heard only the echo of her own scream as warm blood splattered on her face and neck. Her attacker crumpled lifeless to the ground.

Her entire body trembled. Before she could process what was happening, she felt something slam into her skull. She was unconscious before she hit the ground.

*

Dante stumbled back as the gang member punched the girl in the face. She was definitely in the wrong place. He’d already shot a man to help her, and now this?

“Dante,” the man said. “I thought that was you.”

Dante recognized the man from Sanctum, a gang that rivaled his own.

“I just came to give you a message,” the man said. “Sanctum is watching you.”

As he turned and disappeared up the alley, Dante’s friend Andrea pulled up at the back of the alley and threw open the car door.

“Get in!” Andrea yelled.

Dante didn’t normally take home strays. But he knew this was just the beginning of a long night of rival gang fights, and he couldn’t justify leaving a girl with a ripped shirt unconscious on the ground, especially in front of a Sanctum gang member. He lifted her limp body up and slid into the backseat beside her.

“Who’s the girl?” Andrea asked.

“I’ll explain later,” Dante said. “Drive.”

As Andrea sped away, gunshots ricocheting behind them, Dante glanced at the girl. She was covered in blood, and as the car curved, her unconscious body leaned against Dante’s, her head resting on his shoulder.

Andrea glanced at him in the rear view mirror. “Where to?”

Dante glanced down at the woman and then back out the tinted window. “The den.”

~~~

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