Forgivable Sins (Bellandi Crime Syndicate 2)

My bare feet padded across the floor, thoroughly dried and giving me the traction I needed to get through the hall without a sound. The light came from my office, the office I hadn't set foot inside all day, and as I peered around the doorway to peek inside, I knew why.

Connor knelt beside my desk, ticking away at the digital safe as he tried to guess the code. I hefted the bat up higher, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath. "What the fuck is it you think you're doing?" I asked, stepping into the doorway. I held the bat in my hands tightly, channeling all the fear I felt into that grip. I wouldn’t let him come into my home and scare me, wouldn’t show him that what he’d done still woke me up at night.

Barely sparing me a glance, he punched the safe in frustration before turning his full attention to me. "Rowe always gives you a huge bonus for the holiday. I need the money."

"And you thought I'd keep thousands of dollars in cash sitting in a safe in my home? He's not a criminal, Connor. He pays me by direct deposit like any normal emplo

yer." I rolled my eyes, unable to believe that I hadn't been able to see his descent into desperation for exactly what it was during our marriage. He'd been smart, attractive, charming. What remained of him was nothing like the man I'd married, nothing but a shadow of the addiction that plagued him.

"No, that's just the guy you spread your legs for like the good little whore you always were." He stood, unfolding his suit clad body to leer down at me.

I bit my tongue, because arguing that I wasn't Lino's whore and never would be was pointless. He hadn't gotten it through his head in our nearly five years of marriage, and he wouldn't learn now that we separated. "Just get the fuck out," I hissed. "Or I'll call the cops and tell them exactly why we're getting a divorce."

"The cops ain't gonna come and kick me out of my house, Samara," he laughed. "My money pays for it."

"We both know your money hasn't paid for jack shit in years," I argued, stepping aside from the office door in a clear invitation for him to leave. "Besides, we had a deal. You stay the fuck away from me, and I don't press rape charges and stain your precious family name with something 'unsavory' like that." He stepped around the desk, and I held in the tremble that threatened to take over my body. I wouldn't let him see what being near him did to me, wouldn't let him know that having him in my home with no one else to interfere was enough to make my pulse race. I just wanted him out of my space.

"I need that money, Mara," he whispered, something in his voice cracking. I ignored the moment of pity I felt, knowing that it was just another ploy to play on my compassion, on the fact that I had at one point loved him.

"Save your self-pity for someone who gives a shit. That isn't me anymore," I whispered, gesturing him out the door with a nod of my head. He nodded, twisting his lips in a way that communicated that I wouldn't like his next words.

I should have expected it. Should have seen the madness playing just beneath the surface of his calm.

But I didn't, and I barely had time to hit him in the torso with the bat when he reached out for me. "Fucking bitch!" he grunted, grabbing the bat in his hand and yanking it out of my grip to toss it to the side. "You will get me that money. You owe me for all the years I tolerated you fucking around on me."

"You're delusional," I yelled, taking a step back and tugging at where he held my forearm in a bruising grip. "Let go of me!" The panic in my voice might have horrified me under different circumstances, might have made me think twice. I didn't want him to hear it, but I knew I wouldn't survive another rape.

The first one had nearly broken me.

With a twist of his body, he flung me to the floor of the office, so I landed on my stomach and scrambled to get to my feet. The way he chuckled behind me made a rock settle in my stomach. "Where's your precious Lino now?" he hissed, and I flipped over to my back and scooted back away from him in the face of that sound.

When he straddled my hips, I felt a single moment of relief that he wasn't forcing my legs apart. That his fingers weren't prying my legs open to take what I wouldn't give. That relief fled with a sharp gasp when both his hands wrapped around the front of my throat and pressed down, squeezing until my vision went hazy, and I couldn't get a single breath. I kicked my legs, bucked my hips. But there was no reprieve.

No air.

He'd kill me. I knew it wouldn't be long before everything went black.

"You're going to be a good girl and get me everything you have in your account, aren't you, baby?" I tried to nod, tried to speak past the rock in my throat that let nothing pass. His hands tightened further, punctuating the affectionate term I’d hated every time he used it with a squeeze that made my head spin and darkness creep in at the edges of my vision. "I'll be back for it tomorrow and if you don’t have it, I’ll find another way to make that money off you. You understand?" I tried again, heaving in a deep, shuddering breath that made my body heave with coughs when he released me. "Good girl," he sighed, standing to his feet and straightening his suit like he hadn't nearly killed me.

I didn't watch him leave, but somehow heard the path of his footsteps as he made his way down the stairs, even as my ears rang and the feeling returned to my body like being stabbed with a thousand needles repeatedly. I didn't move, couldn't find the strength to make my arms work for what seemed like an eternity.

When I finally turned my head, I found my phone resting where I'd dropped it by the door and maneuvered myself to my hands and knees to crawl to it.

Linda was number four on my speed dial, and she was the only person I could call with this. The only one who wouldn't set off a manhunt of epic proportions.

"Samara?" she asked, her voice thick with sleep. I knew it had to be late; it had been late to begin with when I'd gotten home from the lounge.

"Need h-help," I breathed. My voice was barely a whisper, hoarse and foreign sounding. Like it didn't belong to me.

She came anyway.

Eight

Samara

Linda had me curled up in my bed, thrusting pain medicine at me along with a bottle of water. I wanted to resist, wanted to tell her I didn't think I had it in me to swallow the pills, but the thunderous look on her face had me accepting them, anyway.

"He could have killed you. This has gone too far, Samara." Where she might have been gentle with me, after months of watching me battle with him in divorce litigation, this was the final straw for my hardened neighbor.