28

##Marriage

Emily

As always Joe is breathtaking, he is so handsome I wouldn't mind spending hours just looking at him. Still unable to think straight through what he just said, I can only cry with emotion and partly with anger for giving in to his statement so quickly.

Joe loves me, he loves me as I love him. I can only be dreaming.

"I want you to say something." he demands and I smile.

"What do you want me to say?" I ask with the intention of provoking in him what I felt when I found out that I was just revenge in his bed.

"No need to say anything then." He shrugs and I get annoyed that I don't get any effect from it. "Can you ever forgive me for what I did to you?" I am surprised by your question.

"I don't know." I answer sincerely and see her face pale and her features turn sad.

"I've never wanted anything as much as I want you. Fuck, no victim, no urge to kill, none of my vices compare to you. You're special, there's no other human being like you." He declares and my heart melts within me.

"I won't deny that I also found you interesting. I don't know why crazy, but... I did." Earring.

"I was a little too impulsive with you. You were unlike any woman I've ever had in my company and I wanted you for that. I don't promise I'll change, but I promise I'll take care of you." His dark eyes meet mine.

"So you want to apologize?" I try to help him with the word that he seems to be unfamiliar with.

"Not really. I can't apologize for something I don't regret doing." I swallow hard and don't know whether to feel relieved by his sincerity or scared.

"Why did you do all this, really, explain to me?" I question my biggest doubt.

"From the beginning I wanted you to love me, to fall in love with me, the way you loved that boy." I try to hold back the tears.

"I lied, I was never in love with Roman, actually you got it all wrong, he was always behind me, but I never gave him hope, I love him as a friend. That's all." I explain.

"I think I already knew, I never saw that sparkle I'm seeing in your eyes now looking at me, when you looked at him."

"And how did you know when I looked at him?"

"Have you forgotten that I know your every move?"

"I still don't know how you do it..."

"And you won't even know." Caresses my hair. "I want you to understand once and for all that you are mine, you will stay by my side for the rest of your life, I won't let you go. I can't and I don't want to." Once again I don't know whether to feel happy or afraid of this statement.

"What if I don't want to? If I feel like traveling, getting to know new cultures and new people?" I ask with an air of defiance and he opens his coat a little revealing a syringe in his pocket. "I see..." I shake my head.

"Besides, you can do all this with me. I'll take you around the world, you can ask me anything you want and I'll give you, except one thing."

"It is what it is?"

"Leave. That never." He asserts and I shudder.

I'm stuck with him forever.

"I intend to do something when we get out of here." Joe says suddenly after being thoughtful for a few minutes.

"Is it good or bad?" I ask afraid of the answer. He's so unpredictable.

"We'll go to a justice of the peace." He answers and I widen my eyes.

"For what?" I inquire with strangeness and curiosity.

"Why, to get married." Drop it like it's obvious.

"Wait, what?!" I exclaim in surprise almost choking on my own saliva.

"Get married, my pretty girl. Marriage. Do you understand? I need to have on paper the certainty once and for all that you are mine in every sense of the word, that instead of Emília Antonelli, you are Emília Manganiello." I blink several times, still baffled by the simplicity with which he takes his crazy idea.

I know that my destiny is already mapped out because I have to live with him, because he is obsessed with me. But get married? This is nothing compared to what I dreamed of for myself, Joe and marriage are two things that logically should be far apart. When I think of marriage, it's with a loving man who loves his bride, after that a family with happy, noisy children, weekend picnics and happy family things, not with a killer with the face of a fallen angel and a monster that haunts me. makes her shudder madly in his arms.

"Joe... I can't marry you." I reply shaking inside before I can think straight.

In a matter of seconds his hands lift my body that was lying down, he presses my waist against his body and holds my chin making our gazes penetrated.

"You don't feel anything for me? Is that it?" I hear the anger in your voice.

"Of course I am!" I feel lost on how to explain to him something that even I don't understand.

I love him, I can't live without him, but marriage? Marriage is something special that doesn't fit our relationship out of reason.

"Then why would you refuse to marry me?" He demands that I answer and glares at me. His hands squeezing my jaw hurt my skin.

My eyes start to burn with tears. How can I say that he is not someone I can imagine [Quebra da Disposição de Texto]as my husband? That I never wanted a life like this, being the wife of a murderer is something I never considered for my future?

"Why do you want to marry me?" I ask desperately. "I am already yours."

"I know you are. And I want a legal document that proves it, this way nobody can ever take you from me, if that's the case someday. Which I think is unlikely, but I like guarantees."

I stare at Joe, my chest tightens and I begin to understand that this isn't a sweet, romantic gesture, he's not doing it because he loves me. Marriage would simply legitimize his power over me, would be a guarantee that I belong to him, and something inside me shudders at the idea.

"Maybe we can talk about this another time…" I say, gathering courage.

His expression hardens and his eyes grow even darker. Then he releases me and stands up taking a step away from me.

"I've already realized that you can't try to be good. So let's do it the way you like it. Deep down, you like Bad Joe, so you'll have Bad Joe." He speaks coldly the same way he looks at me.

Joe reaches into his pants pocket and pulls out a cell phone, he starts typing and a feeling of dread washes over me.

"What are you doing?" I question wondering about his attitude. When he doesn't answer me I feel my heart flutter. "Joe, what are you doing?" I question trying not to sound desperate.

"I'll give you a little push on your decision. In fact I should have done this a long time ago." He says it in a hard tone and right after he shows me a photo, which contains Roman and Rocco drinking together. "Maybe if I remove them from your life, you'll start to accept that you're with me now and you won't have a chance to be with anyone else."

"No, no. Joe, please. I never wanted anything to do with anyone else after you, I'm with you, only you. I don't think about anyone else. Only you." I declare. I don't know what to do to convince a man without mercy. "They're just my friends, I don't feel anything for them other than friendship."

"Good. But I'm still not convinced." Responds in an unhealthy way.

"Don't do anything to them! Please. What do they have to do with all of this? They are just people, human beings, they are by far the cause of our relationship." I ask one more time.

"I don't care what they are to you. I want them out of your life and your thoughts. Do you understand me, Emília?" Snarls with fury.

With my eyes clouded with tears, my throat almost closing and my heart desperate, I see that there is no other way to save my friends, if not, I give the only answer I can and he wants to hear it.

"Fine. I say yes, I will marry you." His glare softens and then he puts his phone away, walks over to me and sits back down on the bed.

I have no way out, it's Joe and it will always be him. He won't let me go, and I don't want him to leave me, I love him and even against my will I'm going to marry him. Strange, isn't it?

My idea of marriage was something formal, happy, full of friends, family, something like in movies or soap operas. Something I won't have next to my killer. I have to come to terms with that. By the way, if I don't marry him, he will hurt my friends and I'm not that selfish. I'm already his, I'll have to live with him, what's the point of signing a mere paper just confirming that in the law?

"Are you feeling better?" Ask me as if nothing had happened.

"Yes, I just have a headache." I answer upset.

"I'm going to ask them to give you some medicine." He says ready to get up.

"I think I'll be fine, I just want to get out of here. I wanted to get some fresh air."

"Hell yeah, passione mia, I'm taking you somewhere special tonight." His sexy, perfect mouth moves, I'm fascinated when he speaks certain words in another accent.

"I still don't know what to say... I'm speechless for everything that's happening. I need to digest this idea of marriage." I declare.

"It's okay, amore mio. I just want you to be okay, and soon. I need you, I'm desperate for you." He takes my hand and places a lingering kiss, my blood boils and the sensitive spot between my legs heats up.

At that moment I can no longer see him as a merciless monster, I can only feel the man I love touching my skin and making me more and more crazy and addicted to him. My heart doesn't care how wicked and mean it can be, I belong to it, all of me.