Of volume lineage

X

Isabella

My dramatic imagination had created the Vigliano residence out to be a dark and dreary cave with monstrous spiders lurking in corners and cobwebs swaying over doorways but that couldn’t have been further from the truth.

Instead of bats hanging from the ceiling or spiked heads guarding the entrance, I stepped into a neoclassical apartment that was lavish and bright, with checked marble floors and Parisian detailing. Though beautiful, the interior wasn’t what held my attention. It was the...it was the homeliness.

Worn sneakers were tossed beside the door, coloring books left on the coffee table, a shopping list on the fridge. There was a basket of washing that needed to be folded on the couch. Snapshots of domesticity, proof that Giova

“Go and brush your teeth, Marzia,” came Giova

Marzia yawned and wobbled towards her bedroom, mumbling a goodnight. Her curls had come undone and spaghetti sauce stained her white skirt. Clearly, my stepdaughter had enjoyed the reception, oblivious to the danger that had occurred.

Stepdaughter. I weighed the word in my mind awkwardly.

Suddenly, I wasn’t sure what to do with my limbs. I was the stranger, the intruder. 

“Come. I’ll show you to our room.”

I followed Giova

Giova

I stepped forward, my brows furrowing as my brain tried to process what it was seeing.

It was a vase that had obviously been glued back together and it was holding a bouquet of wilted roses.

“Are they familiar to you?” Giova

I cut my eyes to him. “What are you playing at?”

My husband didn’t react to my accusatory tone. “I’ve given you a gift, Isabella. Do husbands not gift flowers to their wives?”

“Not once they’ve made a point of destroying said flowers,” I grumbled.

He tilted his head in acknowledgement but didn’t reply. Instead, he gestured to the two hallways that offshooted from the room, one on either side of the bed. “The wardrobe on the left is yours. Graziella has already unpacked all your things.”

Without another word, he left, most likely to go and tuck Marzia in. A sigh of relief left me as the door closed behind him. My life had warped and shifted thousands of times in the past hour, leaving me confused and afraid.

I wandered into the closet, where all my clothes were hanging. I might feel like a stranger in an even stranger environment, but it looked like I had lived here for years. I traced the familiar fabrics, before taking my shoes off and tossing them into the shoe rack. My dress came off next, the complex corset design sending me into a small rage as I tore it from my body.

I had half a mind to strut around naked instead of forcing another constricting outfit over my frame but the idea of being completely exposed in front of Giova

The bathroom matched the same aesthetic as the rest of the apartment, chic and vintage. My toiletries were also unpacked, sorted into little baskets beneath the sink on the left. Giova

I suddenly had the urge to paint. I wanted to capture the water droplets on the shower screen and the bathrobe hanging behind the door. Monsters care about personal hygiene too, I would laugh as I showed off the artwork. They brush their teeth and blow dry their hair, just like us!

I heard the bedroom door open and close. I used the mirror’s reflection to spy on him in his wardrobe, catching glimpses as he took off his suit jacket and unbuttoned his trousers. My hairbrush paused as he took off his shirt, revealing the long expanse of chest beneath. Toned muscle, a deep v and a trail of dark hair that disappeared beneath his–

Giova

“Did Marzia fall asleep quickly?” I asked, my voice hoarse.

Giova

So human.

You’re in trouble, a voice whispered in my mind.

No, I’m not! I said back fiercely.

“She was snoring before I left the room.”

I flickered my eyes to his face. His expression was cool, detached. No hint of the activities we were about to take in.

My eyes dropped to his chest again and I quickly looked away, ignoring the clenching of my thighs, the heating of my cheeks.

Maybe you can pretend to be sick, I thought. Though I doubted a man as terrifying as Giova

Our conversations from hours before entered my mind. Giova

Then my mother’s words entered my mind. After a long day of being a criminal, it is you he will come home to and vent. You will run his home, sleep in his bed, and massage the knots out of his neck.

What was it Oscar Wilde said? Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power.

I pushed my hair over my shoulders, revealing my chest. The curve of my breasts were clear to see, the cut of my neckline so low if my father had seen me he’d have a heart attack. The hem stopped a few inches above my knee, high enough that if I sat down my panties would be visible.

Giova

My molars grinded but I forced myself to stay calm as I followed him back into the bedroom.

The view of the city surrounded us from all windows, skyscrapers and night enclosing us into our own little world. Honks and yells came from the street below, but they were nothing more than background noise.

If I screamed for help, none of them would hear me.

Giova

What? I blinked, feeling my entire body tethering on the edge of hysteria. He was asking if I had turned the light off?

“Um, no.”

“Would you mind?”

I pattered back to the bathroom, turned the light off but not without first checking my appearance in the mirror. I was striking to look at, never pretty or lovely, but instead severe in my features. It was the Lombardi genes, this beauty of mine that resembled the holster of a gun. Dangerous, dark, fearsome.