Until Forever Ends: A Dark Mafia Romance by Adelaide Forrest (free children's ebooks online TXT) 📕

I stared out the window, watching as the fire burned, with my heart in my throat and tears in my eyes. Regina had promised she'd try to talk some sense into him, racing in when she’d heard the shattering of glass in his office.

I didn't bother to go to him, knowing reasoning with him would be futile.

Any man who could look me in the eye and talk about scarring me for life knew nothing of remorse. He knew nothing of love. Whatever it was he felt for me, I wanted no part in it. I turned my gaze down to the photo in my hands. Rafael’s mother’s face stared up at me, far too young to have died, especially in such a brutal way. Her eyes were similar to Rafe’s, one blue and the other light grey compared to his green.

He looked like his mother. She possessed the same ethereal kind of beauty that hid his darkness when he wanted.

Rafael stepped up behind me. He brushed the hair off my neck, touching his lips to the bite mark on my shoulder briefly. “She was beautiful,” I murmured, feeling him still as his stare settled on the picture of his mother.

“Where did you get this?” he asked, taking it from my hands gently and setting it on the bed.

“Regina gave it to me,” I replied, watching as he turned his back on the photo like he couldn’t bear to look at her.

"Are you ready?" he asked, shifting his focus back to me.

"Would it matter if I begged you not to do this?" I asked, turning my head to look at him over my shoulder. His bright gaze met mine, something missing in the way he stared at me.

All hints of warmth were gone, replaced by a numbing cold that chilled me to the bone.

"Do you have something you want to tell me?" he asked, stepping forward to put his hand on the doors that led to the pool and fire.

I clenched my eyes closed as my bottom lip trembled briefly. When I opened my eyes to find him waiting, he already knew my answer. Nodding, he pulled the door open and grabbed my hand in his as I tried to back away.

"Come, Isa," he commanded, dragging me through the door. I stumbled over my feet as he set a brisk pace, his footsteps too large for me to keep up with. The flames danced in the night as my heart pounded in my chest.

"Rafe," I said, trying to appeal to the man who’d held me as I cried. The man who’d shown me tenderness as he took my virginity and showed me Ibiza. But all traces of him were gone, and he ignored my pleas.

Joaquin stepped into our path, blocking the fire as the two men waged a silent war. I watched helplessly as Hugo hovered in the distance, his chest bare for the ceremony, the angry red of his brand echoing the flames. I swallowed down my nausea, knowing that my skin would look like that in just a few moments.

Joaquin heaved a conflicted sigh as his lips twisted and his eyes came to mine, but he stepped aside to allow Rafael to guide me past him.

The heat of the fire kissed my skin as he guided us right in front of it. I watched as the smoke billowed into the night sky, mingling with the stars as it carried messages to the ancestors. Rafael turned me to face him, pausing to give me one last chance to give him what he wanted.

But his determination to know the truth only made me more resolved to keep my secret. If this was the man he was, if this was the kind of monster he would be, then I'd do everything I could to keep some part of me for myself.

He was no less a monster than a man who would throw a child into a river.

Tearing the strap on my dress to bare my shoulder, he pushed me to my knees as tears fell down my cheeks, my breathing ragged with my fear. His nostrils flared as he stared down at me, his teeth clenching as he prepared to mark me permanently. "Please don't," I begged one last time, finding nothing but brute determination in his gaze as he lifted the brand from the flames.

I closed my eyes slowly, hearing my grandmother's voice in my ears. The soothing sound of her telling me our lore beside the fire in our yard, carrying the passage of our heritage up to the ancestors so they could know that their stories lived on in us.

Fire cleansed. Fire healed all wounds.

I opened my eyes, and I stared the devil in the face while I waited for the pain. Despite my fear, all I could focus on was the determination to look him in the eye as he hurt me. To make him see what he did to me. His eyes flashed with regret as he watched me cry, finally showing a moment of something.

His mouth twisted into a scowl as he yelled his fury into the night sky. He moved his arm so quickly I flinched back, expecting the blinding pain of my skin burning.

But it never came.

The logs in the fire shifted and sent embers into the air as he threw the brand into the flames. Rafael spun, disappearing into the night as he stalked off and left me hyperventilating by the fire. Regina raced out of the house on the other side of me as I watched Rafe fade into the dark, wrapping me in her arms as she touched my chest frantically.

"He didn't do it," I whispered, staring up at her in bewilderment.

"No, mi hija. He didn't do it," she whispered, tucking me into her chest as sobs wracked my body. She knelt at my side, drawing me away from the fire's edge and folding me more firmly into her embrace as the others dispersed amongst shocked whispers. The