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

a smile when he felt my unwavering devotion in the intimacy between us. He was nothing if not over-confident in the connection we shared.

It didn't matter to Rafael that I still hadn't given him the words to tell him I loved him. He didn't need to hear them, because he felt them every time my body yielded to his touch.

Even still, I'd protect the words deep inside myself. I'd shove them down to the place where I hid the secrets I kept. With the demons that lurked in my past.

"I have to get to work," he said ruefully as he pulled his mouth away from mine. With our foreheads touching and his eyes closed peacefully, I stared up at the devil himself. I studied the peace on his face, wondering if he suddenly seemed so at ease because he'd claimed me as fully as he always wanted to.

With his name on my skin and his rings on my finger, the last way to make me his would be to impregnate me. To breed me. And given his insistence on not using condoms, even that was an inevitability.

"So, go," I said, a teasing lilt surprising even me as he flung his eyes open and stared down at me in amusement.

"I don't want to be away from you," he murmured, the words caressing my skin with the freshness of minty breath.

I smiled up at him, the demented part of me enjoying the reminder of the softer, sweeter Rafe who had showed me Ibiza before reality crashed down around us. "I think you've got it bad, Mr. Ibarra," I teased.

He grinned down at me, running his nose up the side of mine sweetly before catching my bottom lip between his teeth and nipping me lightly. "I think you do too, Mrs. Ibarra," he said back, making my heart pause in my chest at the sound of the name. Knowing it and hearing it were two very different things, and I didn't think I'd ever get used to the sound of Rafael's surname in reference to me.

I shouldn't be his wife. I should be single, waiting for a boring accountant to come and sweep me off my feet into a life of normalcy where I didn't have to wonder if my husband would put a gun to my head the next time I said no to him.

Rafael was a sociopath, uncaring about how his actions affected the people around him, least of all me. He was unstable, driven by rage and violence and his own selfishness. But what did it say about me that I looked into the eyes of a nightmare and loved him?

I was unstable too.

"Maybe," I murmured, refusing to admit to the emotions swirling in me as he stepped back hesitantly and held out a hand for me. I tried to drive my anger higher, to get back to the place where I wanted nothing more than revenge for the way he'd terrified me. Instead, all I could think of was the warm comfort of his hand surrounding mine. Of the way he enveloped me so firmly.

I understood why he didn't want to live without me. I might not have killed him if he didn't want to marry me so quickly, but I knew what it was to be terrified of returning to my life pre-Rafael. I never wanted to be without him, even if I spent most of my time wanting to strangle him for the things he'd done.

He guided me through the labyrinth of a hallway, taking me to the kitchen where Regina waited with ensaimada already prepared. I took a seat at the island with Joaquin in the seat next to me but spaced far enough away that we were at opposite ends of the large counter. Rafe went for his coffee as Regina put a glass of juice in front of me with a broad smile.

"Mrs. Ibarra," Joaquin greeted from my side, making me choke on my orange juice as I felt Rafael's intense eyes on me. He smirked, lifting his coffee to his mouth and leaning forward to snatch an ensaimada off the counter and take a bite. Leaning in with powdered sugar on his lips, he kissed me briefly before retreating down the side hall to his office and closing the door.

Part of me wanted to exist with him. To go into the office and just be in his presence, but I knew if I was going to stay on the island, I needed to find my own way to pass the time. The moment his presence left, I turned my eyes back to the kitchen and zeroed in on the bloodstained fork where it sat on the counter next to the sink.

"I was going to guess, based on the shattered plate I found this morning, that last night went about as well as I could expect after what he did," Regina said, tearing off a piece of her own pastry. "But you seem quite cozy."

I hung my head in my hands, thinking over everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. I shook my head to try to clear it of everything running through me. "I feel like I'm losing my mind," I whispered, turning a grimace to Regina. "What's wrong with me?"

"Why does anything have to be wrong with you, reinita?" she asked, tilting her head to the side and reaching across the island to pat my hand with hers.

"He put a gun to my head, and I let him fuck me. He put a gun to my head, and I smiled at him and acted like everything was okay! And then he leaves and I remember who I'm supposed to be. I remember who I was. My family is probably terrified that something happened to me, and I'm sitting here drinking orange juice."

"You're surviving, mi reina," Joaquin said. "The strongest people adapt when life throws them a curveball. You've done that."

I shook my head. "I'm barely holding on to the girl