Chapter 11

"Who are you?"

"Russo! Special delivery from Cierra!"

"Oh, okay." I looked up to thank him after taking the package and he was gone. I looked all around my front lawn from above, and he was nowhere to be seen. I imagine he was the one in the plane that flew overhead minutes later. I didn't even hear it land.

How did he know about the balcony? And, more importantly, how the hell did he get up there? I looked around my bedroom as if there were eyes on me. Ever since my conversation with Cierra, I've felt like I was in a Bond movie. Speaking of which, what did that child look like just now?

I rushed to my office and closed the door behind me, though the staff doesn't usually interrupt me without reason. My hands trembled as I opened the package. It was a phone and another little gadget that I didn't recognize.

As soon as I turned on the phone it rang in my hand and almost scared me half to death. "Hello!"

"It's me; this line is secure for now, but be careful what you say. In the box you have, there's a sheet of paper with code words for you to use. Once you've learned them, burn it, don't let your husband get his hands on it ever."

"Oh, okay!"

"Don't say anything you don't want him to know. I'm sure he'll know about the delivery soon, just keep the phone hidden, the other one is a decoy, show him that one. Do not speak inside the house or your car. You can use this phone to text if you're not in a secure location."

"I don't understand, you mean he can see me all the time?"

"No, but he can hear you all the time, and he always knows where you are. They draw the line at imposing on our privacy when it comes to visuals, but that's not always the case. Just know that they can hear you whenever they need to."

"Oh, my word, I'm so…."

"Don't say anything. We're working on the names you gave me; I should have something for you soon."

"This is all so confusing."

"It gets even better. Here's the deal. They pretend that they don't know that we know, and we pretend that we don't know that we know that they know."

"Huh?"

"You'll get it eventually; don't worry about it for now. Just know that what these men deal with has nothing to do with something as simple and minute as a shakedown for money. It's about trafficking."

"About what?"

"The trafficking of human beings. Children mostly, but men and women are their victims as well."

"I don't…. What're you talking about?"

"All you need to know for now is that our men are the good guys. Learn the codes; I'll give you two days." She hung up.

What the hell? No wonder Mark didn't want me involved. Trafficking? Like sex trafficking? No, she said kids…oh hell. And Mark is involved? How? When? I tried to wrap my mind around it but it was a lot to take in. Now, all those international trips he took had a different spin.

It can't be. Surely, I would've known something. But look how easily he'd flipped from one personality to the next. He's been hiding who he is from me all our lives. But why? I know he loves me; there's no doubt about that. But how could he keep his true self so well hidden all these years?

The sex thing is one thing. But the man I sent off to work this morning is not the man I have known for almost twenty years. It's like walking into a room and catching Batman changing out of his uniform or something.

How do I reconcile the two? The mild-mannered man who slept beside me, raised our kids with me, and never raised his voice even once, with this man who threatened to spank my ass if I misbehaved? Maybe I'm slowly losing my mind. That has to be it because the alternative makes no sense.

But then I looked down at the sheet of paper that had been hidden in the lining of the box and had to accept that this was no joke. I wasn't losing my faculties; this was real. A little imp tapped my shoulder and urged me to see how far I could push this new husband of mine.

How come I'm more excited about that than learning the code?

* * *

I was hummingwith excitement that evening at dinner. "I had a very interesting conversation with Cierra Mancini today."

"Did you now?"

"Yes, it appears that I have been kept in the dark for a very long time." He didn't bite. Just kept dipping into his soup bowl like my life wasn't a Saturday Matinee.

"I want to know what's going on."

"No. I told you to stay out of it."

"I know that it's about more than them trying to set you up. I know that you've been doing this kind of thing since before we were married. I just don't understand why you never told me."

"Because you're my wife, you're not allowed to get involved in that ugliness."

"I'm an adult. I deserve a key to the closet where all the skeletons are hidden."

"No, you don't."

"I…."

Be very careful with what you say next." He cut me off.

Now, usually, that would be enough to get me to back down. But this time around, that imp on my shoulder was working overtime. I'm not sure why; all of a sudden, a spanking sounded like the most exciting thing to occur in my life, but for some reason, I wanted to make him lose control.

I'd always gotten the reserved, cool gentleman who was always correct in his every action, and something tells me that I've barely brushed the surface of all that he's been keeping hidden from me when it comes to his true personality.

I'm still amazed that he'd been able to hold it in for this long. It's a testament to his love and respect for me that he was willing to withhold his true nature all this time, but I don't want him to anymore. I want the real, raw, unabridged version of him, the side of him that I'd only gotten a glimpse of these last few weeks.

"Whatever you've got cooking in your head, don't."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You forget I can read you like a book. You may think you want to push my buttons, but believe me; you don't want the results. You're not ready."

"And I think you forgot the girl I was before I got married and had kids."

"Brittany, behave yourself. There's no need for you to change."

"Like hell, I'm going back to that. I've made a decision. I will not stop digging until I figure out what Jessica and Jack are really up to."

When he pushed his chair back after wiping his mouth with the silk napkin, my heart started racing in my chest. When he stood and walked over to me with that look on his face, I thought I would faint from the buildup of excitement.

"Hey!" He picked me up and threw me over his shoulder, and even though it was obvious that he was being as careful with me as possible, it was still an undignified position to put one's wife in.

"Too late."

"Wait a minute." I kicked my legs and got a slap on the ass for my trouble.

I was in too much shock from just that little interaction to retaliate, and by the time I got over it, we were in our master suite with the door locked behind us. That wasn't the issue, the issue came into play when he walked into the closet still carrying me like a sack of potatoes and pulled two ties from the special wheel that's made for them.

"What're you doing with those?" He didn't answer. I think I got a bit scared when he sat on the bed and pulled me down across his lap before pulling my arms behind me. I started struggling then and looking for a way out.

"Keep still unless you want to hurt yourself."

My heart was knocking against my chest at this point, especially once I realized that I couldn't move my arms at all in this position. "Why are you tying my ankles together like that?" I tried looking over my shoulder at him, but it was almost impossible, with me trussed up like a turkey.

I tried to speak, but my mouth was dry, and just as I started to calm down, I felt a sting. At first, it was so incongruous that I didn't realize he'd really hit me. Then he did it again. How the hell did he find the same exact spot? And again, "Ow!" I tried rolling off his lap, but he held me in place with one arm and beat my butt red with the other.

I was crying and screaming at this point, and my behind burned like hellfire. "What did Cierra have delivered to you today? Give it to me." Oh, so that's your game. I shook my head. Smack, smack, smack. "Where is it?" I shook my head harder, now full-on crying.

"Brittany, I…" smack, "said…" smack, "give it…" smack, "to me." Smack, smack, smack.

"You bastard, let me up." Now, I've never cussed a day in my life, and I think it shocked him because he didn't move for a good few seconds. I felt him raise his hand and braced myself for the blow which never came.

Instead, I felt one of his thick long fingers being eased into me. Because my limbs were tied back like that, it seemed to make my privates tighter for some reason, and his finger felt monstrous as he moved it in and out of me.

I couldn't believe I was so turned on; I could hear the sloshing of my juices as he moved that finger in and out of me. I felt the movement of his hand after he pulled his finger out, and it seemed as if he was taking something from his pocket. That was soon followed by a feeling of coldness around my rosebud.

I couldn't for the life of me figure out what he was doing until he forced something in there as well, and I felt like I would burst. That finger came back into me again, and with whatever he had shoved up my ass, it was an even tighter fit.

Something huge and feral was building in my chest. I could feel it coming as I tried pushing back against his hand to get even more of his finger inside me. Then he started playing a game of chicken. Each time I pushed back, he pulled it out even further until I was sobbing and begging him to fuck me with his finger.

My ass was relatively cooled by now, but he smacked me once more, right over the plug he had inserted in my ass, and that did strange things to me. I realized that he hadn't spoken one word since I refused his order and was just sitting there looking down at my red ass stuffed with whatever foreign object he had filled it with.

I wasn't sure which was stronger, the pleasure or the pain, but for some reason, I wanted both. So, I bit him. He didn't even wince; he just went back to spanking me with one hand while pushing and pulling on that plug until I came all over his leg. I found myself being airlifted mid-orgasm and placed on my chest with my hands and feet still tied behind me. I thought he would raise me onto my knees, but he didn't. Instead, he drove his cock into me that way with my legs between his, the ties keeping mine close and making my insides tighter.

"Oh, please!" I'm not sure what I was pleading for, but it was too much. There was too much newness. All of it good but overwhelming. My senses were ablaze, and at the center of it all was the fact that this was the man I loved, the man I trusted.

As soon as my mind latched onto that thought, it was as if the pain had receded. My ass still burned, and I'll be sure to make him pay for that later, but the pain took on new meaning. The way he handled me roughly, like a woman and not a paper doll. The way he forgot to be gentle with me and the way he fucked me. This wasn't sex, and it sure as shit wasn't lovemaking. It was raw, unbridled passion.

He entered a place inside me that brought blinding pain, followed quickly by the most intense passion. He groaned out loud, and I felt his cock jump like a fire hose before his seed exploded in what I was sure was my womb.