Page 83 of Broken Crown

Here, in the dark, with her body stretched and trembling for me, I told her the only truth that mattered. "Remember this moment, little one."

As my hand enclosed her throat, I bent low, biting her earlobe, making her shudder. "Even in Rigoletto…the innocent girl never stood a chance."

CHAPTER 23

SABRINA

My hands were still shaking when I attempted to zip my dress.

Sebastian did it for me. Stepped behind me and drew the zipper up with the same steady hands that had pinned me to the railing minutes ago. He smoothed the fabric over my hips, adjusted the strap that had fallen off my shoulder, and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear as if he were sending me off to a dinner party.

Gathering up our outerwear, he held out my coat for me to slip into and adjusted his scarf back around my neck, then shrugged into his own coat.

"Ready?" he asked.

As if we'd just watched an opera and nothing more.

I nodded, speech not possible.

He offered his arm. I took it because my knees weren't reliable.

The corridors of the Teatro Marrucino stretched on and on. Our footsteps echoed against marble that had heard centuries of ovations and scandals and probably things far worse than what had just happened in that box.

I walked carefully. Shoulders back. Chin level. The way my mother had taught me to walk into any room where I was outmatched.

At the foot of the stairs, the general manager waited with his hands clasped, beaming as if he'd just hosted the social event of the season. He bowed and said something rapidly in Italian that I didn't catch.

Sebastian replied smoothly, shaking the man's hand, his other palm still flat against the small of my back.

I managed a smile, though it cost me everything to hold it in place.

The manager's gaze swept over me, and I caught it. The flicker. He knew. Maybe not the details, but he knew that whatever had happened in that box had nothing to do with Verdi.

I kept the smile in place and let Sebastian guide me toward the exit.

The night air hit my face like cold water. I sucked it in, filling my lungs, tasting freedom that wasn't really freedom at all.

Sebastian opened my door. His hand lingered on my elbow as I lowered myself into the passenger seat, and for one brief second, his thumb brushed the inside of my wrist and his expression shifted.

Then it was gone. He rounded the car, slid behind the wheel, and the engine purred to life.

The countryside blurred beyond the window, darkness punctuated by the occasional gleam of moonlight.

My body throbbed in places I didn't want to acknowledge.

The leather seat beneath me was both too soft and too hard, every bump in the road a reminder of what Sebastian had done to me in that opera box.

What I had let him do.

No. What I had wanted him to do.

My throat tightened.

I couldn't even lie to myself anymore.

Sebastian drove in silence, his profile cut sharp against the night, one hand on the wheel, the other resting casually on my thigh.

As if he hadn't just bent me over a balcony rail and claimed me in the most humiliating way possible.