Chapter 9 #2
This is me. The killer. The monster they whisper about in the dark corners of this city. The one who built his reputation on broken bones and shallow graves. The one who does not forgive, forget, or show mercy.
Rico straightens up more, which is funny because that’s not going to save him at all. Nothing will.
I walk past Isabella toward him.
She remains standing there, frozen, her scent hitting me as I pass by. That blend of perfume and something beneath that is uniquely her. The smell that sticks to my sheets, skin, and clothes.
Rico opens his mouth, maybe to say something foolish, apologize, or beg for mercy he won’t receive.
“Boss, I was just—”
He doesn’t get a chance to finish.
The crack of bone against bone punches through the room, sharp and satisfying.
A sound I know well. A sound that never gets old.
His head snaps sideways and he stumbles hard into the wall, one hand flying up to his face.
Blood spills fast from his nose, bright red against his pale skin, dripping onto his shirt, onto the marble floor that cost more than he will ever make in his pathetic life.
He barely gets his balance before I hit him again.
And again.
All the rage I’ve been holding back since I found out Isabella went to her father erupts in a savage rush.
Every ounce of control I’ve been clinging to shatters, leaving only primal fury—the kind that doesn’t stop until bones break, blood flows, and the message is carved so deep into flesh it scars.
My fist slams into his jaw. The impact vibrating up my arm in a way that feels right. He drops to one knee, gasping, choking on blood and broken teeth that scatter across the floor.
I grab the front of his shirt, fisting the fabric, and haul him upright with one hand. He weighs nothing as I drive him backward into the plaster so hard the framed art rattles on the walls. A crack spiders across the surface behind his head, plaster dust raining down.
“You fucking look at her again,” I snarl, my face inches from his, close enough to smell the fear emanating off him in waves. “And I’ll rip your fucking eyes out with my bare hands. I’ll make you eat them.”
He is dazed, bleeding, and terrified. His eyes are unfocused, pupils dilated wide from shock and pain. His breath comes in wet, ragged gasps. One eye is already swelling shut, the skin around it turning purple.
Good.
I hit him again anyway because that look was more than just a look.
It was him imagining what her tits feel like in his hands, what her mouth tastes like, and the sounds she makes when she comes.
It’s the kind of disrespect that gets men buried in concrete or dumped in the river with their throats cut.
I’m the only one who fucks her. She wears my ring and carries my name. She is bound to me by law, blood, and every vow that matters in this world.
And no man in my house is allowed to forget that.
One of the guards in the hall moves half a step forward, instinctively trying to intervene and stop me from killing Rico right here where Isabella can see. Then he reconsiders, freezing in place with his hand dropping away from his weapon.
No one in this house is foolish enough to get between me and a lesson I’ve decided to teach.
Rico spits blood onto the marble, the splatter dark and obscene against the white stone. I slam him into the wall once more, harder this time, my forearm pressing across his throat, pinning him there.
He claws at my arm, desperate and panicked as his airway begins to close. His face turns red, then darker, with veins prominent in his neck and forehead.
“You think because she walked past you that gives you the right?” I ask. My voice is calm in the way men fear most, the kind of calm that comes before executions, before the gun goes off, before the blade slides in and twists. “You think breathing the same air as her puts you in the fucking game?”
He tries to shake his head and speaks. “I weren’t—”
“Weren’t what?” I press harder, watching his face turn purple, watching the light start to fade from his eyes. “Weren’t standing in my house imagining what her pussy would feel like wrapped around that tiny cock of yours?”
He chokes as his fingers claw harder at my arm, nails digging in deep enough to draw blood. Red lines form on my skin. But I don’t care.
“No… boss,” he manages to rasp out, barely audible, the words mangled, wet, and pathetic.
My grip tightens and his eyes begin to roll back.
His struggle weakens, causing his movement to become sluggish and uncoordinated.
A few more seconds, and he will be unconscious.
A few beyond that, and he will be dead. And I will let him drop to the floor and leave him there as a warning to every other man in this house of what happens when you look at what is mine.
Because I am the alpha here—the one who decides who lives and who dies. Anyone who forgets that, anyone who disrespects me by eye-fucking my wife, will learn the hard way.
In blood and pain. In death.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Isabella standing there, taking it all in. The monster, the husband, the man too far gone to pretend this is about discipline alone.
I shift my arm away from Rico’s throat and let him go.
He crumples to the floor like a puppet with cut strings, coughing violently, one hand clamped over his ruined nose, the other clutching his throat.
Blood pools beneath him, spreading across the pristine marble in a dark, growing stain.
His breathing is ragged. He might have a collapsed lung. Broken ribs at the least.
“Get him out of my fucking sight,” I say, voice flat and cold now. The kind of tone that does not get questioned. “Leave now. All of you. Get the fuck out of here.”
Two men move fast, boots pounding on marble in a rush of obedience.
They grab Rico by the arms and haul him up, his weight sagging between them.
His boots drag across the floor, leaving twin streaks of blood behind.
His head lolls forward, chin to chest, blood still dripping from his battered face onto the pristine white stone.
He’ll be lucky if I let him live through the night.
Lucky if I don’t decide in an hour that mercy is weakness and drag him to the basement to finish what I started with a pair of pliers.
The others scatter quickly, disappearing into hallways, slipping behind doors, melting into the shadows of the house. Smart men who know when to make themselves invisible.
Within seconds, the room becomes empty. Except for my wife, Isabella, who stands in the center of the room in a dress that clings to every curve I have memorized with my hands and my mouth. She’s the one who started all of this without even knowing it.
I turn completely to face her.
There is still blood on my knuckles. It drips down my fingers in slow, thick drops that land softly on the marble, making little sounds.
Rage still brews just beneath the surface, far from satisfied.
My pulse pounds in my ears, throat, and even my cock.
Because violence and possession do that to me.
It’s always been that way. And when it involves her, the effect is ten times worse.
My cock is hard in my pants, throbbing with the same savage energy that just put a man on the floor choking on his own blood.
She stands there in the middle of the room, staring at me with those dark eyes.
This kind of violence doesn’t seem to scare her.
No doubt she saw this before at her father’s house.
Probably worse—sitting at the dinner table while men bled out in the next room and pretended not to hear their screams. This world doesn’t breed soft women.
It breeds survivors. And Isabella is nothing if not a survivor.
“Now,” I say, taking a step closer to her, closing the distance between us one measured step at a time. Predator to prey. Hunter to hunted. “Tell me where the fuck you were?”
She doesn’t answer immediately, just stares at me with her chin raised and spine straight, still defiant even now, with blood on the floor, and violence crackling in the air between us.
And the real fight is still waiting now. The one where I find out whether my wife is loyal or playing me. If she is truly mine or if she never was.
“I went to see my father,” she says, her voice steady. Too steady. The kind of calm that comes from years of lying to dangerous men and getting away with it.
“I know where you went,” I say, blood still dripping from my knuckles onto the floor between us. “What I asked is why?”
“He called, so I went. That’s what daughters do.”
“Bullshit.” I step closer, invading her space and using my size to intimidate. “You don’t do anything without a reason, Bella. So tell me what it was.”
Her jaw tightens just a fraction. “He is my father.”
“He is also a man who would gut me in my sleep if it meant consolidating power. So I will ask you one more time. Why did you go there and what did he ask you?”
Something flashes across her face. Quickly. Gone before I can identify it. “Nothing that matters.”
“Everything matters.” My voice drops lower, the same tone I’ve used on many men right before I pull the trigger. “So tell me what he fucking wanted.”
She stares at me for a long moment. Her chest rises and falls with each breath, the fabric of her dress stretching tight across her tits.
I can see the pulse beating in her throat, fast and hard.
Then she lifts her chin higher. Defiant.
That stubborn pride that makes me want to break her and worship her at the same time.
“He asked me what you have been up to.”
“And what did you tell him?”
“Nothing.” Her eyes don’t leave mine. “I told him I didn’t know anything.”