Chapter 15 #2
He pulled out a charcoal-gray T-shirt and a pair of black sweatpants, then returned to the bed, placing them beside me without ceremony.
“Change into these,” he said.
His voice was calm.
I gave a small nod.
It was all I could manage.
I reached for the shirt he’d given me.
The fabric was soft.
Warm.
It slipped over my head easily, falling over my frame and down past my hips like a dress.
His scent hit me immediately.
I froze for a second, just holding onto that feeling.
Then my eyes shifted.
To the sweatpants.
I stared at them.
My stomach twisted slightly at the thought of pulling them over my legs. The waistband. The fabric.
The pressure against torn skin.
It was too much.
I shook my head faintly and looked away, swallowing hard.
“I... can’t,” I whispered, almost to myself.
I didn’t expect him to respond.
From the corner of my eye, I watched him.
He had stripped out of his drenched clothes with the same quiet efficiency.
Broad shoulders moved under his skin as he changed, the line of his spine visible for a brief moment before the shirt covered him again.
Black joggers. A fitted long-sleeve shirt.
Dry. Controlled.
He never once looked directly at me.
Not while he changed. Not while he moved.
Only when he reached for his phone did his attention shift.
His thumb moved across the screen with sharp, impatient motions.
Then—He brought it to his ear.
“I don’t care.”
His voice cut through the room like a blade.
“Why the fuck are you not here yet?”
There was a pause.
I couldn’t hear the response, but I could hear the tightening in his tone—the restrained fury building beneath every word.
“Will she have to bleed out before you drag your sorry ass over?”
His jaw clenched.
Hard.
The muscles in his cheek flexed as he listened, but he didn’t soften.
Didn’t ease.
“You have two minutes.”
Another pause.
His eyes flicked briefly toward me.
Cold. Intense.
“If you’re even one second late, I’ll end you the moment you step through that door.”
He ended the call without another word.
Tossed the phone onto the nightstand with enough force that the lamp beside it wobbled slightly.
Then—
Silence.
The room felt heavier after that.
His gaze returned to me.
Specifically—to my knees.
The towel I’d pressed there earlier was soaked through, darkened with blood.
Fresh crimson still gathered at the edges, slow and sluggish, as if my body hadn’t fully decided whether to keep bleeding or stop.
I shifted slightly.
Pain shot through me.
I inhaled sharply, gripping the edge of the bed for support as my vision blurred for a second.
Then—I spoke.
Because the question had been burning in my chest since the moment he lifted me.
“Renzo told me I might be there for hours... even days,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “But you came for me after barely ten minutes.”
“Why?”
My voice was quiet.
But steady enough.
I lifted my eyes to him.
Met his gaze.
For a long moment, he didn’t answer.
Just looked at me.
Those dark eyes—dangerous, unreadable—holding mine like he was weighing something. Deciding something.
Then, finally—
His voice dropped.
“Because I couldn’t stand it.”
A ragged breath tore from my chest before I could stop it, shaky and uneven, like my body was struggling to keep up with the weight of what he’d just said.
“Not because you believed I didn’t hit your mistress?”
My voice wavered, but I forced it to hold.
“Not because you finally realized I ran because I refuse to let anyone—anyone—take away my right to choose whether or not I ever carry a child?”
The words came out sharper than I expected.
Defiant. Tired.
Broken.
He turned away from me, walking to the door with long, controlled strides.
He pulled it open just enough to look out into the hallway, his posture rigid, like sheer force of will could summon the doctor faster.
The silence stretched.
Thick.
Uncomfortable.
“Have I finished paying, or do you plan to make me suffer even longer?”
He didn’t respond immediately.
Just stood there for a long moment, one hand resting against the doorframe as though he was restraining something inside himself.
Then, slowly—
He turned.
His eyes found mine again.
Dark.
“You boast so fucking much about being a trained CIA agent,” Vincenzo said, his voice low and dripping with mockery, “yet you couldn’t even last ten minutes before you were screaming and breaking like a weak little girl.”
He paused, eyes narrowing, a strange tension threading his tone.
“After crossing two of my red lines, I should be peeling the skin from your body right now. I should make you beg for death in ways that would make grown men piss themselves. But here’s the pathetic truth...”
A bitter, self-mocking laugh escaped him.
“I don’t know what is wrong with me. I can’t stand watching you suffer... for too long.”
“You’ve turned me soft, wife. And I fucking hate it. So enjoy this brief mercy while it lasts.”
The air left my lungs slowly.
I stared at him.
Words failed me.
Not because I didn’t have them—but because none of them seemed capable of holding the reality of what he just said.
He exhaled sharply, dragging a hand through his still-damp hair in a rare display of visible frustration.
For a moment, the control he wore so effortlessly seemed to slip—just enough to reveal the strain underneath.
“This isn’t me,” he muttered, more to himself than to me.
I swallowed hard, my throat tight.
My eyes dropped to the blood-streaked sheets beneath me, unable to hold his gaze any longer.
The red looked darker against the white fabric—evidence of everything I had endured.
Evidence of how far this had gone.
A knock shattered the silence.
Sharp. Urgent. Repetitive.
The door flew open before anyone could respond.
The doctor rushed in, coat askew, face flushed and glistening with sweat, as though he’d run the entire distance without stopping.
His medical bag swung at his side with each hurried step.
He didn’t speak. Didn’t hesitate.
He went straight to the bed.
Straight to me.
Kneeling beside me, he opened his bag with practiced speed, gloved hands already moving as his eyes assessed the damage with clinical precision.
His touch was gentle—but efficient.
I sucked in a sharp breath when he cleaned the wounds.
The antiseptic burned.
Sharp.
I tensed instinctively, gripping the sheets, my breath hitching as he worked, methodical and unflinching.
He didn’t slow down, didn’t flinch at the severity of the damage.
No skin remained in several places.
The flesh looked torn, raw, angry—like the damage had been done with intention and left without care.
He worked quickly to stabilize what he could: cleaning, applying antiseptic ointment, then layering sterile gauze over the wounds in thick, careful sections.
Every movement was precise.
Like he knew exactly how to handle pain without letting it interfere with his work.
When the bleeding had slowed, he reached into his bag again, pulling out a syringe.
“I’m going to give you something for the pain and inflammation,” he said calmly, his voice steady despite the faint sheen of sweat on his brow. “You’ll feel it within a minute or two.”
I barely had time to respond.
The needle pressed in.
A sharp pinch—
Then warmth spread almost immediately through my legs.
Soft. Dulling.
The edges of the pain began to fade, not gone—but no longer screaming at me with the same intensity.
He withdrew the syringe, disposed of it, and began packing his tools away with the same brisk efficiency.
Within moments, everything was zipped shut.
Order restored.
The doctor straightened, giving a small, respectful nod.
Before he could say anything else—
Vincenzo spoke.
“You may leave.”
His voice was quiet.
The doctor didn’t argue.
He simply gave a brief incline of his head and left the room without another word, closing the door softly behind him.
Silence fell again.
More suffocating.
Vincenzo moved.
Slowly.
He walked toward the bed and stopped in front of me, towering over where I sat.
His presence cast a shadow across my lap, his silhouette cutting through the soft light of the room.
I couldn’t look away.
Couldn’t look anywhere else.
“Even though it’s becoming...” he paused, eyes narrowing slightly, as if choosing the right word with care, “...disturbingly difficult to keep hurting you,” he continued quietly, “do not mistake any of this for kindness.”
His gaze locked onto mine.
The words didn’t come as a surprise.
My breath hitched.
My heart stuttered—then cracked wider, like something inside me couldn’t quite hold itself together anymore.
For a moment, I couldn’t speak.
But when I did—
My voice came out soft.
Almost defeated.
“You don’t have to keep saying it.”
A pause.
My eyes lowered slightly. “I already know.”
He reached out without warning.
His fingers closed beneath my chin—firm, controlled—tilting my face upward until there was no escaping his gaze.
The contact was warm, grounding even, but his expression remained untouched, carved from something colder than the air between us.
“Do you take a morning-after pill after the sex we had last time?” Vincenzo asked, his voice low and dangerously calm, each word slicing through the silence like a blade.
I felt the question land heavy in my stomach.
Before I could even form an answer, he continued, eyes locked on mine with chilling intensity.
“I do not want you—” he paused, his gaze narrowing with deliberate disgust, as if the very thought repulsed him, “—ever, in this lifetime, to carry my child
My breath caught.
He didn’t just say it — he made it clear I was unworthy.
The words settled between us like something final.
The pain that followed struck deeper than the raw wounds on my knees, deeper than the cold that had already settled into my bones.
It bloomed inside my chest, stealing my breath in a way I couldn’t control.
For a second, I thought I might collapse under the weight of it.
But I didn’t.
I held his gaze anyway.