Chapter 2
GIA
Idrifted in and out of sleep. There were moments of lucidity, and it seemed I’d just be gone for a while, as if I’d stepped away from the conversation, then picked it up again like it hadn’t happened at all, like I hadn’t just nodded off. How long did this go on?
I recalled my last night with Victor. I’d sworn to myself that I would not be a victim. I wouldn’t allow him to make me one. The memory of it made me shudder.
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
Did they think I couldn’t hear them? Did they think I couldn’t hear the fucking fire crackling?
Mateo had fucked up. God, he’d fucked up so big, and he’d paid. He’d paid big. He was gone. And he’d saved me—he’d made sure I’d live.
They’d made me watch. Victor, fucking Victor, had made me watch.
I glared at him sitting there now, all smug, in his perfect three-piece suit, adjusting his perfect cuffs, turning the gold links, that smirk on his face, the one I wanted to permanently wipe off.
His hands were the bloodiest of all, even if he never raised a freaking finger to do the actual work of killing.
“Ready, boss,” one of his masked soldiers said. I never did see their faces.
A whimper escaped me. I didn’t want to make a sound. I didn’t want to scream. To give him the satisfaction. But I pulled as far back as I could even though the chains made it impossible to move more than a few inches.
Victor stood.
“Last chance, Gia.”
I glanced at the steaming branding iron—I wouldn’t let my gaze linger, wouldn’t let fear paralyze me. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. But the orange glow, the smell, the heat—it scared the fuck out of me.
I turned frantic eyes on Victor. Could I pass out first? Could I piss them off enough that they’d hit me? Knock me out before they did it?
“What do you say?” Victor asked, standing close enough now to lift my face to his.
“Last chance to fuck you?” I asked, a slight tremor to my voice as the man holding the iron came so close I could smell it. And I could imagine the scent of flesh burned away by it. My flesh.
I would be strong. For Mateo. He’d been strong right up until the end.
Victor squatted down beside me and wrapped a tendril of hair around his finger, tugging. “What do you say?” His tone teased. He loved this. The fucking bastard lived for this.
“What do I say?”
He waited.
I looked him straight in the face, knowing I sealed my own fate but drawing all of my courage anyway. I spat. I spat right on his smug killer’s face.
“I say, no, thanks. You’ll kill me either way.”
The back of his hand slammed across my face so hard, stars danced before my eyes, but it wasn’t hard enough to render me unconscious.
He stood. “Stupid, arrogant bitch.” He nodded to the man holding the iron, and two other sets of hands turned me onto my side.
White-hot pain burned through me, and I opened my mouth and let out a bloodcurdling scream. The sound of the iron sizzling, the scent of charring flesh, were too much to bear.
I never did pass out, not during, not after, not once until Victor slapped me again.
“I’ll see you on your knees, Gia. God help me.”
The mad grin on his face was the last thing I saw, his words a mystery as I processed pain like I’d never felt before, welcoming the blackness the back of Victor’s hand across my cheek finally, thankfully, delivered.
I’d been sure Victor would kill me. Why hadn’t he? Did I still have Angus Scava’s protection? Angus Scava was the boss of the Scava family. I’d been engaged to his son. I may not have been his first choice for a daughter-in-law, but he’d accepted me, been kind to me even, for his son.
But would he have had me branded and sent me here? To this psychopath? To do what? What had he said? That he would train me. Train me for the slave auction.
Slave auction.
No. Angus Scava would not have ordered this. This was Victor acting alone.
I blinked, trying to turn onto my back but unable to. It was like I was too heavy to move. The pills must have been some sort of muscle relaxer and the dosage too high. I guessed that was his intention, though. To incapacitate me. It would be easier to control me if I couldn’t fight back.
I thought of my captor, the man in the mask.
That horrible mask. I couldn’t even see his eyes apart from a hint of them, a glint of color.
Blue or gray. I couldn’t tell for sure. I hadn’t needed to see them to know the wickedness there, the cruelty.
But there was more. When he’d raised his hand to slap me and then had stopped—that was when I’d felt it.
Then, and when he’d seen the mark on my hip.
A momentary reprieve, a pause in the middle of madness.
I mentally shook my head at myself. I was grasping at straws, needing to hope. The man who had me, he was no better than Victor or any of his soldiers. He was readying me to be sold as a fucking slave. I had no doubt what that entailed.
I’d been afraid he’d rape me. When he’d pulled my panties off, I’d thought that was it. He was going to do it. Victor hadn’t. He hadn’t let his men do it either. Why? Why not let them? Wasn’t that what he wanted? To break me? To—what had he said—“see me on my knees?”
Maybe it was his deal with Mateo before he’d killed him that saved me from the horror of rape.
I closed my eyes against the image of Mateo before he’d died, forcing it away. I didn’t want to remember my brother that way. I needed to hold on to him as he’d been before—in life. Before he’d ever met Victor. Before everything had happened.
Why hadn’t Victor let his men rape me? Why hadn’t he done it himself? It made no sense. He wanted me. That was obvious. Had been for the two years I’d had the displeasure of knowing him.
Auction.
Slave.
When I woke next, I could roll onto my back and raise heavy arms just inches off the bed on which I still lay naked.
I had to figure out where I was. Who the man was who currently had me. He was going to train me, so he’d probably been hired by Victor. Train me for what, though? To not fight? I’d never stop. I’d never let them win. I’d never let Victor win.
I wondered if Angus Scava knew what he’d done. He’d kill Victor if he knew, I was sure of it. I’d almost been his daughter-in-law, after all. I’d been engaged to James, his son. James had loved me. No way Angus Scava would ever allow this to happen to me.
I thought back to James. To how good things had been two years ago.
Before he’d been killed. Before Victor had come into the picture.
I wondered about my mom. Did she know about Mateo yet?
Did she know we were missing at least, even if she didn’t know he was dead?
She was in Palermo, and although we weren’t particularly close, surely she’d try to phone.
The deadbolt slid, the sound calling my attention.
For the first time in a very long time, I thought of the man who had promised my father he would protect my family. The man my father had worked for, and for whom he had died. He’d vowed to keep me and Mateo safe. Could he save me from this?
But that was years ago. And a promise to a foot soldier couldn’t have meant a whole lot to a crime boss.
The door creaked open.
I blinked, lifting my head as much as I could, and watched as my captor filled the doorway. He was a foot taller than me and strong. I’d never physically be able to take him down. And if he kept me drugged, I wouldn’t be able to do much at all.
Light outlined his body from the outside room, creating a sort of halo around his head. I squinted, used to the dark now, and when he closed the door, I saw his face again—saw that mask. A skull. Death. As if he were death.
I made a small sound, and my body instinctively tried to pull back. Tried. Nothing much happened, though. Nothing but him stepping closer, chuckling. He must have seen the attempt. He seemed to see everything.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, and when I saw the bottle of water in his hand, I opened my mouth, realizing how dry it was, how thirsty I was.
I couldn’t pull away or cover myself when his gaze raked over me, but when he reached into his pocket and produced a key that he used to unbind my wrists, all I felt was grateful.
“Really need to get you washed.”
He twisted the lid off the bottle, and I swallowed in anticipation. But then he brought the bottle to his lips and took a long sip, emptying half of it. I wanted to cry. I may have even, but I couldn’t be sure.
“Thirsty?” he asked.
I blinked.
“I like you like this, you know? You’re kind of sweet when you’re not talking.”
Then he raised my head and held it as he brought the water to my lips and gave me two small sips before setting the bottle aside and standing.
“All right.”
He tugged his shirt off. It looked strange, his chest bare but him wearing that mask covering his face. In the dimly lit room, I saw he had a tattoo on part of his chest and down one arm. I couldn’t make out the shape, though. It was just shadow.
“Let’s get you cleaned up.”
I barely had a chance to look at him before he hauled me up and carried me into the bathroom.
My face bobbed against his muscular chest as he carried me, the skin soft, his scent clean, enticing even—or it would be if I wasn’t being held against my will.
There was something else too. The scent was almost familiar.
Was it an aftershave someone I knew wore? I couldn’t place it.
“This is probably going to be a little cold at first.”
I gasped when he set me into the freezing tub, but my head lolled to the side, and I lay there, shivering, unable to move.
He pulled up a chair from the corner and sat.
I watched his eyes as he took me in, traveling over the length of me.
I tried to cover myself, managing to place a hand over my mound—or close enough to it I could pretend I shielded myself.
“Now, now.”
He turned on the taps. I tried to pull back at the rush of icy water that gurgled out. It sounded like no one had bathed here in a very long time.