Chapter 14 #2
"The ritual elements are crucial," Jino is saying, gesturing to the kneeling mat. "When she addresses you as King, her body must already be in Position One. The psychological weight of physical submission compounds the verbal surrender."
His movements are precise, demonstrating the angles, the positions, the exact degrees of deference he intends to install in Emmaleen's mind. As if she's an operating system he's preparing to update with more efficient coding.
I study the meticulous array of tools he's arranged. The riding crop. The restraints. The notebook where he'll record her progress, her failures, her moments of resistance and surrender. Everything categorized. Everything controlled.
This is the doctrine taken to its logical conclusion. This is where all those rules lead if followed without question, without the tempering influence of something more human.
So ironic that I find myself the human in this equation.
How the hell did my cousin brood a monster equal—perhaps even surpassing—my own? Without even the benefit—benefit?—of a failed sacrificial kidnapping at age eight and the sadistic structure of Auggies in his teens?
He’s always been my mirror, but this is taking it to a whole new extreme.
And Jino expects me to nod along. To assume my position in this carefully orchestrated degradation. To sit on the throne while he does the work of breaking Emmaleen's spirit, only to present her to me afterward like a trophy he's polished to perfection.
He's mapped it all out. Every step. Every role. Mine. His. Hers. A trinity of power and submission that feels like religion to him.
The realization sits cold in my stomach.
This is where control leads when it becomes not just a means but an end in itself. This is what happens when discipline stops being a tool and becomes the purpose.
But is it really so different from what I've done? From what I planned to do? From what Auggies taught me was necessary?
The questions pile up, unanswerable. Doubt spreads through me, not like a wildfire but like frost—slow, crystalline, transforming the landscape it touches into something unrecognizable.
"It's a perfect system," Jino continues, his eyes bright with conviction.
Perfect for whom?
“How would you like her to submit to you while you're on the throne?"
I stand suspended between two futures. Between Jino's doctrine and my growing hesitation. Between the man I was trained to be and whatever alternative might exist beyond these walls.
"Maybe I want something else entirely."
“Like what?”
“Maybe I don’t want to share? Did it ever occur to you that I would say no?”
Jino scoffs. Narrows his eyes. Revels in sudden understanding. "You don't have what it takes."
"To trap a woman into slavery with my psychotic cousin? Maybe. But I'm not gonna lose sleep over that."
His eyes narrow. "What's really bothering you here, Giovanni? Because we both know this girl is a problem. A massive, planet-sized problem. And not only that, she’s unstable."
For a moment, I consider lying to him. Deflecting. But… fuck it. "You're bothering me, Jino."
He practically guffaws. "Is that right?"
"Yeah. You're… different. You're…" But I don't have words for what he is. I've lost track of him completely. So I don't answer.
The most telling thing—perhaps the most disturbing thing—is that he doesn't fill in the blank for me. Whether he wants me to struggle through this or he's just not willing to turn his introspection inward, I can't tell.
"You're jealous," he states flatly. "She responded to me, and you can't handle it."
"Perhaps," I admit. "She's mine, after all. But I'm worried, Jino. This should bother you. I'm really not a man who worries about women in this way. You're…" Again, he lets me falter for the word. So I search, the way Emmaleen might search, and find one that almost fits. "You're… cold."
He doesn't react.
So I continue. "Cold and borderline… gone."
"Gone?" He chuckles.
"What's wrong with you? You didn't used to be like this."
"Really." It's deadpan. "What did I use to be like?"
"I realize we haven't been friends for a while—"
“For a while? How about nearly two decades, Giovanni. You went one way when we were teenagers, I went another."
Which is true, but we didn't stop being friends until… don't think about it, Giovanni. Put that night out of your mind. It's over. It's been over…
"Anyway," Jino fills in the empty space hanging between us. "You brought me into this. And now my life is on the line. Either she stays here as your slave, or we kill her."
"We're not killing her."
"Good." He has the audacity to smile. "Let me repeat the question. How would you like her to submit to you while you're on the throne?"
He points to it, so I turn and the moment my eyes lock on the single ornate Victorian chair upholstered in dark leather, I can feel Emmaleen's breath on my thigh, her head in my lap. Her cheek pressing against my hard on.
The poem. I wanted it to be you who—
Emmaleen doesn't want Jino. She wants me.
This is enough to make me answer. "I want her between my legs," I tell Jino, walking over to the throne. I sit, open my legs wide, and point. "Her head right here. So I can stroke her."
"And she can feel your erection," Jino smiles. "I like it. Okay. That's your default after her supplication ritual."
"What the fuck is that?"
"The supplication ritual is foundational. It establishes hierarchy from the moment she enters your presence."
"I didn't ask what it does. I asked what the fuck it is."
"When you take the throne, she approaches with her head and shoulders straight, eyes downcast. She's naked, always. If she's not naked when you enter, she strips. She assumes Position Three in front of the throne and repeats her supplication mantra."
"Which is what?"
"Whatever you want it to be. Simple is better. 'I belong. I obey. I live.' That sort of thing."
"And this is standard," I say flatly.
"Of course." Jino crosses to the kneeling mat, positioning himself in front of the throne.
"You won't be here during the day. You'll come in late afternoon.
Or whenever, actually. I don't care if you wanna watch.
" He grins at me. "So I'll be training her when you come in—always.
She will never be out of our care. If we are to do this together, then she wakes up in my care, and goes to bed with yours.
So you'll enter the dungeon without notice.
Immediately, she will be yours. The control will transfer without question.
She approaches. She kneels. She speaks her mantra.
You acknowledge her. Then she assumes whatever position you've established as your preference.
" He gestures between my legs. "Which in your case would be her head in your lap. "
I don't respond immediately. I'm picturing Emmaleen performing this ritual—her face carefully blank, her mind somewhere far away, separated from her own body by the necessity of survival. A doll going through prescribed motions.
It feels wrong. Not morally—I've never concerned myself with that particular compass. But tactically. Strategically. Emmaleen's submission would be meaningless if it came from a broken automaton.
But I cannot deny that Jino knows what he's doing. That's why I hired him for this game in the first place.
She is in danger. I'm in danger.
Dom and Ricky are in danger too.
And now Jino. And Jino, unlike Dom and Ricky, won't give up his life on my whims. No matter how much blood there is between us.
The chance to force Emmaleen to leave is over now. Jino knows I killed Rico, knows Emmaleen Rourke is the loose end. He knows he's got power over me to dictate her future.
It's a small sacrifice, really. Her days, as he put it. Especially when I get her nights. "Just to be clear, we're in agreement about the punishments?"
"Well… sure. Fine. You can punish her. But just so we're also clear, that doesn't preclude me from doling out consequences as well."
This is a bad idea. Not because I think Jino will hurt her. At least, not the way she's been hurt in the past. He's never going to punch a woman. He might whip her though.
"I think we need to agree on punishments. I mean, if you're gonna strap her down and cane her legs—"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Jino says, pressing both open palms at me.
"Caning is a punishment living in some as yet undetermined future, Giovanni.
I'm going to withhold orgasm. I'm going to bite her a bit.
Slap her nipples with a crop. I'm not going to lash the girl.
At least, not yet. That's a very advanced demerit consequence.
If—when," he amends, "we do cane her. She will love it. "
I snort. Which is highly unlike me. "I doubt that."
"You say that now, but this is the point, Giovanni. When she does feel the cane across her ass, she will climax. She will squirt down her leg, that's how much she’ll love it."
I picture it. Her body bent over the bench.
Her legs open just enough for me to gauge how wet her pussy gets.
Is it wrong that this turns me on? Because it does.
Of course it does. I like the subs as much as Jino does.
I just never bothered to actually train one.
Not properly. Not to… fruition. To slavery.
But Jino's right. If Emmaleen can learn to crave this, to find pleasure in submission, that’s a prize indeed.
"In theory, I'm okay with that," I say to Jino, my voice cool, controlled. "But I want to be clear on one thing. I don't want her broken. I want her willing."
Jino smiles, a slow, dangerous curve of his lips. "Broken and willing are the same thing, Giovanni. She won't be broken if she chooses it. And she will choose it. When she learns what pleasure can be found in surrender."
I consider this, the implications swirling in my mind.
Jino's approach is brutal, calculated, and effective.
But there's always been a fine line between pleasure and pain with my women.
Between consent and coercion. I've always walked that line, but with Emmaleen, it feels different. More precarious.
Still, what choice do we have?
Emmaleen's life is at stake. Not because I'll kill her or Jino will kill her. But because if the LaRiccia clan ever finds out she's the reason Rico is dead, they will kill her.
We're… saving her.
Protecting her.
Her submission is her salvation.
The next time I look at Jino, he's smiling. He sees it. The change in me.
I'm a believer.
"Let's go over the initial presentation," Jino says. He comes towards me, hooking an arm around my shoulder, directing me back to the various dungeon stations.
Then he leans in close and begins to explain…