Blood Money by Lana Sky

Chapter Six

The second Ines leads me back to that white room; I fixate on the bed. I lunge for it. Crawling beneath the covers is a coping mechanism I’ve retained from childhood, but I indulge it, even now.

Buried beneath the fine, silken sheets, I feel invisible. Smothered. Silenced. If I close my eyes and slam my hands over my ears, I can almost pretend that I’m beyond this place, as insignificant as a snail buried in mud, unnoticed by all, wanted by no one.

That used to be my most fiercely wished-for dream—irrelevance.

Ines, however, is not my usual maid—who learned early on not to bother me when I’m in this state. Fearlessly, she flips back the blankets, her voice persistent enough to seep into my skull no matter how hard I press my hands against it.

“Please, Miss, Mr. Domino requested that you—”

“Please, leave me alone!” My voice echoes back to me, wild and hysterical. “Please. I just need a minute, please?” I sense her withdraw though I don’t know if she ever leaves. I just burrow beneath the sheets again, wrestling with the part of me that wants to ignore, and the faint whisper of instinct warning me to get my bearings and find a way out.

The inner voice is harder to smother without drugs or alcohol. Combined, they’re enough to silence that feeble thread of my conscience, but this time, it lives on, seeping through the chaos of my mind, presenting the reality I can’t hide from.

Domino killed my father. He killed Tristan, and trapped me here. All for what?

Something to do with the Inglecias family.

It’s funny how you can spend nearly every day in someone’s orbit. For that fragment of time, they become the center of your universe. You know everything about them. You’ve tailored your entire life to reacting to their voice. Their smell. Their laughter.

And then one day, they’re just gone, leaving no choice but to cope with their absence—but it’s hard. Like adjusting to life with an amputated limb. Only you have no idea how or why it went missing in the first place.

Pia Inglecias was my best friend. We did everything together. We shared secrets, clothes, and even our beds, spending nearly every night in my room or hers. She was one of the few people my father ever allowed into his coveted world.

Until she vanished without a trace, and I went from talking to her every single day to not being allowed to mention her name.

Good, Catholic girls never question their parents. That’s what my mother cautioned, anyway. Pia was suddenly taboo, and I was a cruel daughter to mention her around my father. Or any of the Ingleciases, for that matter.

Maybe it’s a testament to how damn sheltered I was—or how selfish—that I never really questioned it after the first few days. I pushed all thoughts of her, my best friend, to the back of my mind, and I did what we Pavalos do best.

I wore my brightest smile and conveyed to the world that I had no real care or thought in my head. I was happy, innocent Ada-Maria. The only skeletons in my closet were those literally written in the Holy Bible. I was an upstanding girl who never feared that her father raped and murdered her best friend and disposed of her family the way one would plastic utensils after a barbecue.

Because Pia is still alive, of course—she has to be.

Even though I know full well that my father is capable of the worst.

Somehow, Domino is connected to everything… Is blackmail his aim? Though, who is left to extort if he’s killed Papa and has me captive?

I dwell on the thought, and I let the fear consume me. I sob openly and loudly, rocking myself against the mattress as tears fall hot and fast from my eyes to wet the sheets. I shiver, feeling every bruise and scrape throb at full force.

And with every cry, I’m reminded of the danger lurking beyond my thin white shroud. The collar is a constant presence, and I’m aware of the length of chain dangling from it always. Especially when it’s suddenly yanked by an unseen hand.

Mid-sob, I’m silenced, forced to crawl toward the source of the pulling. From beyond my realm of blankets looms Domino Valenciaga. He stands at the foot of the bed, the chain in hand.

Panic sets in as I take in the room’s interior. It looks different. No longer is the sunlight a bright golden hue, but a sultry orange glow paints the man before me bronze.

He’s changed as well, switching the all-black ensemble for one of all white. Wearing a loose dress shirt and a pair of white slacks, he embodies my prior religious comparison to a fallen angel. This man is Lucifer himself, here to condemn me to hell.

On second thought, the devil comparison is too easy. Too simple. This man is something far, far worse. He is vengeance incarnate, as elusive as his supposed motives.

“You are ungrateful, you know that?” He doesn’t sound angry. Not even when he turns his back to me to stare from the nearest window.

I didn’t notice before, but this room has a breathtaking view of the terrace gardens from another angle. Here, the sunlight bathes the fields and fountains in varying hues of soothing ochre. It would be a vacation spot most would die to inhabit during the summer months. Overall, a beautiful prison.

“Selfish. Spoiled. None too bright. I knew this all, of course, even after all the time I’ve spent watching you from afar. Still, Ada-Maria, your complete lack of self-preservation astounds.”

He’s insulting me. The worst part is that I don’t truly understand about what.

“Ines was to prepare you a nice bath, feed you a filling lunch, and allow you ample time to sleep. But you’ve wasted it.”

He shrugs, turning to face me. “I was going to issue your punishment now and deny you those little comforts, but luckily for you, I am not as punitive as your father. Unfortunately, however, Ines is off for the evening, so she will be unable to assist you.”

He pauses. I sense that he wants me to parse over his meaning. That I’ll have to wash myself? Objectively, I haven’t bathed without a maid in years, but I’m more than willing to make an exception now.

But no… That would be too simple. The reality of what he intends sinks in with the impact of a stabbing blade, and I bolt upright, feeling along the sheets for anything I can use as a barrier between us.

“Stay the hell away from me—”

“I have no qualms in filling in for her,” Domino says, confirming my worst suspicion. Heedless of my refusal, he advances, lowering his gaze toward the mattress—I didn’t even realize that I’ve gathered the length of my chain, holding it loosely in a fist. When he takes another step, I brandish it, but my hand shakes so badly it sways, rattling against itself.

“D-Don’t touch me!”

“I suggest you save your fight for later, Ada-Maria,” Domino warns, taking yet another step. “Trust me, I am more than eager to experience firsthand how much the daughter of Roy Pavalos values her life, and I’d prefer you not to exhaust yourself before then. But—”

He lunges. One of his hands snatches my forearm, shoving me facedown against the mattress. My heartbeat surges through my ears as I feel the metal snatched from my grasp. Without warning, my throat is wrenched from behind, raising my head from the bed as I gasp at the air.

“I think I’ll bathe you, first,” Domino murmurs as he maneuvers to stand before me, chain in hand. “I want you clean and dressed before dinner.”

I’m flashed back to our last “meal.” Who could he serve to me next? My mother?

“No!” I sink my nails into the sheets beneath me, digging my heels into the mattress.

I barely see his arm move before I’m lurching forward, hitting the floor on my knees, my ears ringing.

“Come,” he says, manipulating the leash so that I lurch another inch across the floor. “I won’t enjoy having your skin covered in bruises by the time I can enjoy you, Ada-Maria. At least, any that aren’t inflicted by me.”

I choke, horrified by the insinuation. Rape?

No,a childish part of me whispers. He’d have to be interested in me sexually for that. My cheeks flame when I replay all the times I would prance before him, hoping to grab his notice. When each attempt failed, I consoled myself with a logical explanation for his lack of interest in addition to taking his job too seriously—he is homosexual.

That pathetic attempt to soothe my own pride might be my sole salvation now. I cling to it, finding the strength to crawl after him as he marches toward the door.

The length of chain is about ten feet long, meaning he’s already left the room by the time I stagger to my feet and follow.

Again, this strange dwelling takes on a newer identity depending on the time of day. At night, it’s a fortress. By day, it’s an ethereal wonderland, and during this twilight hour…

It’s hell. Ignited by the glow cast by the setting sun, the walls gleam orange like flames. Everything takes on the reddish sheen, and with his white clothing, Domino resembles a creature composed of shadow and fire.

Without warning, he turns into a room just before we’d enter that circular foyer. I recognize it the second I cross the threshold after him—the bathroom Ines brought me to the other night.

Beside her, I’d been able to appreciate the beauty of it.

Domino’s presence transforms the sleek design into a torture chamber. The gold fixtures are potential posts he can wrap my leash around, the walk-in shower a likely death trap. My mind spins, envisioning all of the many ways he can hurt me here. He wants to.

When he turns to me, I take a step back, shuddering at the look I see in his eyes.

But I forget that he has the leash in his grasp. He winds a few more inches around his wrist—a warning. The chain is a rigid line between us. Any more pressure, and he’ll be choking me.

“A bath or a shower, Ada-Maria,” he proposes. “Your choice.”

“Shower,” I blurt, preferring the barrier of a glass stall to having him stand over me in the tub.

He nods. To my shock, he releases the chain, letting it clang to the floor. Then he maneuvers around the room, gathering various supplies as he goes. From a golden rack of cream-colored towels, he takes one and fetches a bottle from beneath the countertop. Bounty in hand, he walks right past the shower stall to the tub. He runs the water, adjusting the drain to let it fill. Eyeing me from over his shoulder, he says, “A bath it is.”

I grit my teeth, irritated to have fallen into his trap so easily.

“You can wait as I prepare it,” he adds. “I’ll undress you myself.”

My feet twitch against the floor. He’s at least four feet from the end of the chain. If I can drag it toward me in time, I might be able to make it through the door before he could catch me.

“Try to run,” he says above the roar of the water. “Ines may be off this evening, but Pedro and Miguel are not. They’ve been forewarned to merely apprehend you, should you try to escape, no matter how violent your attempt might be. Have no fear, Ada-Maria—only I can inflict punishment upon that beautiful body.”

Chills. Despair grips me, so overwhelming that I croak out a sob before I can stifle it. My heart aches. Every breath is a struggle, and I almost wish he’d grab that chain and choke me now. End this.

Instead, he sits on the rim of the tub, watching me as though my terror is an amusing show. I feel my knees buckle, threatening to pitch me to the floor while I’d beg him to let me go. I might do it too.

If a part of my brain wasn’t stuck on that one word. I’m sure he meant it as a threat, but it sticks out regardless, diminishing the overall malice.

“I’m not beautiful…t-to you,” I add hastily. My self-esteem never hinged on his notice—but if it did, my vanity would be nonexistent. “You never wanted me before.”

“And you sound so damn proud of that, Ada-Maria. Like you’ve solved some million-dollar puzzle.” He laughs while reaching back with one hand, dipping his fingers beneath the rising water. The amount of steam issuing from it already has me on edge, but he doesn’t react as though it’s scalding. Finished, he flicks his fingers at me one by one, spraying droplets of water onto the floor. “Trust a Pavalos to take pride in whether or not her attacker wants to fuck her. Because you’ve wanted me to for a long time, haven’t you?”

I feel my cheeks catch fire. “N-No!”

“Liar.” He levels his gaze over mine with a piercing intensity.

Too intense. I look away, and he laughs again.

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed all the times you’ve pranced past me in some skimpy little dress, hoping to have me drooling like the other men in your father’s employ. It was always a game to you, wasn’t it? Seeing how many you could get to fuck you. Want to fuck you. It’s the only thing you had to look forward to in your sheltered, pathetic life. Has no one told you that beauty doesn’t last forever, Ada-Maria?”

If they did, it was some bitchy blogger or a jealous cunt from primary school. My mother is the perfect, shining example that beauty can get you anywhere and last as long as you damn well want it to. Even if you had to claw at it with Botox injections, fillers, and liposuction. Beauty is a construct, she liked to say. One that she perfected how to wield to her benefit—at least while in public. Pretty makeup can hide everything, even sickness and decay.

“You’re right. I never thought you were beautiful,” Domino says.

I’m pathetic enough that the admission stings. Despite everything, I’m not immune to that one form of insult.

Rejection based on my appearance alone.

“Beauty is too delicate a word to describe what you are.” He nods toward me and inclines his head. “I’ve changed my mind. Undress. Now.”

My heart plummets through my body, hitting the floor. I can taste my own fear, as potent as blood. I don’t know what I’ll do. Run, I think, as my toes twitch again.

Then it creeps in—that sick, twisted voice whispering from the back of my mind. Undressing myself would be better than having him do it. He’d most likely rip the dress from my skin. This way, I can keep some modicum of decency.

Besides…

The only way men use moments like this to regain control is by using lust as a cudgel to induce fear. In this case, I don’t have to worry about that.

I have the upper hand.

“The water’s almost ready, Ada-Maria,” he scolds. He snaps his fingers, and it’s a second before I realize that he didn’t intend to summon anyone. He only meant to spur me on.

My hands shake so badly I can barely hook them beneath the thin straps of the dress. I’m sloppy and rough, refusing to take my time or give him a show. Instead, I jerk the material over my head and throw it toward his feet.

I don’t know why, but it feels more liberating than humiliating to stand here, knowing that I’ve defied at least one of his sick games. I don’t cower.

Until he stands. The way he looks at me…

My fragile assessment of him shatters. That gleam in his eye isn’t disinterest.

It’s predatory.

“Stop.” His command sinks into my body, rooting me in place before I even register moving. I’d been poised to take a step back, my foot still hovering above the floor.

“Ay, Dios mío. I always want to remember you like this,” he rasps.

My pulse turns painful, every beat of my heart registering like the blow from a fist. Thump. Thump. Belatedly, I can recognize that there was no real admiration in his voice. Not like the way I’m used to men admiring me. With covetous need and naked desire.

Domino speaks of me in this moment like I’m a toy on display. The way men boast about a piece of property they own. Or, the way my father sounded on the night of his first political victory. Like this small triumph was the first step toward his ultimate goal—utter domination of the city, its people. Everything.

“Pink tweed skirt and matching jacket. A cream-colored tank top that displayed your navel despite the conservative dress code your father enforced in his office. Or at least, he wanted everyone else to believe he disapproved. I know for a fact that he told you what to wear. How to wear it. The mayor was meeting with him that day to discuss him potentially becoming a deputy during his next term. You were to catch his eye, and of course, you did.”

I swallow hard, swaying as the memory catches me off guard. I can still see that day so clearly, just as he described it. Like a good, doting daughter, I intruded on an important business meeting to make some menial request—using the credit card for shopping was my reason that day, I think—but my real aim was whatever my father wanted to achieve by flaunting me before his opponent like prey. It was a game to him.

I think he got off on it, far more than I did anyway.

That day stands out to me for one reason alone. As I sauntered through my father’s office—an upscale building I’d visited enough times to know inside and out—a new figure stood guard outside the boardroom where Papa was holding his meeting.

One look at him, and I felt tense and hot in a way I’d never felt before. Like my clothing was too tight, and the room was too small. Sex was a chore I’d grown bored of attempting sober, but I couldn’t help but wonder how this man would feel inside me. He was so tall I had to strain on tiptoe to get a better look at the hard planes of his face. His eyes were dark, shrouded by the brim of a straw cowboy hat he somehow wore without looking as stupid as he should have. The shadow cast by it enhanced his chiseled features, deepening the mystery of who he was and why he was there.

Struck dumb, I’d inspected the rest of him, forgetting my purpose for being there at all. Tight faded jeans that clung to his muscular thighs, supporting a distinct bulge straining around the zipper where his cock would be, and a loose denim shirt that did little to disguise the bulk lurking beneath…

Overall, he was the most handsome man I’d ever seen. When I remembered how to move, I approached him, swishing my hips the way my old friend once taught me, my head held high.

As his eyes roved in my direction, I fixed him with my most charming smile. The one I’d spent hours practicing before a mirror to nail down that fragile line between sexy and coy.

I wanted him to look at me the way the lecherous mayor in the next room soon would. I wanted those dark eyes to drink me in with a raw precision that warned he was undressing me with them. I wanted him to look at me as though he wanted to take me then and there. Strange, I remember remarking. I never craved that kind of reaction so badly before.

He was a different sort of man. Perhaps that was part of the allure. He wasn’t a bold, rich bastard accustomed to taking who or whatever he wanted.

No, he was someone who would look at me like a prize he could never attain. Unless I wanted him to.

“Hello,”I addressed him in my lightest, flirtiest tone of voice. I even offered him a manicured hand—fully expecting that, like most men I encountered, he would brush his lips across the back of it rather than shake it. “My name is Ada—”

“I didn’t know it was you,” the present-day Domino admits. He’s closer, stroking his chin as the fact that I’m naked grows more real by the second. His heat acts like a battering ram, rivaling the warmth emanating from the tub. “Not Ada-Maria, the chubby little ugly duckling I remembered, fully grown into a swan. I’d heard the rumors that you were quite the little whore. Still, I never imagined...”

He stops, snagging a lock of my hair between two fingers. Slowly, he grinds the strands together and sighs.

“That little pink skirt… I wanted to fuck you in it then and there, Ada-Maria. I’d never seen an ass so fucking round. Tits the spitting image of what every woman these days goes under the knife to achieve. Lips so pink I could imagine you biting them as I fucked you deep. Never in my life had I wanted a woman like that. I could feel my cock straining like a motherfucker. My careful plan would have been ruined in a heartbeat—”

I’m holding my breath, feeling my lungs strain for air. The worst part is that I can hear the truth. In every word. Every grudging bit of inflection. He wanted me.

Two days ago, I would have been elated by hearing those very words.

“But then,” he continues, “I heard your name. Ada, you said. As in Ada-Maria Pavalos. Nothing has ever killed my hard-on faster than hearing that. Consider it a gift, Ada. The sick, twisted, disgusting soul you are inside is revolting enough to override a body designed by the Gods and a face so beautiful it’s sin.”

Shakily, I suck in air, hating just how deeply the insult wounds. I hear the words of my therapist, playing in a mocking loop. You have low self-esteem, Ada. You seem to equate your sexuality and beauty directly to your self-worth. I’m sure that if you looked deep within yourself, you would find plenty of attributes worthy of being proud of. You are more than a pretty face…

The bitch was wrong, of course. I knew that without having to hear Domino state it so bluntly. I’m empty inside. A shell over which my father would paint whatever he wanted me to be in that moment. Doting daughter. Dutiful doll.

A prize he could use to sway men to his side. Like the Mayor he met with that day. I spent that very night on my knees, choking down his cum with the same simpering smile on my face I’d attempted to charm Domino with. I think I would have fucked him even if Papa didn’t tell me to; so fragile was my pride in the moments after I’d entered that boardroom.

“Hello,”I told the man waiting by the door. “I’m Ada.”

His dark eyes flickered, but not with lust or an ounce of interest. To my utter embarrassment, he looked away. Then he opened the door for me.

“Good morning, Ada-Maria.”

Just that. Good morning in a flat, emotionless baritone. No innuendo. No flustered response. As shameful as it feels to admit in this present moment, I’d never felt uglier then. Not even during all those years as the “fat ugly duckling,” so awkward my father had no use for me.

Wait…

“How did you know?” Returning to the present is like surfacing from minutes spent underwater. I’m breathless, panting after every word. “My weight… How?”

No one knew that. It was a time in my life when my father had no use for me. Overweight with braces, cystic acne, and poor grades, it was more beneficial to him to have me shipped off from boarding school to boarding school.

I had no one in those days. Just Pia and one other friend.

The three amigas.

“How did you know?” I ask, facing Domino. My father could have told him, but I doubt that. I personally went through our family photos and ripped up any that featured me in that state. I only kept one in a safe place no one else could find.

“Know what?” His tone shifts again. Did I catch him off guard? If so, his face stubbornly gives nothing away. “That you were a chubby, awkward teenager? It’s not exactly an unusual origin story for a woman as superficial as you. Anyone could take one look at you and know that.”

But they’d have to strip me to do so.

I remember crying into my pillow every night, praying that I could go through a growth spurt capable of adding inches to my height while subtracting double from my waist. Pia was so pretty in comparison to me. Standing beside her, was like being reduced to a piece of scenery. All eyes went to her. Men, women, adults, and children alike. Beautiful Pia, with her enchanting hazel eyes, slender frame, and dark hair, could light up a room with just a smile.

The same smile I stole from her years after her disappearance. I spent hours in the mirror trying to get it just right. But I never could.

For ten years, I’ve held a secret I wasn’t brave enough to confess even to my therapist. That on my fifteenth birthday, I stood next to Pia, and I made a wish as I blew out my candles. Just one. No longer did I dream for another pony, or new clothes, or Daddy’s affection.

I just wanted to be like her. As beautiful as her. As tall and as skinny.

As desirable.

A week later, she went missing, and six months after that, I shot up five inches and lost forty pounds almost overnight.

But no one tells you that Cinderella was the only bitch in the world to undergo a transformation without scars to show for it. Rapid weight loss leaves tiny little silvery stretch marks that speckle the skin like veins. No matter how much you scrub, buff, or pay for laser removal treatments, they never go away.

The men who fuck you years later might trace them with their fingers, sensing the slight flaws in your seemingly perfect skin. Were you hurt? One of them asked me once.

He didn’t really care as to the answer.

My cunt worked, at least.

“Did you hear me?”

I shiver as thick, calloused fingers slip beneath my chin, gripping it tight until I face the man before me, my eyes streaming.

“I asked if you like it hot or cold.”

I blink, confused. “W-What?”

“The water.” He snatches my collar, sliding his finger beneath the thin leather. With a beckoning motion, he yanks me forward so suddenly I nearly trip into him.

At the last moment, he pivots, shoving me aside.

Whoosh!Water hits my skin, so hot, every ounce of air leaves my chest. A hard surface slams against my knee as I scramble to brace my hands against something firm, but curved, beneath me. The bottom of the tub? My head, however, is still above water, my mouth open. I’m trying to scream, but I can’t even make a sound.

“Too hot?” Domino questions as he shuts the faucet off. “Don’t,” he warns when I grip the rim, ready to bolt from the basin. “I suggest you endure it, Ada-Maria. Think of it as practice for what else I have in store for you.”

“You’re sick.” My reply is a wail, barely audible beneath the pain.

Everything hurts. My skin is raw, blistering wherever it contacts the water. I’m burning alive. More tears fall, and I’m helpless to stop them.

“You’re a monster—”

“I’d advise you to save the insults,” Domino suggests. He sits on the rim of the tub and plunges his hand beneath the water. Leisurely he feels down to the bottom, dipping between my legs.

I jump, bracing myself to feel his touch, but he evades my skin completely, retrieving something with a sigh. The chain. Deliberately, he loops it around and around his wrist, seemingly unbothered by the scalding heat.

“I have a lot more planned for you, Ada-Maria,” he says once the majority of the chain is secured, leaving me just enough to breathe freely. “This is merely an act of mercy. Later, you’ll thank me for seeing that you are fed and bathed. I will bet my life on that. This will be the last luxury your beautiful skin will feel for a long while. Now…” He bends, fiddling with something that must be on the floor by his feet. When he sits upright, he’s holding a bottle of different colored liquid in either hand.

“Honey or Lavender?”

Body wash, I presume. Each one looks to be a golden liquid at the base, with one containing purple flowers, and the other simmering bits of pearlescent beads.

Eyeing them, I shiver so violently water sloshes over the rim. He couldn’t know. Could he?

But those choices are so specific. So deliberately plotted. God, these memories hurt more than they should. It’s been so damn long. Why can I still hear her so clearly, her laughter infectious?

Purple is the color of royalty, Adie. So is gold. They’ll be our colors, the three queens...

“Pia,” I croak, swiping at my cheek to banish whatever tears I can. “You knew Pia.”

He looks away and makes a show of lifting each bottle for closer observation.

But I don’t miss the satisfied tilt to his mouth. This test I passed with flying colors.

“Pia Inglecias,” he murmurs. “I’ve heard the story. Who hasn’t? What a damn shame for that poor girl and her family.”

Her family.

“She only had her mother,” I say. But the second the words leave my mouth, I realize I’m wrong. “And a brother, but he—” I break off, feeling my throat go dry at the possibility. Could he somehow be a living Inglecias? It could explain his grudge. Even as I think it, I recall a detail that renders that explanation impossible. “He was sick. With a terminal heart condition. It couldn’t be cured.”

Whenever Pia spoke of him, it was briefly, only to mention how precarious his health was. My brother was the fastest runner in the neighborhood before he got sick. Could have gone to play ball in the big leagues, I bet. That’s why I’m here, she added, referring to our boarding school. It was an open secret that she was there on a scholarship as part of the school’s community outreach toward promising students from poor families. Mama is too busy with Nav to worry about me, too. I’m not jealous, though. He needs the help.

As far as I knew, his life expectancy was months by the time we both turned fifteen. Even if he did manage to live, I doubt a boy who survived a congenital heart defect, so severe he could no longer run, would grow into a man sculpted from solid muscle.

He’s been listening to me speak all this time, but I can’t gauge a single hint of emotion.

“A brother,” he says. “Funny. From what I remember, Pia Inglecias was an only child.”

I shake my head. “No, I remember—”

“Lift your arms.” When I don’t comply fast enough, he snaps his fingers. “Now, Ada-Maria. As much as another man would enjoy the sight of your naked body, I find that the allure has worn off—” he inspects me with a ruthless sweep of his gaze, his eyes narrowing. “It’s not quite as impressive as I imagined.”

Because he did imagine me once. Five years ago, before he knew who I was, when I sauntered up to him wearing a pink ensemble with a cream top. He wanted me then.

But not now. No man can fake this level of disinterest. Like the vain creature I am, I cling to the same excuse I’ve used all these years to explain it. He’s gay. There is nothing wrong with that.

It just means, in the grand scheme of his nefarious plans, I have nothing to fear when it comes to the realm of sexual violence. …Right?

Slowly, I lift my arms without taking my eyes off his face.

He bends, grabbing something else from the materials at his feet—a cream-colored cloth. He makes a show of wetting it with the bathwater, barely grazing my knee with the fabric. Then he comes at me directly.

I stiffen, hating the way my body reacts to him. Part of it is instinctive. The rest is pure vanity. It’s repulsive how his appearance can still have an effect on me.

He’s handsome beneath the evil, and my brain struggles to separate the two. Why would it? I’ve spent my entire life in the shadow of a man who excelled at blending beauty with violence.

And therein lies the key to resisting him and dampening any attraction I may feel. Those in my father’s orbit always joked that Domino was his shadow, damn near inseparable from his master. They were wrong, of course.

Domino is no better than my father, bred from the same stock all powerful, egotistical men are born from.

“What are you thinking behind those eyes, Ada-Maria?” His tone is so deceptively casual that a part of me is lulled by it. I respond to him without thinking.

“That you seem to hate my father, but you’re just like him—”

I break off the second I see his arm move. My body braces for another slap, but when his finger does make contact with my face, it’s gently, stroking along the corner of my mouth.

“You will never compare me to him again, do you understand?” His eyes hunt mine ruthlessly, reminding me of a stern father scolding a naughty child. “Do you?”

I’m terrified enough to nod—but as I do, my lips part. Curiosity is as addicting as any other vice when it comes to him.

“Why?” My eyes water, and blinking frees more tears despite how hard I try to keep them at bay. It’s horrifying to think of all the ways he’s been invited into the very heart of my family, becoming a regular fixture at my mother’s perfunctory Sunday dinners. “You worked for him for five years,” I add. “Why now?”

I think of all the times I snuck glances at him, imagining how that body would feel against mine. Was I so naïve as to not sense his true feelings? Was I just blind to the hate lurking beneath that stern façade?

Or just stupid enough to be easily fooled.

“Why?” He taps his thumb against my bottom lip, applying a bit more pressure with each pass. I hiss as he nears the throbbing mark from his slap. “You’re right. For five years, I worked for the bastard. I hid his messes. Cleaned up his dirty work—”

“You killed for him.” It’s an accusation I’ve never made out loud, but one I know full well is the damn truth.

He doesn’t try to deny it. “I did. I arranged hits on the political enemies he wanted out of the way. I sent covert threats to their families. I handled his contacts with the men who ran his drug mules in and out of the city. I covered up every illicit affair while your Mama’s back was turned—”

I wrench away from him, eyeing the floor. Harshly, he snatches my chin, forcing me to face him.

“He had a type,” he tells me, his voice gruffer. Guttural. “Some could say it was creepily specific. He liked them young with supple tanned skin, and big round eyes—bonus points if they were light blue, or even gray. He liked big tits, a tiny waist, and long, straight hair, preferably blond—”

“You’re disgusting!”

He chuckles and dips the hand holding the cloth into the water just beyond my quivering belly.

“I’m not the man who liked fucking women who resemble his daughter, Ada-Maria.”

Is he lying? Bile spills up my throat and I can’t process the thought further. I squeeze my eyes shut instead, struggling to keep my breathing steady. I can’t give in to the panic now. It’s what he wants. He’s trying to rattle me.

It’s working.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t sense that his devotion to his only daughter verged on the unhealthy,” Domino taunts.

When I open my eyes, he’s smirking. He’s gotten inside my head, and he knows it. Even if my father were screwing other women on the side, that has nothing to do with me. Nothing.

“I guess that means he molded you into the perfect woman according to him. Beauty. Obedient. No brains to speak of. The only downside was that he couldn’t touch you, so he had to make do somehow.” Withdrawing his hand from my chin, he uses both to wring the water from the cloth. Then he brings it to my chest as if daring me to react.

I do, flinching as the fabric makes contact. It’s painful to subject myself to his touch. He swipes across the top of my breasts and dips the cloth into the water again.

“I’ll spare you what the rumors have claimed about you and your dearest Don Roy. I hope, in that case, it was all merely talk—”

“You don’t know anything!” My voice is a whisper, strained by how badly I’m shaking. Every secret I’ve kept at bay cloys on the tip of my tongue like a bad taste.

My father never abused me. Sexually.

But sex was always a game to me. A trivial act, neither overly fun or too boring to attempt every now and again. I never felt the rapture other women bragged about. I was damn good at faking it like I did, though. Sex never terrified me the way it did good, seemingly wholesome girls like Pia who openly fantasized about the man they would bestow their virginity upon.

I want a love like in the movies,she told me once. Real tragic shit. I want to orgasm rainbows and live happily ever after…

Deep down, I think I’ve always believed that there are other forms of violation far more degrading than sex. A body can heal.

The mind can’t. I was never one to play the “my trauma was worse” card like some of the spoiled bitches from my boarding school, who equated credit card limits with child abuse, liked to. Still, I tend to believe that I’m smart enough to recognize that there are some lines a normal parent shouldn’t cross. “Favors,” they should never ask of their children.

Secrets they should never demand be kept.

“Your father never touched you,” Domino declares, but when I look up…

He’s scanning my face intently, and I get that niggling feeling again. He’s telling me what he believes he knows. What he wants to hear. Anything otherwise goes against the narrative he’s built.

“How did you kill him?” I don’t think I really want to know the answer. Somehow, it feels important just to say it. To watch his expression shift as he mulls over his reply.

I think I’m hoping to catch him up. To prove that it’s a lie. Papa is alive and well, and the nightmare that has ruled my life wouldn’t end so easily.

Domino cocks his head. “It was slow,” he tells me, his voice surprisingly expressive. He doesn’t sound like someone recounting a traumatic event. He sounds like a man re-living a sweet, beautiful moment he wants to savor reminiscing. “Very slow, Ada-Maria. Over hours. He suffered, if that’s what you really wanted to know. He suffered greatly.”

I close my eyes again, inhaling raggedly. A wave of emotions crashes over me, but the worst part? I can’t decide which one to feel; they all resonate with the same intensity. Horror. Grief. Pain. Relief…

“Turn around so I can finish,” Domino demands, cutting my mourning short.

I comply in silence, too stunned to question.

“Wait—”

He grabs my arm, dragging me toward him, and I scream, reflexively trying to escape his grasp.

“No.”

Something in his voice freezes me solid. I go still as he yanks me to my knees with my back to him.

The water drips from my body, playing an eerie melody as I brace myself for his assault. Will he hurt me now? I almost can’t stifle another scream as cool air tickles my ass, warning of an impending touch.

Instead, he prods my lower back, and my confusion battles with the terror. Then I realize exactly what he’s inspecting.

Oh, that.

“You were whipped,” he says, his voice rough as he drags the pad of his finger over a long-healed scar. It’s one of many. “Multiple times… By who?”