by Zoey Parker
“Good!” Mario laughed, the tang of his aftershave filling Gio's nostrils. “Well done, Gio! That's my boy. You've taken an important first step today. Now it's time to reward yourself.”
And as Bruno and Julius loaded the bleeding, moaning bodies into the trunk of a car to be delivered God-knew-where, Mario called for a limo and took Gio to a brothel on the South Side. As they stood in the parlor, Mario ordered the women to line up so Gio could choose one he liked.
“Remember, whoever you choose, she's yours for the rest of the night,” Mario told Gio. “You can do anything you want with her, anything at all, and she can't refuse. Understand?”
Gio understood. And as he chose a woman named Gilda and followed her into her room, he felt the quivering fear in his gut giving way to a hot miasma of hatred and disgust. He loathed himself for feeling so shaky and terrified by his own actions in the garage earlier and for his moment of helpless indecision. He was filled with a sudden urge to take it out on Gilda.
Someone he'd never met now offered to fulfill his every fantasy, and he wanted to hurt her. He wanted to make her feel as small and helpless as he had felt. If he couldn't take pleasure in terrorizing other men, at least he could take out his rage on her.
Gio had never considered harming a woman before in his life, but over the next three hours, he choked, whipped, brutalized, and humiliated Gilda in every way he could think of. Every new act of terror he carried out on her made him feel stronger.
More like a man.
And no matter what he did to her, no matter how much genuine pain and fright he saw in her eyes, she kept on taking it and letting him do more and more, until finally, the fury inside him was all used up and he felt something like peace.
He felt like a god—dangerous and unpredictable, unmoved by the pleas and suffering of those under his power, able to inflict pain or end it at a whim.
After that, there were many more times when Mario involved Gio in his criminal activities, and after each time, they went to the same brothel and Gio indulged his darkest desires again. When the visits with his father became more infrequent, Gio started going to the brothel on his own after every successful crime he committed.
Then he started to go in between crimes, during times when he was stressed or horny or even just bored. After a while, he found himself no longer satisfied by whores, and he began seeking out underground sex parties so he could explore his urges among people who were more experienced. He became a regular in the scene.
And no matter how far he went, no matter how hideous or shameful his lust became, it seemed like there was always some woman who was happily waiting to help him give in to it. With each new torture he devised and inflicted, he felt morbid blossoms of self-love bloom inside himself.
By this point, Gio's hobbies were becoming a well-known rumor within the Mancini family. Certain sexual preferences—like adultery, homosexuality, or pedophilia—were strictly looked down upon, since they could be used to blackmail members of the organization into betrayal. But even though Gio's obsessions were considered extreme, they were still technically within the rules, and he was left to his own devices. If Mario knew about them, he gave no sign.
When Gio turned twenty, he bought his own house and converted the attic into his Special Room.
Now Gio had finally become a made guy, and he was scanning the dimly-lit room restlessly, looking for someone to help him really celebrate.
He felt someone tap him on the shoulder and turned. A short woman with long brown hair and brown eyes smiled up at him, handing him a fresh tumbler of scotch. “Congratulations on your big night, Daddy” she said, slurring slightly.
“Thanks,” he replied, taking a sip. “Do I know you?”
“Not yet,” she grinned, “but a few of your friends invited me. My name's Katie. They said I'm the kind of girl you'd want to meet tonight.”
“Oh?” Gio asked, mildly annoyed. “Why is that?” He looked around and saw Bruno nudging Julius as they watched this interaction. The last thing he wanted was to be set up by the other guys based on what they thought his interests might be. The whole idea of them gossiping about the kind of sex he enjoyed bugged him, even though he supposed it was inevitable.
Katie leaned in close, and Gio felt the warmth of her breath tickling his ear. “Because you can do absolutely anything you want to me, no matter how fucked up, and I'll love it and beg you for more. How's that sound?”
Gio looked at Katie again, her eyes glittering darkly, her smile growing wider. She looked hot enough, but there was something else about her that seemed off. Still, he couldn't figure out what it was, and he knew he probably wouldn't find a better offer that night. The other women there might be more gorgeous, but would they do even half of what he needed to get the satisfaction he craved?
He doubted it. And what good was sex if he couldn't do the things he really wanted?
“Come on, Daddy,” she pleaded, tugging on his arm. “Tonight's your lucky night. Let's go.”
Gio thought it over for another moment, then beckoned for her to follow him to his car.
Chapter 4
They left the party together and Gio unlocked the silver 1978 Corvette he kept in perfect condition. She slipped into the passenger's seat and immediately took off her high heels, putting her bare feet up on the dashboard and wiggling her toes.
“Take your fucking feet off the dash,” Gio snapped. “It's a Corvette, not an ottoman.”
“Sorry,” Katie said, rolling her eyes and putting her feet back on the floor.
As Gio pulled away from the house and got on the road, Katie reached into her purse and withdrew a joint. She put it between her lips, lighting it and inhaling deeply.
“No smoking in the car,” Gio said.
Katie giggled, rolling the window down. “It's cool,” she insisted. “I can blow it out the window, see?”
Gio reached over and grabbed the back of Katie's hair, twisting it hard. He expected her to react with a cry of pain, or even anger. Instead, she was silent, her head rearing back to expose her neck. “I said no smoking,” he growled. “Now get rid of it before I hurt you.”
“Yes, Daddy,” she agreed mildly, pitching the lit joint out the window.
“And stop calling me Daddy,” Gio added, letting go of her hair.
“Okay,” Katie sighed. “What do you want me to call you?”
“Nothing. Don't even open your mouth to speak to me unless I tell you to.”
Again, Gio expected some small flash of defiance from her. Instead, she simply nodded and stared out the windshield blankly for the rest of the drive, her hands fidgeting in her lap.
When they got to Gio's house, he ushered her inside. “I need to use the bathroom before we get started,” Katie said.
“I thought I told you not to speak until spoken to,” Gio snarled.
“Yeah, but I gotta go,” Katie whined. “I'll just be a sec, okay?” Before Gio could answer, she clip-clopped down the hall in her heels, looking for the bathroom. As she did, she reached behind her to pick at her thong.
Gio grimaced. Clearly, she had no class, but unfortunately, that was often how it went when trying to find sexual partners—the ones who were willing to cater to desires as warped as his were usually trashy by definition.
A minute later, Katie emerged from the bathroom without flushing, and Gio noticed that she was sniffling and gingerly brushing at her nostrils.
“I don't want you high for this,” Gio said disapprovingly. “I want you completely awake and aware of every moment while I break you.”
Katie shrugged nonchalantly. “Okay,” she slurred.
“Do you have a yellow word you prefer to use, or a red word?” Gio asked.
Katie cocked her head like a dog being shown a card trick. After a dazed moment, she said, “Oh, you mean, like, safe words? No, that's cool, I don't need 'em. Nothing's off limits on this bod, haha.” She sniffled again.
Gio flicked on the lamp in the room and surveyed Katie
, noticing many details he hadn't picked up on at the party. Her bare arms were crisscrossed with old scars in patterns that looked self-inflicted. The insides of her elbows had small clusters of angry-looking red needle marks. Her hair was coarse and matted, her pupils were pinpricks, the skin under her nose was chapped, and the muscles in her face seemed slack.
“Get over here,” Gio commanded.
Katie trotted over to him, losing her balance once halfway across the room and snorting out a laugh.
Gio hated not being taken seriously. He felt a burst of rage and seized her by the throat, desperately wanting to see her face contort in surprise or anger. He pushed her backward, holding her down against his coffee table.
“You're mine, you fucking dirty slut,” Gio told her between clenched teeth. “I can do anything I want to you tonight. I can kill you. You wouldn't be able to stop me, and no one would ever know.”
He'd made such threats to his playmates before, and he always relished the awe and panic he saw in their eyes when he did. He loved the power that came from knowing that their lives were in his hands, and that they knew it.
But even as Katie's face flushed and started to turn purple from lack of oxygen, her expression remained dead, her eyes as empty as broken camera lenses as they stared up at him.
Gio eased up his grip on her throat so she could have some air. As he did, he used his other hand to reach into his pocket for a cigarette and lighter. He lit up, blowing the smoke into her face.
“Now pull your dress down and show me your tits,” Gio said, “or I'll crush your fucking windpipe.”
Katie reached up and pulled down her dress. She wasn't wearing a bra, and Gio slowly lowered the lit cigarette to her left breast, expecting her to draw back, to struggle, to try to fight him off. He was eager to see her skin overrun with goosebumps, her nipples erect when he pressed the smoldering tip of the cigarette against her flesh and savored her sounds of pain.
But her arms hung limply at her sides, and when Gio looked down, he saw that her nipples were still soft.
He also saw that she already had two cigarette burns on her breast, and several more high on her neck.
She was still looking up at him expectantly, her eyes as glassy as a doll's.
Gio snuffed out the cigarette in an ashtray without burning her. There was a part of Gio that wanted to reach under Katie's dress and rip her panties off, to shove himself inside her without warning or mercy, to violate her as hard as he could, to punish her for her disappointing apathy.
But he knew he might as well fuck a slit in a piece of meat for all the satisfaction it would give him.
She was a sub, yes. She would let him do whatever he wanted to her, yes. She'd call him whatever he wanted to be called and obey any rules he gave her. But she was burned out and drugged out and used up. She couldn't be shocked or hurt anymore. There was nothing fierce left inside her, nothing to bend to his will.
Fucking her would be as cold and joyless as fucking a corpse.
Gio released her and straightened up. “Go on, get the fuck out of here.”
Even then, there was something inside Gio that wanted Katie to react with confusion, anger, or hurt at being dismissed so suddenly without any explanation. But instead, all she did was shrug again, get up, grab her purse, and walk out the door, shutting it behind her. He heard her heels clicking down his driveway, and her voice as she called one of her friends to pick her up.
Gio trudged up to the Special Room in the attic and sat among his strange furniture and torture devices, contemplating the array of sex toys displayed on the walls.
This should have been the happiest night of his life. He was finally a real member of the Mancini family, and his place as its leader someday was assured. He had true power and respect. Most of all, his father had expressed genuine pride in him, and his friends had even shown their support for his unusual hobbies by trying to offer him the kind of woman they thought he'd want.
So why the hell did he feel so utterly misunderstood, out of place, and alone?
Chapter 5
Carla
Carla looked in the mirror at the sleek pantsuit she was wearing, as well as the expensive makeup, fashionable hairstyle, and tasteful jewelry. Federal agents didn't make much—she usually bought her own clothes at Target or JC Penney, and she rarely concerned herself with makeup or accessories. The teardrop diamond earrings they'd given her cost more than she earned in six months. Now, as she examined herself, she felt like a completely different person.
She caught herself wishing she could ask to keep her costumes like movie stars do, and stifled a nervous laugh. Why shouldn't she be allowed to hang onto them if she managed to survive this undercover operation? Meryl Streep may have been unparalleled at transforming into the characters she played, but it wasn't as though an unconvincing performance could lead to her being beaten to death with a crowbar and dumped in the river.
Carla smoothed the front of her blouse to make sure the tiny microphone underneath didn't ruin the line of her outfit. Then she turned to Don, raising an eyebrow. “Well? What do you think?”
Don favored her with a toothy grin. “Darlin', you look like one of them business gals from Houston who never said yes when I asked 'em out.”
“Their loss, right?”
“Damn straight,” Don chuckled.
Louie Grammatica stood in front of the mirror next to Carla's, carefully shaving his chest with a trembling hand. The Mancinis' family lawyer was a short, stocky man with graying hair and heavy bags under his eyes. He nicked his left nipple with the razor and hissed as a drop of blood welled up. “Goddamn it! Will you two stop gushing about her clothes? You're distracting me.”
“Say, what's the matter?” Don drawled, his eyes glinting with amusement. “I thought you gay boys didn't have no problem shavin' off your body hair. Puts you more in touch with your feminine side, right?”
Louie shot him a venomous look. “You're thinking of Olympic swimmers. Lots of gay men don't shave their body hair. And for the last time, I'm not gay, okay? I was...”
“...'you were there to deliver a message to someone, you'd never been there before in your life, and you were just wearing that outfit so you'd blend in,'” Don and Carla finished with him in unison. He'd made the same claims at least five times already that day.
“But I don't reckon any of that'd hold much water with Mario if'n he saw the location typed on your arrest record, right?” Don added.
“I imagine he'd at least want to know who you were delivering a message to,” Carla pointed out. “And why you seemed so certain you'd find the message's intended recipient in the glory hole booths at the back of the club.”
“Oh, an' how he knew which outfit to wear so he could 'blend in' if he'd never even been there before,” Don continued. “You startin' to see our point here, Louie? 'Cause we can keep goin' if you like.”
Louie scowled and went back to shaving his chest. “Yeah, fine, okay. Just remember what you guys promised. When you take Mario down, Witness Protection had better put me somewhere no one's ever even heard of the fucking mafia outside of a Coppola flick.”
“Sure, sure,” Don nodded. “Now hurry up an' finish shavin' those titties of yours so we can tape a mic to 'em. We ain't got all day.”
Don motioned for Carla to follow him into the next room. She did, smoothing out the front of her pantsuit again. She wasn't used to wearing anything this nice, and she didn't want to get it wrinkled and spoil the disguise.
Don noticed this as he closed the door behind them. “It's gettin' rumpled on you 'cause you slouch,” he said, as though reading her thoughts. “Try to keep your neck an' your back straight, an' your shoulders squared off. Posture, that's the key. You want to look like someone who spends half her life walkin' into courtrooms like she owns the place, 'stead of someone who mostly sits in front of computer screens transcribin' surveillance tapes.”
Carla stiffened her spine and threw her shoulders back. “Like this?”
Don laughed, shaking his head. “Now you look like some kinda robot.” He positioned himself behind her and gently moved her shoulders into a more natural position. “There, that's more like it. You want to be poised without lookin' like you're trying too hard. It's like my old yoga teacher used to say: You just go on an' picture an invisible wire extendin' from your crown chakra up to the sky, an' all them other chakras in your body are gonna align right under it. You keep that up, an' soon it'll feel so natural you won't even realize you're doin' it.”
“You do yoga, Don?” Carla asked incredulously.
“There's plenty about this here Texas boy you don't know,” Don replied lightly. “Shoot, just 'cause a fella likes his Wild Turkey don't mean he ain't tried wheatgrass a time or two.”