by Bella J.
“I don’t care how long we stand out here in the cold, how many times I have to whip you. But I will break you. Once I’m done with you, little girl, you will be who I want you to be.”
Another strike hit my back.
And another.
And another.
I no longer felt the cold. All I felt was the raging inferno burning like hell across my skin. The warmth of my tears thawed the cold on my cheeks. The screams pouring from my lips melted the ice in my lungs. With every lash, my fingers dug deeper into the muddy ground, pain possessing every nerve. I cried and screamed so loud, my ears rang. But the whipping didn’t stop.
“What is your name?” he screamed, his harsh voice carrying much farther than a little girl’s cries. Mine. My cries.
“What is your name, girl?”
“I won’t—”
But the crack and strike of the whip broke through my sobbing cries. I wanted to get up and run. I wanted to escape. But the heavy shackles around my ankles forced me to stay where I was—on my knees, naked, and at the mercy of a wretched man with no conscience.
The whipping stopped, and I tried to take a deep breath. But it hurt too much. The slightest movement made the broken skin on my back pull taut, and the burning wouldn’t stop. All my senses were overpowered by pain, and for a second, I thought he might have left. It was only when I tried to push myself off the dirty ground that I realized he was still standing behind me.
“Going somewhere?” A boot lunged against my spine, kicking me, forcing me back down. “I told you I’m not stopping until I break you. But it seems like you’re a stubborn little cunt. I might have to try harder.”
He stepped in next to me, and I saw the end of the whip hanging down, drops of crimson dripping from the leather, staining the dirt. In that moment, I wondered whether fighting him was worth it. Whether I, a little girl of only ten years old, would be able to continue struggling against the devil himself—if I even had half a chance to win this fight.
“I’ll ask you again. What is your name, little girl?”
I swallowed hard, tasting the blood from where my teeth pierced my lip.
Just one more. Just one more try. One more attempt to fight.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying my best to ignore the brutal sting on my back. Tears slipped down my cheeks, staining the earth beneath me. My silence was the only answer I gave him as I bit my tongue, the brutal pain possessing my body urging me to let him break me. To do anything he wanted, just as long as the punishment stopped. But my will was stronger than the pain.
I braced myself for another ruthless beating, but it didn’t come. There was no sound of a whip slicing through the air. No strikes that landed across my skin.
The whip disappeared from view as he walked back, the crunch of his shoes stepping on dirt and dead branches causing me to bite down, grinding my teeth so hard, it felt like they would break in half at any moment.
Then I heard it. The sound of a zipper followed by the jangle of a steel belt buckle that fell on the ground. “If my whip won’t break you, I have something else that will.”
I thought the pain on my back was the worst. I thought the cries that came out of my mouth while getting whipped was the loudest…but I was wrong.
I was dead wrong.
That day, I became Nessuno. Nobody. For years, I refused to acknowledge that little girl, but now my new master demanded it. How was I supposed to make the shift from being who I had been trained to be, to go back and think about the little girl who died outside in the cold that day?
He took a step closer. “You can’t tell me your real name, can you?”
My gaze dropped to the floor, his shiny black shoes in my view. He was right. I couldn’t.
With a gentle touch, he lifted my chin. “Look at me.”
It was hard to look up and into his eyes. But I did, and I could barely take a simple breath as that one moment seemed to stretch on for eternity.
Dark eyes with endless depth searched my face. “Why me?”
My gaze dropped to the floor once more.
“Don’t look away from me.”
I swallowed hard, unable to gather the strength to look him in the eye as if I was his equal—which I wasn’t. My purpose here was to submit.
“I said, look at me!”
I jolted at the snap of his tone. He was losing his patience with me, which meant I was displeasing him.
Immediately, I looked up at him just as he demanded. “I’m sorry, Master.”
He stumbled back as if someone had punched him in the gut. “What did you just call me?”
Oh, God. I failed. I could see it on his disappointed yet bewildered face. I screwed up…and now I would pay the price.
Chapter 6
Antonio
Master.
Red.
Blood.
Pain.
Jesus. She called me Master. Why the fuck would she call me Master? This was fucking insane. It was like I got sucked through a vortex of shit, only to get spat out in this goddamn nightmare where my mistake had finally returned to haunt me. It was as if someone was playing a sick joke, pulling my mind back to a past I’d rather forget. The worst part? It was working. The sound of submission in her voice, the way she called me Master sent a surge of adrenaline down my spine, all the way to the tip of my cock. With one word, this woman had every part of me electrified and my body hummed with wicked intent. I was that man once again. After years of fighting it, pushing it back to the farthest corners of my mind, this woman pulled it all back with one simple little word.
One. Simple. Little. Word.
For a second, I lost myself. I lost myself in the depraved desires no man should ever have. It was sick. It was twisted. And it was the fucking vice I had been struggling with for so long.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, pushing back the darkness which had been lurking within, waiting for an opportunity to consume me.
Never stop fighting it.
I exhaled then looked at her. The chocolate swirls in her eyes were filled with shades of panic, her body shuddering while her shoulders slumped forward. The next thing I knew, she all but fell out of the bed onto her knees right in front of me, bowing so low her forehead was against the floor.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” She groveled at my feet, naked, with the raven strands of her long, dirty hair which hung over her left shoulder splayed across the floor. “I’ve displeased you.”
“What the fuck, woman? Get up.”
She didn’t move.
“I said get up.” I wanted to crouch. To help her up. But that was when I saw it. The scars. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t think. All I saw were the big, thick marks which tainted the skin of her back. Some were older than others, the flesh already white, while others were red, dry scabs still hanging at the edges. It was horrendous mutilations. Remnants of what seemed like brutal lashes, burns, and cut marks. And it all seemed too fucking familiar.
Hanging from the ceiling, chained and bound by her wrists and ankles, she looked like a fucking offering. An offering to God. An offering to me.
Her naked body had never looked more enticing, more pure and beautiful than it did then. Blonde hair braided perfectly hung down her back, a red mask covering her eyes. We’d done this dance before, she and I. A dance of seduction, submission, and complete control. She trusted me. Surrendered herself to me fully. I demanded nothing less. From the very first day she stepped into the playroom with me holding the whip, she knew I would only be satisfied with perfection. Complete and utter submission. And, by God, she gave it to me.
Her body was mine. It belonged to me, and I reminded her of that with every strike of my whip across her skin. Every mark of my cane on her flesh. And every orgasm that tore through her body.
Mine.
Mine.
Mine.
Right here in this room, everything about her was mine. Once that door closed, the outside world didn’t exist. H
er life consisted of nothing but me. I was her master. Her dominant.
I was her fucking king. And like a man obsessed, I wanted it to stay that way. I was possessed and addicted to the adrenaline that pumped through my veins when I witnessed her submission, the way she surrendered her all to me. It was fucking perfect…except tonight it was different. Everything was wrong. It was tainted. Distorted. Ruined.
Red decorated her pale skin, tears of crimson slipping down her naked back, all the way down her legs. Her cries which filled the room weren’t those of ecstasy, but those of pain and agony.
Red.
Red.
Red.
Over and over she said the one word I never thought I’d hear from her lips. And even though I heard her say it, somehow my mind couldn’t understand what the fuck was going on.
Deep grooves had been slashed across her back, open wounds bleeding, her skin marred and mutilated.
What the fuck happened? Nothing about the sight in front of me made any sense. My mind was reeling, the inside of my veins burning with adrenaline.
More blood.
More cries.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak, completely separated from reality…until I felt a weight in my right hand. It was only when I looked down, seeing what I held in my hand, that reality knocked the wind right out of me.
A whip. And at the ends…blood.
My chest ached as the memory assaulted my mind. One word. That was all it took to catapult me back to a past I fought so hard to forget. A past which seemed to never let go of my being.
I swallowed hard. “Please, get up.” My voice wasn’t nearly hard enough for her to hear. “Jesus. I said get up from the motherfucking floor!” My hands wrapped tightly around her shoulders as I yanked her up to her feet, grabbing one of the sheets off the bed and wrapping it around her. Her body trembled, her lips quivering even though it was eighty degrees outside.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She kept repeating it over and over and over again, as if her entire vocabulary only existing of those words, and it was driving me mad.
“Stop.”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Pleading eyes met mine. “The word Master displeased you. I deserve to be punished.”
Punished.
Pain.
Red.
Blood.
“Stop it. Calm the fuck down.” I moved her backward, trying to get her to sit down on the bed, but she kept struggling, wanting to fall down back to the floor.
“Nessuno, I said stop!”
My voice slammed against the concrete walls as she fell to her knees once more.
Her head hung down, her body trembling. “I have displeased you. I deserve to be punished.”
I looked up to the roof. “Jesus Christ,” I muttered under my breath.
The door opened, and Lucio walked in.
I sighed. “Thank God.”
Lucio smirked. “Yeah, I get that a lot when I walk into a room.” Then he noticed the woman on the floor…on her knees…by my feet. He stilled. “I am going to pretend I know exactly what is going on here and that this ain’t weird at all.”
“It’s weird.”
“Yes. Yes, it is.” He closed the door and walked closer. “What’s happening here?”
I pulled my hand through my hair. “This is a goddamn nightmare.”
“A woman groveling at your feet? I dunno. This seems like shit dreams are made of, actually.”
I glowered at him. “Not funny.”
He shrugged. “Yeah. It’s not funny.” He turned to face me. “So, imagine I have a gun to your head right now, and you only have one guess as to what the fuck is happening here right now, what would it be?”
“Oh, my God. Are you fucking serious?”
He nodded. “As cancer.”
I threw my hands in the air and looked up at the roof. Truth be told, with every bone in my body, I believed I already knew what the fuck was going on here. I just didn’t want to say it out loud.
Lucio gave me a pointed look. “So?”
“Christ.” I let out a breath. “You and I both know what’s happening here.”
He cocked a brow at me. “We do?”
“Come on, Lucio. You’re seeing this, right?” I pointed toward Nessuno, who was still on her knees on the floor…by my feet.
Lucio frowned then gestured toward the door. “I think we need to discuss this further outside. Come on.” Lucio grabbed me by the shoulder.
“What about her? I can’t just leave her on the fucking ground.”
He paused. “If you’re right, and we both know what’s going on here, I have a feeling she’s in her comfort zone right now.”
Lucio pulled me back, and I exited the room with him, leaving Nessuno—God, I hated the word—on the floor. I hated it. But I would have been a liar if I said the obedient side of her didn’t stir something deep inside me. Something I had spent my whole life to get rid of.
Lucio closed the door then turned to me. “I say you go first, and then if you’re right and we’re both thinking the same thing, then I won’t feel like such a sick fuck as I do right now.”
I scowled. “I swear to God, sometimes I wonder how the fuck you and I can be related.”
“Small things, cousin. Now spill.”
With narrowed eyes, I stared at him while crossing my arms. “I don’t have to spell it out, Lucio.”
“I know you don’t, but I’d prefer it if you do.”
I pulled my palm down my face, the stubble of my five o’clock shadow scratching against my skin. “Nessuno…she’s a…you know. She’s a…”
“A what?”
Goddammit. I couldn’t get myself to say the word. Saying it out loud would make it a reality and I wasn’t sure whether I was ready to deal with that. Making this entire scenario surrounding Nessuno real would mean I had to confront the part of me I’d worked so hard to hide in the first place.
“Come on, Antonio. For God’s sake.”
“She’s a slave, Lucio. Nessuno is a goddamn sex slave.”
With an unreadable expression, Lucio nodded slightly. “Yup, exactly what I thought. At least now I don’t feel like such a sick fuck.”
I pointed to the bedroom door. “That woman is a slave, which means my theory of human trafficking has about a ninety-nine percent chance of being right on the mark.”
Lucio stared at me before lifting his gaze to the roof. It felt like fucking hours as silence passed between us, until I figured I might as well say what I thought was going on. “I think Nessuno is under the impression I’m her new…” I struggled to find the right word since “master” wasn’t the word I wanted to use.
Lucio frowned. “You’re her new, what? Owner.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Yeah, something like that. Earlier, before you came in, she called me…she called me,” I swallowed, “Master.”
And then Lucio’s entire face lit up as if someone had just told him the Earth was round instead of flat. “That’s what this is. It’s like one of those ‘the newly hatched babies figure the first creature they see is their mom’ kind of thing.”
I blinked. “I’ve always had this feeling that you were somewhere between slightly and completely fucked in the head. Now I’m leaning toward completely.”
“It makes total sense.”
I sighed. “Yeah, that’s the scary part.”
He seemed confused. “What?”
“The fact that it actually makes sense.”
Lucio stepped closer, his face every shade of serious. “Why would she think you’re her new owner?”
I shrugged. “If you think about it, she’s been a slave for fuck knows how long. This kind of life is all she knows. Being owned is all she knows. There’s no reason for her to think we’re any different. That her being here with us will be any different for her. What I don’t get is why me. Why not Lorik, Dante…or you?”
Lucio raised a brow. “First, Lorik? Ew. Second, Dante is so pussy-whipped
with Layla, it would take a special kind of stupid to think he’s even remotely available or interested in any other woman. And third,” he paused for a second, “yeah, I don’t know why not me.” He shrugged. “But maybe she knows.”
“Knows what?”
“Maybe she knows about…you know. You.”
“Um…”
“For fuck’s sake, Antonio. I know, okay? I know about Club X.”
I stepped back, narrowing my eyes. “What?”
Lucio crossed his arms. “You can’t expect me to run security and not know everything there is to know around here.”
My heart picked up its pace. “You followed me?”
“That’s beside the point, Antonio.”
And then I snapped. I launched forward and grabbed him by the collar, shoving him backward and slamming him against the wall. “Who the fuck gave you the right to have me followed?”
“Jesus, calm down.”
“No!” I pulled him forward, slamming his back hard against the concrete. “I am the fucking boss around here. I run things in this goddamn family. You overstepped, Lucio.”
He held up his hands in surrender, not attempting to free himself. “I take my job seriously. I take the protection of this family seriously. If you can’t deal with that, then maybe you should find someone else to do it.”
I tightened my grip on his collar, anger pulsing through my veins. He knew. Lucio fucking knew. I had spent years hiding this part of me, and now someone knew. My own goddamn cousin.
“I’ve known for a while, Antonio. I don’t plan on telling anyone.”
I bit the inside of my mouth while glaring at him for a few more seconds. “Do not forget your place, Lucio.” And then I let go of him. “I am king in this fucking house.”
“I know that.” He straightened his shirt. “What you do in your personal life is none of my business. I don’t give a fuck what shit you’re into, all I care about is protecting you and the rest of the people in this house.”
For a second, I had to respect the loyalty my cousin had toward our family. This kind of loyalty could not be bought, and I needed to appreciate that.