Roxana

(Trigger warning for non-consensual stuff.) 

"A million euros is a lot of money, kitten. You need to work for it," says Stefano and rips my panties off.

Oh crap, this is really happening and I don't even have the chance to prepare a little bit, maybe with a drink or two to not be so painfully conscious.

Marco is staring at us wide-eyed. It looks like he was not expecting this either. Stefano presses his middle finger against the glass and after that, he tilts my face so he can push it into my mouth. I trace it with my tongue obediently but the humiliation is stinging despite everything.

Marco bites his lip and pulls out a gun pointing it in our direction. Fuck! This is not a movie; I bet that here the poor hostage sucker dies, and in this situation that would be me. What the fuck are you doing, Marco?

Shortly after I feel the cold metal of a gun on my temple. Christ in heaven, I cannot die here. What will become of Dani if I do? This whole goddamn day I tried to hold back tears but now they just flow and smear the glass.

Marco clenches his teeth but doesn't lower the gun just yet and that displeases Stefano even more. I feel a jolt of pain when he presses me even harder against the window. My mind is fuzzy and my body is aching while I suffer through the most painful penetration of my whole life, all this while the guy I like is watching. He lowers the gun finally and starts running towards the house but ten armed men walk in his direction from inside and point their weapons at him menacingly.

What happens after is something I didn't see before. It seems like the scene from an action movie, when he fires the six bullets aiming perfectly toward six of the men, injuring them all. But ten minus six is still four and while it looks like magic that he avoids two of the bullets one scratches his face and one his torso.

"Marco!" I can't help gasping and boy was that a mistake too.

"Wrong name, kitten!" says Stefano and I feel a deep thrust while my hair is pulled.

Still, I can't stop watching Marco even between tears. The way he moves is oddly fascinating. With agility that seems out of this world, he gets his hand on a weapon of one of the injured guys and guns down the ones left while still bleeding and cursing.

I thought I knew what I was getting myself into, but good Lord I didn't imagine this and not in such gruesome details. Marco is hovering over a pile of bodies, bruised and bloody but utterly unimpressed. Who the fuck is this guy because it is certainly not the one I ate instant noodles with. If he can gun down ten guys without blinking he could as well have killed that girl too. And if he did, I understand why Stefano does what he does. If someone hurt Dani I would also try my best to make their life a living hell.

Marco walks further towards the house but encounters Rosangela in all her might in the way, pointing a gun at him too. Somehow this time he cannot push the trigger as easily as before.

"Do you like it?" asks Stefano.

What on earth is here to like, you sociopath? Some like it rough; I don't. I also don't know or like you, nor did I imply I was in any way into this, but I guess if you sign your soul away, this is what you should expect. And everything turned even more awful if that was even possible when I had to watch a mass murder scene in the meantime, done by the guy I thought I liked, that is just like you, a fucking psychopath.

In the end, Rosangela says something to him that makes him frown and probably curse again but I can't follow the scene further because Stefano yanks me away from the window and zips up his pants.

"Come on, you are leaving. And don't think about doing anything stupid or I will shoot you. You are quite expandable for me."

I am dragged to the car in the garage. Tomaso is seemingly leaving with me. His face is somber and he is not saying a word. After we exit the grounds he hands me his jacket. I take it gratefully to cover my sparsely dressed body and the sticky fluid that is still running down my thighs. What a day. I am not sure how I am going to make it through the year.

"Is this a usual day in your life?" I ask Tomaso. My voice is drained just like I am, drained of all desire to live. 

"No. This one was particularly... Action-packed," he says with a tired smile.

"Marco hmm... he killed ten men without even blinking."  I can't get the images out of my head.

"No, he didn't kill them all, mostly wounded. He didn't aim to kill, or else they would be dead. Don Marco is one of the best snipers in the world."

"Sniper you say."

"Assassin."

Well Roxi, you were simping over a guy that kills people for a living. A glorious day, isn't it? I would seriously contemplate suicide were it not for Dani and Kary.

I fell asleep on the long drive in the heavy silence. Tomaso shook me awake only when we arrived.

"I need some clothes," I tell him.

"That would be a problem today. Tomorrow I can see to that. Maybe Signorina Chiara can lend you something."

Yeah, top three of my favorite people but I guess I have to give her the dress back, so let's try.

"Come, I will walk you to her room."

I tag along behind him tired as can be.

"This is Don Stefano's suite and that one adjoined is where Signorina Chiara is sleeping."

Aha, good to know.

I knock. Surprisingly, she answers right away and asks me inside. She expected somebody else, I assume, because her expression changes from jolly to annoyed when she sees me.

"Chiara, I uh... came to bring the dress back and Tomaso said perhaps you can lend me some clothes till tomorrow."

"What? Where is your stuff? I understand you didn't have a couture dress but don't you even have a freakin' pyjama?"

Not even underwear.

"Umm no. I left home kind of in a hurry."

She just rolls her eyes and huffs, in very openly expressed annoyance. 

"Wait, what is there on the back of the dress?"

You don't want to know the answer.

"No fucking way, you got a cum stain on my Dior dress?! Get out of my room and I expect you to pay for this."

"You can always ask Stefano for a new one; he was the one that ruined it," I fire back. Ups. That was bad but I couldn't help it. Her face becomes purple and I can imagine the smoke coming out of her ears. I shouldn't have said that, but it was a long difficult day and I ran out of patience. 

"Get out of my room!"

I slam the door shut and get away in a hurry. Now that was one bad idea, not that today wasn't filled with them.

I drag my tired body along the corridor looking out the window at the sunset. That room at the end of the east wing should be the one you can climb on the roof from best. That should have been his room. I can't contain myself and press the door handle. It should be locked but it isn't and when it opens a gasp pushes out my thought. 

Like hypnotized, I push the door open and for a few minutes, I stare bewitched at everything. I would have expected it to be grim, black like everything he wears, barely some things in it but no, this room is just fairy-tale-like beautiful. The silver moonlight shines inside and lets me distinguish the giant bookcase that goes over a whole wall till it reaches the roof, the Art Noveau wrought iron spiral staircase, adorned with iris patterns that leads to a half story housing a wooden desk that fits the baroque air of the rest of the house and the general unexpectedly artsy flair of this place.

Everything is very orderly except the bed which looks like it has not been made since the last time someone slept in it. A few books litter the nightstand and a myriad of papers the desk. Still under the spell, I take off Chiara's heels and climb up the stairs to look at the beautiful image outside showing Mount Edna from the distance and the tragically beautiful full moon.

I can't help smiling a bit, for the first time on this awful day. It seems the psychopath killer is a big reader. On the nightstand is an open copy of Il Principe. It seems to be an old edition, most probably expensive and it is not the only one of that sort.

The desk has a slim laptop on it and lots of papers all around it with... drawings, extremely skilled pencil drawings of buildings, details, and flowers... A rather peculiar one stands out, showing the little girl from the Flintstones cartoon looking at a wall full of clocks. Below in handwriting resembling also a work of art, it says 'Pebbles at the Clock Museum' and that dumb thing brings weird tears into my eyes. I can stop looking at it and emotionally destabilized as I am, I am taking it with me and climbing down the stairs to let myself fall on the bed that was indeed not touched since the last time someone slept it. It still smells like bergamot and at that point, I know that is the smell of illusions.

Today has been so horrible that I just want to indulge a little bit more so I lay there looking at the moon over Monte Gibello and feel my heart breaking piece by piece.

And that was yet another mistake because I must have fallen asleep. The next day I am awoken by the rays of sun on my face and someone screaming in proximity. 

Fuck. This is most probably Stefano. I jump up frightened. But I am luckily wrong, it is just the workers screaming outside.

I shouldn't be here, I shouldn't entered this room at all. Plagues with fear and guilt, I embark on a peculiar walk of shame toward Tomaso's office. 

"I see you didn't have any luck last night."

"No," I answer, avoiding his gaze. 

"Come closer."

I make two steps in his direction.

"Closer, the walls have ears here." Ok, this is weird but I comply. 

When I am only a step away he takes my hand. I freeze. He presses a small something in my palm. It's a white pill.

"Is this?" I mutter, 

"Yes. But no word to anybody about it or it will come with consequences I don't want to imagine."

I nod and swallow it without even needing water. That was close but what in God's name am I going to do for a whole year? I can't become Stefano's baby mama.

My brother and Kary will survive but I am not sure I will after a year with Stefano. Then again, Chiara is here by her own will sulking over the fact that he is having other girls. People are so strange...

"When will he be back?"

"These gatherings take usually one to two days so probably tomorrow."

"Okay," I sigh.

"In that bag are some clothes." He gestures to one, the size of a small suitcase.

"How did you know my size?" Not that it matters if the clothes fit perfectly or not. At this point, I would settle for only halfway clean and not super slutty.

"I guessed. You are about the size of my daughter and I was talking about this with Don Marco too when I bought you the jacket."

"You have a daughter?"

"Two. But they live with their mother in London. We are separated. It's safer like this but I see them once in a while. One of them is only two years younger than you."

Tomaso is a dad and seemingly not a bad one. I am a bit surprised but it fits him.

"Do they know what you do?"

"They do. They do not agree with all of it but they didn't turn their back on me just yet."

"Did you choose this life?"

"No. Let's say it chose me. My father was consigliere of the Messina before me. When you are born in families like these you do not have many choices."

I believe that. I didn't have many choices when I landed here either.

"Can I ask you a favour?"

"Yes."

"Can I call my friend and my brother? Don Stefano took my phone away."

He nods.

"Just wait here."

After a few minutes, he returns with my phone. On the screen are lots of lost calls, many of them from Kary.

"Thank you. For everything." I smile, sad but genuine, and leave the room to call Kary.

"Roxi. Thank goodness. I try to get hold of you for days. Ivan is out of prison and he came here and forced us both to go with him."

"Go where ...?" is the only thing I can say.

"I don't know. He just forced us into a van and afterwards at a warehouse we got separated. I don't know where Dani is. They wanted to sell me off to some Middle Eastern men but there was a guy that I knew from before, who bought me off. Since then I have been trying to find Dani but it is like he vanished."

Vanished...