Ch 3

ALESSANDRO

She has been in my suite for three hours. Pacing, no doubt. Probably looking for hidden cameras or escape routes. Maybe even praying, though she doesn’t strike me as the type. Rue doesn’t kneel for gods. Not even devils. Especially not devils.

She’d rather point a gun at one.

I lean against the marble countertop in the upstairs lounge, nursing a glass of scotch that tastes like dirt and fire. My head isn’t in this room. It’s two floors below. In the suite with her. I should be thinking about the traitors who siphoned money from my bloodline. I should be planning how I’ll string them up and make an example of their rotting corpses.

Instead, I was thinking about the fire in Rue’s eyes when she put Luka’s gun to my chest.

She doesn’t understand the rules here. Or maybe she does and just doesn’t care. Either way, I’ve never met a girl who made fear look so intoxicating.

A knock.

“Come in,” I say, already knowing it’s Luka.

He steps in, posture stiff. “She won’t eat.”

I don’t respond.

“She keeps asking for your terms.”

“Of course she does,” I murmured. “She thinks she has leverage.”

Luka shifts on his feet. “Want me to sedate her? That will keep her calm until you’re ready.”

I shoot him a look so sharp he stops breathing.

“She is not cattle.”

He lowers his head. “Apologies, boss.”

I finish my scotch and place the glass down with a quiet clink. “Tell the kitchen to send up fresh pasta, something hot, and wine. She looks like she hasn’t eaten in days.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And Luka?”

He pauses at the door. “Yeah?”

“Next time she grabs your weapon, don’t bring her to me alive.”

His throat bobs as he swallows. “Understood.”

He leaves, and I remain still for another minute, letting silence wrap around me. The kind of silence that only exists right before chaos.

Then I move.

When I walk into the suite, she’s standing by the window, arms crossed, body tense. She doesn’t look at me. Doesn’t flinch. Just speak like I’ve been there all along.

“You don’t get to lock someone up and then pretend they’re supposed to eat like nothing happened.”

“You pointed a gun at me,” I say.

“Because you kidnapped me.”

I walk toward her, slow and deliberate. “ I didn't kidnap you. Your father sold you. In fact, I heard it is you who decided to sacrifice yourself.”

“That doesn’t make it right.”

I stop just a foot behind her. Close enough to smell the defiance bleeding off her skin. “Right and wrong don’t exist in my world. Only survival, debt, and power.”

“Then you should be terrified of someone with nothing left to lose.”

That makes me smile. “Rue, that's not true. You are here, aren't you?”

I step beside her, both of us now staring out at the night-soaked city through the tall windows. “You don’t look like someone who’s given up.”

“I haven’t,” she snaps. “I’m just… calculating.”

I glance down at her. “Smart girl.”

She turns to face me finally. And there it is again, rage wrapped in elegance, grief painted across her cheeks like bruised roses.

“What do you want from me?” she demands. “Really. I told you I would pay what we owe, I don't need to be here”

I study her. Her jaw is set like stone, her lips are in a tight line, but her eyes, they’re screaming. She’s not broken. Not yet, but she’s close.

“I want what I’m owed.”

“You have a hundred cars. Diamonds. People who kill with a look. You don’t need five hundred grand.”

“No,” I agree. “I don’t.”

She waits for more, but I give her silence, I let her sit in it.

“So what? You just enjoy hurting people?” she asks.

I take a slow breath. “You want honesty?”

“Yes.”

“I enjoy control. Breaking people is just a consequence of reminding them they never had any.” Her throat tightens at that. I see it. But she is not saying anything about her displeasure.

She takes a step back. “Then you’re more pathetic than the men you torture.”

The tension in the air thickens instantly. I suddenly feel hurt by her words. I take a step forward to match her. “And you’re bolder than any woman I’ve ever met. That’s dangerous.”

She snorts. “Don’t pretend like it turns you on.”

“I’m not pretending.”

Her eyes narrow with fear in her eyes. “But sadly I’m not here to entertain your twisted fantasies.” I like it.

I reach out and run a knuckle along her jaw, not roughly, not gently. Just enough to remind her she’s standing in the lion’s den.

“No,” I say quietly. “You’re here to survive.” She shivers but doesn’t pull away.

“I’m not scared of you,” she whispers.

“You should be.”

And then I turn and walk out. Because I know what I’m doing, it’s already started working.

That night, I sat in my study and watched the security feed. She’s curled on the far end of the bed, refusing to touch the food, staring out the window like freedom might come flying in through the glass.

She doesn’t cry or whine, she is not sleeping either, she just waits like a soldier stranded behind enemy lines.

And I realize something, she is not a captive, she is a test. A fucking mirror held up to every monstrous thing I’ve become. If my father saw me now, he would call me pathetic.

And if I’m not careful, she’s going to tear me apart with nothing but her silence.

The next morning, I visited the basement again. The man on the hook is dead and the others are close behind.

But I don't really care if they die now or two days later, Not really. Not when the only face I can’t get out of my head belongs to a girl who doesn’t belong here.

The girl who would rather die with dignity than kneel for survival.

I walk into the room, blood coating the concrete floor, and yet all I can see is her. Not her body or her mouth but her fury.

She made me feel something last night. And that? That makes her the most dangerous person in this entire goddamn house.

I step over a puddle of blood, drag the last rat by the collar, and whisper into his ear, “Tell the Milan Don we’re not done yet. And when I find him, I’m going to make him wish he’d chosen anyone but me to mess with.” Then I slit his throat.

As his body slumps to the floor, I close my eyes and picture Rue’s face again. She doesn’t know it yet, but she’s already burned her name into me.