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When we came to a door at the end of the corridor, Cristian didn’t pause, didn’t give me a moment to catch my breath to acclimate to whatever might lay beyond. No.
He thrust me in.
The smell hit me the second I crossed the threshold. Sour. Rotten. Human waste. Blood. Death. Mixed with some kind of perfume, an expensive oil diffuser making it all the more rancid in here.
The source of the smell was the dead man shackled to a metal chair in the middle of the room.
Pete.
Barely recognizable.
He was covered in blood.
Flaps of his skin were hanging down from his face, arms, legs. Blood covered almost every inch of him and his clothing.
I didn’t look away. Didn’t cry out. Didn’t vomit on the stone floor. I just stared at him, entranced by the hideousness of it all. The violent way in which he had died. Cristian was behind me somewhere, waiting for my reaction.
I wasn’t sure whether this was a test or a show of something. He wasn’t showing me this because he wanted me to fear him. I should’ve feared him, staring at what he was capable of, but I didn’t. No, this only served to make me more curious about Cristian, desperate to know every inch of him. Every ugly thing about him.
“This is where I killed them all,” Cristian said from behind me, his voice bouncing off the stone walls. “Every single one that I thought might have had a hand in Isabella’s murder.”
My eyes ran over the room. It was luxurious. Rich reds and woods were used to decorate. Comfortable leather armchairs sat in front of Pete’s body, in case someone wanted to watch as Cristian tortured someone. A sick, disgusted part of me was excited by the thought, disappointed I wasn’t here to listen to Pete’s screams.
“This room was the place that made me into a Don,” Cristian continued. He hadn’t moved. I didn’t turn to look at him. “I killed and tortured without mercy. Without conscience. I lost my soul in this room, Sienna.”
My stomach swirled at the sincerity of his words. He believed he was a soulless monster. I wasn’t so sure.
Silence pulsated through the room like a living thing until I heard skin slap against the stone. Cristian walking toward me. My body was taut, wired, but it relaxed when I felt the warmth of his presence.
“I’m not going to repeat the past, Sienna,” Cristian murmured, pushing my hair aside so he could lay his lips on my neck.
Goosebumps rose on my skin.
“I’m not going to let a man like that draw breath, whatever deal I made with him.” Though I couldn’t see his face, I knew he was staring at Pete, fury and hatred thick in his tone. “This was a man that sought to trade you like an object. That did not know your worth. Did not treasure you.” His hand moved to slip under the silk of my robe, running over my pebbled nipple. “So he pays.”
My breathing quickened as he tweaked my nipple.
“This is your life, Sienna,” he said, voice running over my skin like a caress. “You will walk with death, blood and pain.”
It wasn’t a question. Wasn’t a choice. I didn’t have an escape now. And even though I was looking at the grotesque corpse of a man I had planned to marry, I didn’t want to escape.
Chapter Fifteen
One Week Later
Felix was now training me.
Training. Me.
I’d tried to fight when Cristian broached the subject the morning after ... everything. Cristian had made it clear that was a fight I wasn’t going to win. I’d screamed at him.
Threw a mug at the wall.
He’d watched the tantrum with a raised brow but otherwise no reaction.
“You can break as much as you’d like, Sienna,” he’d told me, sipping his coffee. “Tear the house down with your bare hands. It will not change the fact that at six every morning, you will be down in the basement.” He put his mug down, eyes on me. “I will do everything in my power to make sure the only marks you wear on your body come from me. And I have considerable fucking power, Sienna.”
He paused, like he knew what his words, his tone, were doing to me. He knew the bruises on my inner thighs throbbed as he spoke.
“But I am not leaving anything to chance,” he continued. “Not when it comes to you. Not ever fucking again. Only one man gets to hurt you. And you’re wearing his fucking ring.” His eyes burned into me, wild with everything we’d shared in the past week.
“In a handful of weeks, you will have my name,” he said. “With that name comes expectation. Though I will die first, if a situation arises where you need to protect yourself, you’re going to know how to do it.” He picked up the paper beside him. Cristian still read a physical paper. It was endearing, impossibly attractive and somehow masculine.
