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Idon’t particularly want to eat. I never used to have issues with appetite, but now that I have nothing to do except dread Giulio, Damien, or Slayer’s visits, my stomach ties itself up in knots and threatens to expel any food. Every day is spent in anticipation of one of them showing up to drag me out of the room and force me to service them.
“I’m not hungry,” I tell whoever is at the door, curling myself toward the wall. I half-expect it to be one of the men, to have them tell me they don’t care, and despair sweeps over me. A few nights ago when that door had opened, it had been Giulio and Slayer, who had been intent on having me give them lap dances.
It might’ve been comical if it hadn’t been so humiliating.
“I’m coming in,” a female voice answers, completely ignoring me.
Not Stef, this time, but Elena. I glance at her briefly to see her carrying a tray with a full lunch on it. She walks over to the bed and sits down, placing the tray between us.
“You can’t simply starve yourself,” Elena says softly. “No matter how much you want to.”
I stare down at the tray. I’m torn between hunger and nausea, unsure of which is stronger. It smells good, but I don’t know if I can keep anything down, not with the stress and the constant fear. I shake my head. “I’ll eat later,” I say. “I’m really not hungry.”
For a few minutes, Elena doesn’t say anything. She picks at her fingers, hiding her face behind her hair. Hiding her scars, maybe, the strange, stretched out ones that I can only begin to guess how she received. In a fire, maybe, or somebody dumping scalding water on her.
“When I first… When I was first forced to work here,” Elena begins quietly. “I felt the same. I tried everything I could think of to kill myself. I tried starving myself. I tried cutting. I tried suffocating. I even once attempted to drown myself in that tiny sink.”
I look at her, horrified. No matter how bad the situation is, suicide hasn’t even crossed my mind. Would it now? Would I be tempted now that the thought’s been planted in my head, a way to escape?
No. Lucia needs me. I don’t know how, and I don’t know when, but I’m going to get out of here, and I’m going to… My shoulders slump. I’m utterly helpless, and I know it. I can’t understand the level of despair Elena must’ve been going through when she’d first arrived here, and I’m grateful for that—even though the gratitude makes me feel guilty.
I want to say something powerful, meaningful, but I can’t think of anything. I bite my bottom lip then look down at the tray.
“They’ll force feed you if they think you’re starving yourself. It isn’t pleasant.” Elena spears some of the large noodles with the fork and holds it out to me. “Please. Things won’t get better if you have no energy at all.”
“Things aren’t going to get better, period,” I tell her. I take the fork anyway and force myself to eat the bite. I swallow, then tell her bitterly, “They’re going to keep me here forever. Until I have… his… child, then for more children, then they’re going to sell me off when they get tired of me.”
“Yes.” Elena chuckles darkly. “Things don’t get better, for a long, long time. But Giulio… Giulio is the reason I was able to survive. The one kind person in all of this. He did what he could to defy his father and helped me out in little ways.” She gives me a strained smile. “You can’t think about where you’d rather be. You have to accept where you are now and figure out what you can do for yourself here.”
I can’tacceptit. That would be like admitting defeat before I ever had a chance to do anything about it. I stab at the noodles, getting another forkful to buy myself time. “You mean I should play along with Giulio and his… games, and pretend to want him and Damien and Slayer, and hope they decide to be nicer to me for it.”
Elena nods. “That’s one way, yes. I don’t like Slayer any more than you do, but he’s predictable once you figure out what he wants. Damien… will defer to Giulio. And Giulio… well, I can’t call him predictable. His moods will change on a whim. But if you play along, he generally doesn’t care if you like him or not.” She smiles, the scars pulling strangely on her skin. “Even as a kid, he was unpredictable. I think that was the only way he could ever get attention from his father.”
“Emilio was a monster,” I say. “He’d have been better off without his attention.”
Elena reaches up to touch her scarred face. “No child wants to believe that of their parents.” Then she meets my eyes. “Suppose you continue as you are. You’ll get pregnant, birth a child. And… you’ll have so little energy, and be confined here all the time, so you won’t be able to see the child you bore. The only role models it will have will be Giulio, and Damien, and possibly Slayer. Is that preferable to you?”
I recoil as though she’s slapped me. “No!” I say without even needing to think about it. I take a deep breath, forcing myself to remain calm. “No.” I don’t want to imagine having a child, only to have them grow up to be like the brutal men who would claim an unwilling woman and force theirlegacyupon her. “But what could I possibly do to stop it? If it’s a girl, maybe. I was… pretty sheltered from the mafia side of things. But a boy? They’ll indoctrinate him as soon as he can walk.”
And I don’t know if I can stand to watch that.
“Maybe you can’t stop everything. But if you compare Giulio to his father…” Elena lowers her head again. “He’s done his best to help me. He is far gentler to the women here than his father ever was. I know… I know this isn’t a good situation. I know I’m pitiable. But I can’t imagine any other man who would accept me as I am so easily. Even after I was mutilated, he’s never had a problem meeting my eyes. And maybe I’m thinking too highly of myself, but I want to believe that it was my influence on him that softened his edges.”
I want to scoff at her. He isn’t soft at all. But she seems to be trying, genuinely trying, for reasons I can’t even begin to understand, to get me to see Giulio in a different light.
I shake my head. “I don’t understand why he couldn’t just… find someone willing. There have to be plenty of women who would love to have his children. Why me?” I’m frustrated to find tears rolling down my cheeks, and I set the fork down so I can hurriedly wipe them away. Damn it, I feel like all I do is cry these days.
“Damien likes you,” Elena says. “Giulio doesn’t get attached to people easily. I think there are two people he currently cares about—me, and Damien. Perhaps even Slayer, for reasons I don’t understand.” Her lip curls slightly in distaste. “So if Damien wants you, then Giulio will give you to him. But… I don’t understand Damien well enough to know why he chose you.”
“I don’t either,” I say honestly. “He watched over me after Emilio had my father killed and took over. I didn’t do anything special. He just… liked me. He always wanted to touch me and be near me. I’m not like my sister. She’s outgoing and good with people, good with men. I’m… not. There’s nothing special about me. He’ll see that eventually.” I have to fight back the tears again. And what will they do with me once he does see that? Throw me onto the floor here? Get rid of me? The only thing I know for sure is that they won’t let me go home.
It isn’t a pleasant realization.
“I can’t tell you what to do,” Elena says. “But when I became…useless… to Emilio, things got worse for me.” Then she pushes the tray closer to me. “Finish up. Stef is worried about you, you know.”
I reluctantly pick up the fork again, poking at the food. “She’s too nice for this place,” I say, then take another bite.
“Because the not nice girls deserve to be here, of course,” Elena answers sharply.
