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I plead with my eyes as he approaches, silently begging for mercy, for forgiveness—though I’m not sure if I’m asking Adrien to forgive me for getting him into this situation or asking Vittorio to forgive whatever perceived slight led to this punishment.

My thoughts are fragmenting, rational thinking giving way to pure animal survival instinct.

“Relax,” he orders, his tone almost gentle despite the violence of his actions. “Fighting makes it worse.

Vittorio stands at the foot of the bed, his chest rising and falling with exertion, sweat glistening on his tattooed torso.

His eyes roam over me with clinical detachment, assessing the damage he’s inflicted like an artist examining his canvas.

I want to curl into myself, to hide the evidence of what he’s done, my muscles refuse to cooperate, trembling too violently to obey even the simplest commands.

“You really were a virgin,” he says, sounding almost impressed. He reaches for the blanket I’d abandoned, and for one surreal moment, I think he might cover me, might grant me this small mercy.

Instead, he rips it completely aside, exposing me fully to the cool air of the hotel room. “Spread your legs wider,” he orders, his voice hoarse from exertion.

When I don’t move fast enough—can’t move fast enough—he grips my ankles and forces my legs apart. The movement sends fresh pain spiraling through my core, drawing a broken whimper from my throat.

“Shh,” he soothes, climbing back onto the bed and positioning himself between my spread thighs. “I know you’re sore, pretty girl. I can make it better.”

Better? There is no better. There’s only this nightmare that keeps unfolding in new and terrible ways. I shake my head weakly, unable to form words through the fog of pain and humiliation.

“Don’t worry,” he murmurs, his hands surprisingly gentle as they stroke my inner thighs, smearing blood across my skin. “This part, you’ll like.”

His face lowers toward my wounded flesh, and panic surges through me, momentarily overriding the pain. My leg jerks in an instinctive attempt to close, to protect myself from whatever fresh violation he’s planning.

Vittorio’s head snaps up, his eyes hardening. “Kick me and I will bite you,” he warns, his fingers digging painfully into my thighs. “Do you understand?”

I nod frantically, tears leaking from the corners of my eyes.

He holds my gaze for a long moment, making sure the threat has registered, then his expression softens again into that eerie facsimile of tenderness.

Unfortunately, my body doesn’t understand his words, and the moment he lowers his head, my leg moves to kick him.

Then his teeth clamp into the tender flesh of my inner thigh without warning.

I scream, the sound tearing from my throat before I can stop it. The pain is sharp, immediate—different from the deep ache between my legs. No that pain is long forgotten as this new agony tears through me as he bites hard on my pussy and clit.

“I fucking warned you,” he chides when he releases my flesh, licking the indentations his teeth have left behind. “Last warning.”

Before I can process what’s happening, his mouth moves higher, his tongue flicking out to taste the blood and fluids coating my abused flesh. I gasp, the sensation so unexpected, so bizarre in its twisted intimacy that my mind struggles to categorize it.

This isn’t sex. It isn’t rape, not exactly, not anymore. It’s something else—a claiming, a marking, a debasement so complete that I feel myself fragmenting, pieces of my identity floating away like ash from a burning building.

His tongue moves with practiced skill, somehow finding places that don’t hurt, places that—in any other context, with any other person—might even feel good.

The contrast between this almost-pleasure and the searing pain that preceded it is disorienting, nauseating.

My body, already confused by trauma, doesn’t know how to respond.

Vittorio makes a sound against my flesh—approval or disappointment, I can’t tell. His hands slide beneath my hips, lifting me slightly, changing the angle of his assault. His tongue probes deeper, tasting blood and violence and violation.

“So sweet,” he murmurs against me, the vibration of his voice sending unwanted sensations through my traumatized nerve endings. “Even like this.”

I want to vomit. I want to scream. I want to kick him in his smug, monstrous face and run until my legs give out. Adrien’s life depends on my compliance, on my surrender. So I lie still, tears streaming silently down my temples and into my hair, and I endure.

Time stretches, elastic and uncertain. It could be minutes or hours that I lie there, pinned beneath Vittorio’s mouth, trapped in this strange purgatory between pain and unwanted stimulation.

My body betrays me in small ways—a quickened breath, a slight arch when he finds a particularly sensitive spot.

Each involuntary response feels like another violation, another piece of myself lost.

Finally, he lifts his head, his mouth glistening with evidence of his actions. He wipes it casually on the back of his hand, studying my face with that same clinical interest.

I think of Adrien, still watching, still suffering. I wonder if he hates me now, if he blames me for this horror we’ve fallen into. I wouldn’t blame him if he did. This is my fault— my stupidity, my recklessness. I got us into this, and now I can’t get us out of it.

Vittorio’s tongue moves with deliberate purpose, no longer exploring just focused, intent.

There’s something mechanical about it now, a task to be completed rather than a pleasure to be savored.

I feel nothing—not pain, not pleasure, not even revulsion anymore.

Just a distant awareness that my body is being used in ways I never consented to.

When he finally stops, lifting his head to study my face again, I keep my eyes closed. I can’t bear to see the satisfaction in his gaze, the ownership he believes he’s claimed over me.

I force my eyes open, blinking to clear the tears. His face hovers above mine, studying my expression with something that might almost be concern.

“There’s my girl,” he murmurs, brushing a strand of hair from my forehead with surprising tenderness. “The worst is over now. You did well.”

The praise lands like acid on an open wound as if I’ve accomplished something worthy of recognition.

As if surviving his violation is an achievement to be celebrated.

“Now you’ll be rewarded for telling the truth,” he murmurs so low it has me staring at him, wondering what he means.

He leans over to the bedside table and retrieves something from the drawer.

My eyes see the glint of metal just as he twists, then the next second the bang of it resonates through the space, making my ears ring, and I scream as he puts a bullet between Adrian’s eyes.