"And when he grew tired of her—which he did, because he always does—he discarded her. Not with violence. With indifference. Which is far worse." He stops in front of me, tilting my chin up with the crop. "Last I heard, she was working in some café in Toronto. She flinches when men speak too loudly. Can't make decisions without asking permission first. Doesn't even remember who she used to be."
I swallow hard, suddenly questioning everything I thought I knew about the man who brought me here.
"Giovanni doesn't destroy women, Emmaleen. He remakes them into what he wants. And when he's done with his creation, he simply... sets it aside. Like a child bored with a toy." His eyes bore into mine. "You think you're different? Special? They all did."
My head spins like a carousel with all its light bulbs shot out. His words slicing through my defenses, nicking all the places I've tried to armor up. For a terrifying moment, I can't conjure a single snarky thought. My inner monologue—usually a relentless stream of commentary—stutters and buffers like a YouTube video on dial-up.
Pull it together, Emmaleen.
The sick thing is, I can picture it perfectly. Giovanni, methodically disassembling a woman piece by piece, his precise hands separating her components like one of those exploded-view diagrams. The beautiful shell in Toronto, flinching at loud voices.
I close my eyes, trying to force my brain back online.
Get. A. Grip.
What the hell am I doing here? Standing naked in a basement while a ski-masked man circles me like a shark.There's a literal riding crop involved. And a manual of submission that reads like it was written by a control freak with a thesaurus and a God complex.
Giovanni clearly wants me gone.Here’s your prize, Miss Take. Cash, a plane ticket, a new identity. Take it and run. When that didn't work, he resorted to... whatever the fuck this is. Submission Boot Camp. Demerits and humiliation and rules designed to break me.
And yet I'm still here. Why?
My brain offers up a series of increasingly stupid answers:
Because I need the money.(The money is upstairs, practically begging me to take it.)
Because I'm stubborn.(There's stubborn, and then there's whatever standing naked in a basement qualifies as.)
Because I have nowhere else to go.(The world is large. Toronto, apparently, has cafés.)
Because I want to win.(Win what, exactly? The privilege of being hollowed out?)
But beneath all those half-truths lurks the real reason, the one I'm afraid to admit even to myself.
I like this game.
I like that I've captivated the imagination of this dangerous, controlled man.
That I've somehow gotten under his skin.
That I matter enough for him to build an entire elaborate scenario just to prove I don't.
A man like Giovanni Bavga doesn't play games he doesn't need to play. If he truly wanted me gone, there are more efficient ways to do it. He could have taken his money back, thrown me in a trunk, and dropped me in the middle of nowhere without a backward glance.
Or had his goons handle it. No involvement whatsoever.
But instead, he put me here.
Playing along with my double-or-nothing challenge.
And he brought his A-game.
This whole setup—the basement, the manual, Master Ski Mask here—it's all Giovanni's move in whatever twisted chess match we've found ourselves in. He's not fucking around. He's showing me exactly what I'm getting myself into if I stay.
So maybe I should bring my A-game too.
The Master is still watching me, waiting for my reaction to his little speech about Giovanni's past conquests. I let my eyes meet his through the ski mask holes.
I consider the question burning in my mind: Can I win by merely complying?