Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 136731 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 684(@200wpm)___ 547(@250wpm)___ 456(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 136731 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 684(@200wpm)___ 547(@250wpm)___ 456(@300wpm)
It rings twice, before he answers a gruff, “What?”
I want to say so many things to him, yet part of me wants to hang up without saying a word. “Ana’s alive.”
Shuffling, then a rough, “Who is this?”
“She’s alive, bro. Gambino’s got a place on Canningvale. She’s there, and she’s waiting for you.” A quick pause. “The fuck you waiting for? Go get her.”
“Who the fu—” I cut him off when I hang up.
I sit on the closed lid of the toilet seat and run my hands down my face, knowing a storm is brewing, and I’m willingly about to step into the eye of it.
Sometimes I wonder about myself. I really do.
God, help me.
My palms are sweaty, head swimming, with my long hair pasted to my dampened back, resulting in an itch that causes more agitation than it should, knowing I’ll never be able to reach it with my hands tied.
Gio hasn’t offered me food in the days I’ve been here. I don’t know how many have passed, but when he ate in front of me this morning and my stomach rumbled loudly, he laughed to himself. “Not wasting food on a dead woman.”
And there it was.
He planned to torture me until my last breath.
My stomach turned violently at the thought. The place inside of my head, the safe spot I escaped to, my happy place, had grown darker and darker until no light shone and there was no longer happiness there.
I had won a battle by framing Dino, but Gio would win the war.
In the end, the satisfaction of small victories was short lived and growing more and more stale by the second. Starvation has left me weak of both body and mind. Torture has broken my spirit. And I’m ready to die.
Craving it, more accurately.
I silently wish I could see Julius one last time, feel his kiss on my lips as I passed onto a higher plane.
It would be the happiest ending for me.
But people like me don’t have their wishes come true. People like me die in the cool silence of the night, naked and alone, without a single soul looking for them.
People like me are dispensable.
We are nothing, gone in a wisp of smoke, carried away by a moonlight shadow.
My eyes are closed and my breathing labored, a large hand grips my chin harshly, lifting it up, higher than is comfortable. I try to open my eyes, but I can’t, and a memory of the beating Gio delivered only hours ago reminds me that my eyes are swollen almost completely shut. When something cold is pressed to my temple, my body breaks out into gooseflesh.
“Like that, do you?” I recognize the voice. I attempt to remove my chin from his hold, but he grips it tighter. “Calm down. I’m here to help you. Show a little appreciation.”
My lips cracked, I try to lick them, but my mouth is just as dry. My neck painfully stretched, I rasp out, “Kill me.”
I hear his smile. “I will, baby. Gambino’s out like a log, and I’m going to slit your pretty little throat, spill all your blood with a single gash.” He presses his lax lips to my cheek, and his breath warms me, as he whispers an apologetic, “I know I said I wouldn’t, but I can’t help it. I’m… I’m not normal. I love death, love watching it, love causing it. It’s just who I am.”
Right now, I don’t care what he is, if he’ll grant me this one kindness.
“Please,” I all but beg.
The hand at my chin begins to shake, and Maxim Nikulin nips my jaw. “I’m sorry.” His lusty voice trembles. “I need to do this. I need to.”
The tip of the cool blade is pressed to the side of my forehead, just above my temple. I don’t feel much of anything, just a dull pressure. A second passes, and the pain quickly follows. My mouth parts and I let out a low keening moan.
Maxim Nikulin shushes me. “It’ll be over soon, but you have to be quiet. Just a little longer.” His shaking hand makes a mess of my face. His quiet groan barely audible, he utters a clearly aroused, “Fuck yeah.” The sharp blade slices into my skin, past my temple, down my jawline and over my lips, ending at my chin.
He takes a moment to view his handiwork before sighing in satisfaction, returning the blade to rest at the place where my head meets neck with one hand, while pushing my chin up with the other.
“It’s almost over,” he promises, and breathing in deeply, I take in my last breath.
Lost inside my head, preparing for what is to come, I miss the beginning of the commotion. Loud male voices shout and a struggle ensues, with furniture scraping along the floor, breaking and cries of pain filling the air.