Page 12 of Ruthless Vow

“I don’t—” Why is it so hard to form a coherent thought?

“Sorry to disappoint you, Nicole, but this isn’t a sex playroom. It’s a place I bring people when I want answers to difficult questions.”

“Questions—”

My brain feels like it’s wrapped in cotton balls. I don’t know where I am or what’s happened. I don’t know—

Hazy memories drift through me, slowly sharpening and coming into focus.

The yacht.

The graveyard.

Luca…Cassio…

Leo.

Again, I failed. All my efforts to stay hidden were for nothing. He found me. He drugged me. He brought me here.

Full awareness slams me like a two-by-four upside the head.

I glance around the room. It’s about twenty by twenty. No windows. Sparse décor. There’s a simple wooden table with four simple wooden chairs. A concrete floor with a drain in the center. A wheeled, stainless steel service cart with an array of tools and instruments: a hammer, a saw, scalpels, pliers…

My stomach lurches. I take a deep breath through my nose and smell lemon cleaner, which tells me this room has recently been scrubbed clean.

Most likely scrubbed clean of blood.

I form a very clear picture of precisely how Leo intends to get answers to his questions.

I draw a shaky breath, fear gnawing at me.

“Start talking, Nicole,” he says, his voice soft. Terrifyingly soft.

“Are you going to kill me?” I ask, my whole body trembling.

“Yes,” he replies flatly. “And you will be grateful when I do. It’s what will precede the killing that should scare you, mypiccololupetta.”

His words make my skin prickle, leaving me cold and clammy, my heart racing. I test my bonds, jerking my hands, making the chain clank.

My reaction pleases him. The corners of his lips curl slightly upward—the sinister smile of a remorseless killer. He’s a fucking tiger playing with his food.

“I want to tell you a story,” he says, his tone light, conversational. “The first time I tortured a man to death, I was nineteen. By the time I was twenty, I had killed four more men. But I had not killed a woman. Not yet.” He rests his palm against my low back and walks a slow circle around me, letting his fingers trace my waist. When he’s behind me, he leans close and says against my ear, “I used my knife. Up close and personal. I removed parts of her, one at a time. I asked her questions, and for each answer I didn’t like, I took a piece of her.”

He slides his hand up until it rests on my left shoulder blade. “She had a tattoo right here. A rose. Lovely work, really. In fact, her tattoo inspired one of my own.” He taps my shoulder blade. “That was the first bit of her I cut away.”

Terror gnaws at me. My panic tastes like iron and ash.

“It took her seven hours to die,” he says. “Seven hours. She screamed and begged for her life for six of those hours. But by the seventh, she was begging to die. She was talking non-stop, sharing every secret she’d ever had.” He moves to stand in frontof me once more, his gaze locked on mine, obsidian, soulless. “And when she was done, I thanked her and slit her throat.”

I press my lips together, desperate to hold back a cry of fear.

He reaches into his pocket and removes his wallet. It’s pale beige, the leather very smooth.

“A souvenir,” he says, turning the wallet so I can see the black lines of a rose. He quirks a brow. “Do you have any tattoos, Nicole?”

“No,” I whisper, horror settling in my veins.

He slides his wallet back into his pocket and lifts a knife from the cart.

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