Page 37 of Passion and Revenge

“My name isn’t Marino.”

“I’ll call you whatever I want,” he snarls. “I’ll decide when you get to die and if you get to live, what clothes you’ll wear and what foods you’ll eat. I’ll do whatever I want with you because you’re completely at my mercy.”

I know it’s just my imagination, but the collar seems to tighten at his words, making me feel even more trapped.

“If you don’t do it, then I will,” I roar at him, waiting for him to lash out. His lack of reaction is drawing out a leashed madness inside of me. I’m angry, I’m frustrated, terrified for my father and myself, worried sick for him, and bored.

All of it is driving me off the edge, and yet here he is. The man responsible for making me like this is sitting here calm as a cucumber and looking every inch like a suave and refined gentleman in the dark turtleneck and grey pants that are molded to his body.

“You’ll do what exactly?” Alessandro asks.

“There are a thousand ways to ruin your master plan,” I say with a shrug. “It’s not as foolproof as you imagined it.”

Blue eyes lock on mine, all traces of lust gone.

Swallowing the lump in my throat, I continue, “I suspect your master plot won’t be all that satisfactory without your key players.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“Well, by all means, enlighten me then.” He spits the words like they’re something foul, and I furrow my eyebrows, confused.

“The bathroom mirror,” I say after a minute of silence spent waiting for him to elaborate. “I can break it and slice my own carotid.”

“How morbid,” he drawls. “Fortunately, I’ve taken the precaution of installing a tempered glass mirror. But you’re welcome to try a hundred other ways of killing yourself. We both know you’re too much of a coward to do it.”

“If there’s anyone who’s a coward here, it’s you,” I spit, furious that he’s saying the same thing I just thought to myself earlier.

He rolls his shoulders in a nonchalant shrug, but I can see the way the corners of his eyes tighten, telling me he’s not as unaffected by the words as he’s trying to show.

“Also, you being dead or alive does nothing to derail my plans. Don’t think you’re a major player in this game, Sienna,” he says bluntly. “Your life isn’t as valuable as you think. You’re, at best, a side character. A supporting piece. Replaceable. Irrelevant.”

The cruel words reverberate through me, and I still. It took me years to work through my feelings of being unimportant to my father, and I thought I had left that far behind, but suddenly, I’m thirteen-year-old Sienna again, begging for Papa’s attention while he buried himself in work and then crying in the library.

The memory plays before my eyes, bringing a flood of past feelings with it. I wasn’t enough for him after my mother passed. It felt like he only loved me because of her, not because of who I was. It was why it was so easy for him to ship me away so he could drown in his grief. While he was mourning my mother, I was left to battle something no child should have had to.

Irrelevant.

The word echoes in my head.

And I wonder for the millionth time if my father would care about what happened that summer.

“If you die today, Sienna, it won’t change anything.” His voice snaps me back to the present. “I’ll throw your body into a pool full of piranhas, and I won’t stick around to watch what becomes of you. But the prosecutor won’t know you’re dead. He’ll continue his fruitless efforts to find you.” The bastard cocks his head, looking thoughtful. Then, he adds, “Come to think of it, maybe that’s the best solution.”

I tuck some of the hair that’s crowding my face behind my ear, and his sharp gaze follows the movement before coming to linger on my mouth.

I blink at him, and for the first time, I wonder if one day, that barely hidden hunger in Alessandro’s eyes will boil up to the surface. What will make a man like him explode?

Thoughts like this are dangerous, I know, but I cannot help but feel annoyed at the fact that he’s so casual about all this. He speaks about my death like it’s as mundane as a phone battery dying. Nothing seems to faze him.

“Perfect then,” I say stiffly. “How generous of me to become a willing sacrifice in your grand scheme. Do it. Kill me. Put a bullet through my head and toss me in with the cannibal fish. It beats having to look at you.”

A dry chuckle escapes him. “I remember when you called me the most handsome man alive.”

“That’s when I thought you were a businessman who was interested in my art, not a man who tosses out threats to use me as fish food,” I snap back.

“Don’t tell me, Sienna, you’re one of those people who say that beauty lies on the inside.” He’s clearly mocking me.

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