Page 48 of Vicious Little Princess

No sign of any hostiles.

I stepped inside, finding myself in a large open space with a scuffed hardwood floor that had seen better days, along with two walls that had been torn down, revealing big gaps through the rest of the area. I walked through a makeshift arch and found myself in a wide corridor with closed doors on either side, listening carefully as I went.

Muffled sounds reached me, sending a surge of adrenaline flooding through my system.

I followed them to the first closed door on the left.

Taking a centering breath, I kicked it open and burst in, ready to clear the room, only to find it empty.

Well, of people.

I’d walked into a surveillance area.

The equipment looked brand new and as I peered closer; I saw that it was actually state-of-the-art and it really stood out from the rest of the place that I’d observed so far.

Hmm.The place was being renovated, not just in the process of being torn down, as the state of those walls had suggested.

This was one of the first rooms to get the renovation treatment.

I walked to the monitors, finding them observing different rooms inside the house. Most were empty.

But then I saw one decked out like a BDSM dungeon, somewhat similar to a few of the rooms atNocturne.

My breath caught in my throat as I took in Angelo stalking around a black bed where somebody was bound naked.

I peered closer and nearly vomited when I identified the person as Julian.

“Oh my God,” I breathed.

He was shaking his head from side-to-side and writhing in clear pain on the bed.

I found the volume button and turned it up enough to hear what was actually going on.

“Please, just stop. I can’t… I can’t take another second.”

“You begged me to fuck that sweet ass. And, hell, did I make you come. I’m still wearing it all over me.”

“To end… this. It’s done… just… stop.”

Angelo lunged forward and wrapped his hand around Julian’s throat.“You were playing me? After all we’ve done together? After how you melted for me? I’m getting you medication and treatment tonight and this is how you repay me? You are fucking mine. That isn’t changing. Just for that, you’re gonna take me raw. I’ll show you how much you belong to me, tear through all this denial bullshit.”

I cursed, then stepped back.

I couldn’t tell which room they were in. It could be any of them.

A creak sounded, and I just managed to activate the panic button beneath my ring and spin around in time as one of Angelo’s masked men lunged at me.

I kicked him back and as he fell into the control panel, an idea occurred to me.

So, when he came at me, I pretended to lose my grip on my gun, and I let him drive me into the wall. He snatched the gun up and shoved it against my temple.

“I know who you are,” he told me. “The boss is gonna want to deal with you personally.”

Excellent. Plan progressing nicely.

I let him drag me out of the room and down the hallway, shoving me every few steps, then jamming the gun into my back to make it clear it was still there and very much a threat.

He grabbed my arm and hauled me up a set of dirtied carpeted stairs to the second floor, down another corridor, until we came to the room at the far end straight ahead.

---