His eyes are dead. His smile pure evil.
He steps forward and wrenches the broom from my hands. I clatters to the floor behind him.
“But I need that to clean up.”
He grabs me and slams me back into the pantry shelves. My arm is wrenched up and twisted behind me so fast I can’t react. A jolt of pain shoots through my shoulder.
“What do you want?” I gasp. My chest tightens. Panic climbs, and I can’t breathe right.
He says nothing.
Only silence and the sound of my own ragged breath.
Finally, he speaks. “You know what to do.” A pack of cigarettes and a lighter drop onto the shelf beside my face. “You piss me off, you pay.”
I try to placate him. “I’m sorry.”
“Things will be different in Chicago. You drop a tray like you did tonight, and I’ll leave burn marks across your body.”
What can I say to make him release me, some line that will pacify him? “I’ll be a new girl in Chicago. A good one.”
He laughs, and it’s vile. He’s enjoying fucking with me.
His breath smells sour as his lips graze my earlobe. The urge to hurl is great.
“We’ll practice tonight.”
My brain scrambles to decode his words.
He thumbs his phone, the cigarettes forgotten. “You left animpression on me, and I’ve been thinking about this since your visit.” His tone reads eager. I’m terrified to learn why. “But I couldn’t remember your size to prepare.”
Prepare?
He presses play on a video.
What I see is worse than anything I could imagine.
I blink, trying to understand what I’m viewing. A person lies still on a cement floor, completely engulfed in a white latex catsuit. Only the eyes, nostrils, and mouth are exposed. She can’t move. She doesn’t even try.
The terror in her gaze is unmistakable.
Oh God.
She looks like something discarded. Not a person anymore. Just a shell.
“What is this?” I whisper.
He presses his erection into my back, and my stomach turns.
“Your future.”
This excites him. He gets off on this. The control. The fear.
“But Carlo …”
“I’ll be our secret.”
“Whatever you want.” My voice quivers even though I want to scream. “I swear I won’t say a word.”