Page 48 of Ruthless Sinner
“No,” Tommaso decides. “I will not apologize. I was the best father I could have been to a selfish, aggravating little bitch that killed the only woman I ever loved.”
The stubbornness in Adalina’s eyes is a mirror image of her father, Tommaso. But while it serves her well, it will be the death of Tommaso. “Have at it,” I nod to Enzo and my brothers. “But don’t kill him. I’ve got one thing left in store for him.”
The three of them jump on him like a pack of wild dogs. His roars of pain are complemented by the sound of flesh meeting flesh.
“Come here.” I reach out to grab Adalina’s hand and draw her closer. Her eyes widen as she gets nearer. “This is for you.”
Adalina tears her eyes away from the brutal scene of my men mercilessly beating Tommaso. In my hand, I hold a knife and offer it to her. If she wanted, she could rip it from my grasp and plunge it into my chest, but I don’t think she’s going to do that. I have every hope in the world that she’ll use it for its intended purpose. “Are you sure?” She asks as she touches the blade.
Her pupils dilate with a dark, insatiable hunger that mirrors my own. I admire and envy the opportunity I present her with. Part of me yearns to be in her position, but another part revels in seeing her take on this role—she is the perfect substitute for my darkest fantasies. “No matter what we do to your father, it’ll never be enough to pay you back for all the pain and suffering you endured at his commands.”
She takes the knife from me, her good hand curling around the hilt. It is my final offering to her, a desperate attempt to show her that she is worth more than just a bargaining chip in the cruel game between her father and me. “I want to carve my name into his chest,” Adalina says after a minute. “I want him to die scarred and scared, the same way I thought I was going to die on nights when his guards wouldn’t stop beating me because it gave them hard-ons.”
I wish I could cut off the dick of every man in Tommaso Martinelli’s service. I envision their screams as I wield my knife, slicing through flesh and bone until only mangled stumps remain.
“You can do whatever you want.” I grab Adalina by the shoulders and turn her to face her father. He looks like raw hamburger meat, and the men don’t stop. They continue pounding away at his face, his chest, his stomach, and even his cock. They bury their fists into his body until he can no longer cry out or remain conscious. “He is yours now, Adalina. Break him the way he wanted to break you.”
Chapter 50
Adalina
My vision is drenched in crimson, not from actual blood but from the haunting fantasies of me violently ending my father’s life. It is this vision that propels me forward, pushing me to intervene in the brutal violence being inflicted upon him. Their fists are raised, ready to deliver the final blow at any time, but they hesitate and back away as I approach with a glinting knife in hand.
I press it against the fabric of his shirt and watch as it effortlessly tears through the material, exposing his heaving chest beneath. His body is covered in a sheen of sweat and drool, but I pay no mind to the mess. My heart thuds violently against my ribcage, like a caged animal desperate for freedom. The sound of my blood rushing in my ears is drowned out by the whooshing of the blade as I etch the first letter into his skin. The sharp tip slices through his nipple, unleashing a fresh stream of crimson that joins the already pooling blood below.
For the first time in my life, I want to be close to my father.
He moans, his eyes still closed, as if he’s stuck somewhere between life and death. He tries to speak, but his words are a gurgle, and I am not fluent in the language.
My letters are jagged and crude, the result of a rusty blade carving into skin. They resemble a child’s scrawl, but each stroke is deliberate, fueled by years of anger and hatred. The blood drips and pools along my father’s chest, creating a grotesque masterpiece of vengeance.
“I wish I could see the wounds fester,” I whisper in his ear. “I wish you could be around for the next month, the next year, the next ten years, so I could watch the scars become engrained in your identity. You left yours on my back in the form of cigar burns. I never have to see them, but I know they’re there. I am marked by your anger, and I have to live with that every day for the rest of my life. And so will you. You will die knowing that your anger is the reason why you’re here. You will die with my name etched into your skin. You will die knowing cruelty and pain, the same way you forced me to live.”
The blade of the knife that was so silver and pristine in Dante’s hands now gleams in red. She is beautiful, even if she is marred. Just like me.
“Do you want me to finish?” Dante asks.
I could step back and hand the knife to him. Dante wouldn’t let me down. He’d make Tommaso suffer just as much if not more, than I would.
But I need to do this for me.
“No, I can finish him myself.” With steady hands, I grasp the knife and drive it into my father’s chest. The blade slices through flesh and bone, releasing a gut-wrenching scream from his lips that will haunt me for years to come. A crimson spray of blood arcs through the air, splattering against walls and furniture as it spurts from the fatal wound. His body convulses and then falls still, a pool of thick red liquid spreading beneath him.
I straighten up and try to wipe the sticky blood from my hands on my borrowed clothes, but it clings stubbornly to my skin, a sickening reminder of what I’ve just done.
Someone in front of me lets out a low whistle. “Damn.” It’s Luciano. I recognize his voice. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”
My gaze reluctantly shifts from my father’s lifeless body, the metallic smell of blood still lingering in the air, to Dante’s youngest brother. His arms hang limply by his sides, his eyes wide with a mixture of shock and awe at the brutal scene before him.
“Give us a minute,” Dante interrupts before I can reply. “We’ll see you upstairs, yeah?”
Enzo, Salvatore, and Luciano look around expectantly as if waiting for the other to say something. No one ever does. Finally, as they make their way out of the room and down the hall, their hushed voices can be heard mingling with the sounds from my father’s imprisoned guards. The tension in the air dissipates with their absence, but the scent of death lingers in their wake.
The sound of their footsteps slowly fades away, and I feel Dante’s presence behind me a moment later. His hands gently grip my hips as he turns me around to face him. In his eyes, I see a tumultuous mixture of worry, fury, and suppressed longing. “Are you alright?” he asks, his voice laced with genuine concern.
“Never better.” The blood drenching my outfit bathes me in liberation. I’ll never have to worry about going back to my father’s. He’ll never touch me or tell his guards to hurt me again. I’m free from my greatest fear.
Dante places a hand on my cheek, his eyebrows knitting together as he examines me. But if he’s looking for remorse or guilt, he won’t find it. “Are you sure? You just killed your father. It’s natural to feel regret. The average person’s soul is not equipped for this kind of thing.”