I shoved the thought of rape aside. I didn’t do that. Whatever else I did to them, I didn’t do that. Some tiny little piece of my fucked-up brain held on to that, as if I were somehow honorable for it.

Honor?

Fuck.

I had no delusions on that note. Honor was a thing that had never belonged to me. Not then, not when I was Dominic Benedetti, son of a mafia king. So close, so fucking goddamned close to having it all. And it certainly didn’t belong to me now. Not now that I knew who I was. Who I really was.

More thoughts to shove away, shove so far down they couldn’t choke me anymore. Instead they sat like cement, like fucking concrete bricks in my gut.

I stepped purposefully toward the girl, my boots heavy and loud on the old and decrepit wood.

“Wakey, wakey.”

She sat with her knees pulled up to her naked chest, her bound wrists wrapped around them, and made the smallest movement, tucking her face deeper into her knees. I noticed she still wore underwear, although it was filthy. That was new. By the time they got to me, they were so used to being buck naked they almost didn’t notice anymore.

The three night-lights plugged into outlets around the bedroom allowed me to take her in. Dark hair fell over her shoulders and down her back. So dark, I wondered if it would be black after I washed the dirt and grime from it.

I nudged the toe of my boot under her hip. “You stink.”

She made some small sound and dug her fingernails into the flesh of her legs, crouching farther into the corner, folding and withdrawing deeper into herself.

I squatted down, looking at what I could see of her too skinny body. I’d check her for bruises later, once I cleaned her up. Make sure there wasn’t anything that needed immediate attention. No festering wounds acquired in transit.

“Did you piss yourself?”

She exhaled an angry breath.

I grinned behind my mask. There we go. That was different.

“Lift your head, so I can see your face.”

Nothing.

I lay one of my hands on top of her head. She flinched but otherwise didn’t move. I gently stroked her head before gripping the long thick mass of hair and turning my hand around and around, wrapping the length of it tight in my fist before tugging hard, jerking her head back, forcing her to look at me.

She cried out, the sound one of pain and anger combined. They matched the features of her face: eyes narrowed, fear just behind the rebellion in her hate-filled, gleaming green eyes. Her mouth opened when I squeezed my fingers tighter, and a tear fell from the corner of one eye.

“Get your hands off me.”