I wanted her.
I didn't just think it; I owned the thought the same way I owned every crooked street in this city. I had demanded her, and in my world, a demand was a death sentence for anyone who stood in the way.
I sat deep in the shadows of the elevated VIP box...my throne, my territory. The imported cigar smoke coiled lazily around my head like a venomous crown. My index finger tapped rhythmically against the cold crystal rim of my glass, a countdown to someone's undoing.
Then, she stepped onto the marble stage.
The room evaporated. The bass, the flashing lights, the mindless chatter of the elite...it all dissolved into white noise. There was only her: a cruel, porcelain mask hiding her face, and crimson silk stretched so tight over every aggressive curve it looked like a second skin.
The heat radiating off that stage was thick enough to choke on.
Her lips...the only flesh she allowed the world to see...curled into a blatant, wicked smirk. She wasn't dancing for the clientele; this was a private audience for the man who signed the checks and the death warrants.
Every sway of her waist, every deliberate, filthy grind of her hips was a middle finger to my authority. She was a viper in silk, playing with her prey, begging to be claimed, broken, and ruined until she forgot her own damn name.
"Your name?" I demanded.
My voice sliced through the music like a blade. It was low, sharp, carrying the weight of a firing squad. I exhaled a cloud of smoke, a visible warning to everyone in the room to look away. She was mine to watch.
Her body registered the command with a beautiful stiffening...a tiny tremor of surprise that betrayed her practiced calm.
Silence. She was testing the leash, daring me to snap it.
"I don't fucking repeat myself," I growled. The words rolled off my tongue like heavy artillery.
She didn't retreat. Instead, she dropped to her knees, sliding across the cold marble until she was inches from the velvet ropes of my section.
She reached out, her fingers trailing intimately close to the hard ridge beneath my tailored slacks. She teased the line, retreating just before the contact became an invitation for me to lose my mind.
"How do you want it, Boss?" she breathed.
Her voice was velvet layered over sin, coiling around me like a promise of something messy and final. I could feel the heat of her breath through that mask. I almost shattered the glass in my hand. I wanted to reach out, tangle my hand in her hair, and smash my mouth against hers until she bled.
Instead, I let out a dry, humorless chuckle and dragged a plume of smoke across her face. She didn't flinch.
"Your name," I repeated, the threat darker now. Normally, I'd have a girl choked on her own silk for wasting sixty seconds of my time.
"Sin," she whispered, her smirk returning, defiant and sharp.
I laughed, a short sound that tasted like Scotch and ashes. She wasn't giving me her name, and I wasn't giving her mine. Dangerous girls understood the currency of deniability.
"Given to you at birth, was it?" I asked, my voice cutting through the heavy air.
I took another drag, watching her through the haze. She was kneeling at my feet, submissive in posture but a rebel in spirit. Those lips were plump, parted, perfetta. All I could think about was how they'd look wrapped around me, pulling the soul out of my body.
"And what's your name?" she asked suddenly. Her head was bowed, but her voice dripped with insolent velvet.
I leaned back, my hand crushing the ice in my glass. "If I tell you that," I murmured, my tone as dark as a freshly dug grave, "I'll have to put a bullet in you."
Zero hesitation. No flinch. No fear. Most men pissed themselves when I looked at them; she was inviting the devil to dinner.
"Matteo," I finally said, letting the name hang in the air like a curse. "Matteo Ricci."
The name usually turned cities cold. But she just rolled the syllables over her tongue, savoring the taste of my damnation.
"Matteo Ricci," she repeated.
Then, slow as a threat, she slid her hand down to her ankle and drew a small, razor-sharp blade. The low light caught the gleam of the steel as she held it up.
"You can kill me now, Matteo Ricci," she said, her smirk stretching into an open, hungry smile. Her voice dropped to a liquid, raw challenge. "Or… are you going to fuck me?"