Chapter 19
When the car arrived at the warehouse, agonized screams were already coming from inside.
The damp air was thick with the mixed smell of rust and blood. Everyone was used to it, their faces showing numb calm.
Vitale's leather shoes clicked rhythmically on the stained cement floor, echoing through the empty warehouse.
As he walked in, no one dared make a sound. Even spiders had to stop spinning their webs—this was the ultimate respect for the mafia.
Everyone kept their heads down, quietly waiting for him to enter.
Vitale finally stopped in front of the figure tied naked to a wooden cross, his gray-blue eyes completely cold.
"Lift your head." His voice was calm as he gestured lightly, and Torian had someone bring over a chair.
Vitale stretched out his long legs and slowly sat down, frowning at the stains on his shoes.
Torian immediately sent someone to kneel down and wipe them clean. No one dared breathe loudly—after all, they all wanted to stay alive.
The man had been beaten bloody. Hearing Vitale's voice, he slowly tried to lift his head, but it hurt too much and his head immediately dropped back down.
Vitale looked displeased. He raised an eyebrow, and Torian roughly grabbed the man's hair, forcing him to face the light.
Chris's pale face was covered in sweat and dried blood, his lips cracked from dehydration, his eyes so swollen he could barely open them.
"Mr. Luca..." Chris's voice was hoarse, like a broken bellows. "Please... I'm innocent... let me go, let me crawl away like a rat into the sewers..."
Vitale tilted his head slightly, examining the whip marks and bruises on Chris's body.
"What's with these injuries?"
He asked Torian, though his gaze remained locked on Chris's trembling body.
"He kept trying to escape, boss. He said his wife at home was about to give birth, so he tried to run. When he wouldn't listen, we beat him."
Vitale nodded slightly, taking a pair of black gloves from his pocket and slowly putting them on. His fingers were long and slender, his nails beautifully manicured—these were the same hands that had brought Isabella to climax several times.
"Everyone out." He commanded. "I'll have a chat with him myself. Maybe then he won't want to run anymore."
Torian left with his men. Chris became even more terrified. Looking at the man before him was like looking at a powerful lion that could devour him in one bite.
After the warehouse door closed, Vitale took down a spiked leather whip from the wall. He casually cracked it in the air, and the sharp whistle of the whip tearing through the air made Chris's body shake.
No, no, that whip was too terrifying.
Lord, would he be beaten to death?
Why? Why did Vitale bring him here?
"Chris, I'll ask you one more time." Vitale's voice was almost gentle. "Do you know my girlfriend? Did you hurt her?"
"I don't know her, Mr. Luca. I would never disrespect another woman. I have a wife, I love her very much..."
The whip struck Chris's back like a venomous snake, leaving a fresh bloody mark.
Screams echoed through the warehouse, blood glistening on the whip.
"Know why I hired you as my secretary?" Vitale approached, using the whip handle to lift Chris's chin. "You're a gambler who can't change his ways. Why would I let you handle so much money?"
Chris gasped through the pain, eyes wide, shaking his head frantically. "I don't know, Mr. Luca, I really don't know why?"
At first, he thought this mafia boss Vitale had recognized his talent—after all, his smooth talking could work its way around certain people. But he never imagined it wasn't for that reason, but because of Vitale's girlfriend.
He swore to God he wouldn't dare touch Vitale's girlfriend.
Another lash struck his thigh. Chris screamed in pain, looking like a ridiculous red-bottomed monkey.
"Let me give you a hint." Vitale's voice grew colder. "You dated her."
"Leila? I never hurt Leila, she's about to have my baby." Chris said urgently. "I swear... damn it!"
His words were cut off by a crisp sound of bones dislocating.
Vitale had directly dislocated his right arm. Chris let out an inhuman howl, cursing a few times before nearly passing out.
"Think again." Vitale scooped up a ladle of cold water from a bucket and splashed it on Chris's face.
"Is it Maria? Or Jennifer?" Chris's voice was broken by pain. "I can't remember clearly."
The whip struck precisely between his legs. Chris's vision went black, and this time he really did pass out.
Ice cubes hit his chest, the bone-chilling cold bringing him back to consciousness.
"I don't have the patience to play guessing games with you," Vitale grabbed his hair and brutally tore out a clump. "At a wedding, you hurt a woman."
A scene finally flashed through Chris's foggy mind.
Isabella in a champagne-colored dress, standing on a terrace in the moonlight.
"Isabella..." he gasped. "But I didn't hurt her! I just wanted to talk to her."
Vitale's fist slammed hard into his abdomen. Chris suddenly vomited up acidic bile.
"Torian!" Vitale shouted. "This man is full of lies! Did he want Isabella to be his mistress? Did he touch her wrist?"
The warehouse door opened a crack, and Torian's voice came through: "Yes, boss."
Vitale turned around, cold fury burning in his eyes.
"How dare you?" He kicked Chris in the ribs.
What followed was violence that went beyond human limits.
Vitale was like an enraged beast, fists, knees, and whip raining down until Chris hung from the ropes covered in wounds, blood pouring from countless injuries.
Vitale took a red-hot branding iron from the brazier and slowly walked back to Chris.
"I could take your life directly," his voice trembled slightly with rage, "but in a way, I should thank you."
The branding iron pressed against the tender flesh of Chris's inner thigh, sizzling, the smell of burning flesh spreading.
Chris let out one last piercing scream, his whole body convulsing violently.
"You're the one who brought her to me," Vitale threw down the branding iron and pulled out a silver pistol from his waist. "You made her gather the courage to say she wanted to belong to me."
He elegantly loaded the bullet, the gun barrel wandering over Chris's broken body.
"So I'll give you a choice." A cruel smile curved his lips. "How do you want to die? A bullet through the heart? Or the head?"
Chris barely lifted his swollen eyelids, blood blurring his vision.
"Why?"
"Because you touched her," Vitale's voice suddenly became soft, yet more chilling than any roar. "You touched something that belongs to me. And now, every inch of her skin, every part inside her body, is branded with my mark."
The gun barrel finally stopped at Chris's forehead.
"Choose," Vitale tightened the trigger. "This is the last choice of your life."
Chris's cracked lips moved, but he couldn't make any sound.
Before his consciousness completely faded, the only thing he could think of was Isabella's resolute eyes when she left him.
Outside the warehouse, Torian lit a cigar and said quietly to his subordinate, "Get ready to clean up the scene. The boss is in a bad mood tonight."