I stared out the window of the limousine, looking at familiar streets I passed to help the children of the southern part of town. I had always walked enjoying the sun against my face, the cool breeze against my palm.

Now I was looking through the window exposed.

Naked.

My lips felt the pressure of my teeth, unshed tears burned my eyes as I clenched and unclenched my fists.

I wasn't always a good child.

I wasn't a saint. I was a spoiled brat who wanted to enjoy the world but was tied down by my mother.

Having dreams had killed her though.

Had killed me once. And will kill me again.

I dreamt of dying.

Nightmares.

Dreams, all coming into one.

And I had sworn the day I became a call girl, would be the day I end it.

Unfortunately that day was today. Because what is there to enjoy in a world filled with judgement and hate?

The driver had left a small bottle of whiskey on the seat beside me. I stared at it for a long moment before grabbing it with trembling hands. I had never drunk alcohol before. Never broken that rule. But what did rules matter now?

I unscrewed the cap and took a long drink. It burned going down my throat, making me cough and gasp. But I took another. And another.

I could have left, I thought bitterly. I could have run away from the convent years ago when I first discovered what they really were. But where would I have gone? Back to my father who couldn't look at me? Back to Liora who blamed me for everything? Back to the town that whispered about me like I was an horror tale?

The convent was the only place that had given me peace, even if that peace was built on lies. Even after I knew what the other sisters were doing in the night, I turned a blind eye. I pretended not to see. I convinced myself it wasn't my business.

Does that make me selfish?

The word echoed in my head like a curse. Selfish. Sister Beatrice had said it. Mother Superior had said it. Liora had screamed it at me over our mother's dead body. Even I believed it now.

Was that why I agreed to go instead of Margaret? Not because I was noble or good, but because I couldn't stand watching another person suffer because of me? Because I was tired of carrying guilt and thought maybe this would finally balance the scales?

It hurt. God, it hurt so much that this was how it all turned out. Six years of prayers and penance, and I was still just a selfish girl making selfish choices that eventually ended in me being dressed up as sacrifice.

Another tear rolled down my cheek, joining the others that had soaked into the white scarf.

I took another drink from the bottle. The alcohol made my head feel fuzzy, distant from my body. Maybe that was better. Maybe I needed to be distant for what was coming.

There was a quote I had read once in one of the forbidden books some girls smuggled into the convent. "Men do not break women. Women break themselves trying to be what men want them to be."

Dante Salvatore wanted a virgin. Pure and innocent.

Just like Thomas had wanted my virginity all those years ago. The boy who had asked me to meet him on the bridge, who had kissed me and touched me and made me feel wanted for the first time in my life. He had whispered that he loved me, that he wanted me to be his first, that we should meet again the next night to... to do more.

The next night. The night after my mother died because I wasn't there to give her the medicine.

I never went back to that bridge. Never saw Thomas again. And I had kept my virginity like it was some kind of proof that I could still be good. That I hadn't completely failed.

But it didn't matter, did it? Virgin or not, I had still killed my mother. And tonight, I would lose the one thing I had protected all these years to a dangerous stranger who paid extra for innocence he could destroy.

I would do this for Margaret. I would endure whatever Dante Salvatore wanted from me. And when it was over, when I returned to the convent used and broken, I would find a way to end it. Maybe I would go back to that bridge where Father Benedict had found me. Maybe this time, no one would stop me from jumping.

And maybe after I died, no one would ever call me selfish again. Margaret would never be chosen because I would have satisfied the cruel appetites of the worst client. My death would finally mean something. Finally save someone.

The limousine stopped in front of a building I had never noticed before. From the outside, it looked abandoned. But I could hear music thumping from somewhere below ground.

"We're here," the driver said without looking at me.

I finished the last of the whiskey and stepped out of the car on unsteady legs. The alcohol made everything feel dreamlike, unreal. The driver led me to a side entrance and down a long staircase that descended into darkness.

.

.

The underground club pulsed with dark energy.

Velvet couches lined the walls. Amber light painted everything in shades of gold and shadow. Beautiful people in expensive clothes engaged in activities my convent education never acknowledged existed. Women sucking on other women lips, men rubbing their ducks behind their trousers as they watched. Men danced on tables naked, their penis moving along with their bodies.

Women danced on tables wearing panties but no bras. Men watched with hungry eyes while touching

I gulped in disgust. This...was pure sin.

Sodom and Gomorrah. No shame was seen at all.

I did the sign of the cross. Oh lord, please protect me. Send down your guardian angels to guard me in this place.

"Wait here," the driver said, pointing to a spot near the bar. "He'll come find you."

Then he disappeared into the crowd, leaving me alone.

Some people were watching me. I could feel their eyes crawling over my body, taking in the white lace, the fur coat, the scarf covering my face. The lights made it hard to see clearly but I could feel their lewd stares.

I pressed myself against the wall, my feet staggering from the alcohol I had taken. Still, I pressed harder against the wall trying to make myself small.

Invisible. But it was too late for that.

A hand grabbed my arm suddenly, fingers digging into my skin. Before I could scream, I was pushed hard against the wall, a man's body pressing against mine.

"Hello, pretty," he slurred, his breath reeking of alcohol and cigarettes. His face was too close, his eyes unfocused. "What are you supposed to be? A bride? A slave? Or a succubus? What role do you hide under your massskkk." He slurred disgustingly.

"Let me go," I struggled against his grip, trying to push him away. My heart pounded with fear as I felt too weak against his strong grip.

"Don't be like that," he laughed, his other hand running down my body, touching me through the thin lace. "You're here to play, aren't you? All dressed up like a present waiting to be unwrapped-"

He was pulled away from me so fast it was like he'd been yanked by invisible strings. He stumbled backward, confusion replacing the drunken lust on his face.

"Tsk tsk tsk." A new voice cut through the music. "I believe that's my plaything, Mr. Armani. And I don't think I like having my playthings touched."

I looked up and saw him for the first time. His aura, his dark eyes, his imposing stance.

This man must be Dante Salvatore. Tall, perfectly dressed in a black suit that probably cost enough to feed all the children in the north. Dark hair styled back from his face, a carefully groomed beard - mustache and goatee that gave him the look of an old-world prince turned devil.

The thin scar running from his ear to his chin cut through the edge of the beard, making him look even more dangerous.

The drunk man-Mr. Armani-raised his hands in surrender. "I didn't know, Salvatore. I swear, I didn't know she was yours-"

CRACK!

The gunshot was so loud it made my ears ring. One moment Mr. Armani was talking, and the next, his head exploded in a spray of red. His body collapsed to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut.

I screamed, but the sound was swallowed by the music that never stopped playing. No one in the club even looked surprised. They just stepped around the body and kept dancing, kept drinking, kept touching each other like murder was normal.

Dante lowered his gun and looked at me with those cold, calculating eyes.

"Welcome, Sister Celeste," he said softly. "Shall we begin?"

The scream died in my throat, choked off by the metallic tang of blood that sprayed across the floor.

Mr. Armani's body slumped like a discarded rag, his eyes still wide with that drunken shock, but no life to it, his wrinkled forehead now had a bleeding hole through it.

I pressed myself against the wall until the stone bit into my spine through the fur coat.

Two buff men dressed in gray suit, appeared from behind Dante, their movement robotic as one gripped Mr. Armani's ankles and dragged him across the floor like he was taking out trash, his body leaving a dark smear on the tile. The other crouched with a spray bottle and a cloth, wiping the blood away in long, practiced strokes.

The music never stopped during all these. Nobody seemed to care as they continued dancing and sinning their lives away.

My whole body was shaking, I could feel it in my teeth, in my knees, in the fingers I had pressed flat against the wall like I could push through it if I tried hard enough. My eyes were too wide and I couldn't make them smaller. I couldn't make anything work right at that moment.

He had killed him, he just killed him like that with no remorse. I blinked rapidly looking at the blood then at the man in front of me whose eyes were on me as if I was his next target.

Oh Jesus...I gulped. Dante stepped forward.

He moved slowly, like a man who had never needed to rush for anything in his life. Up close, he was overwhelming in a way the amber lighting hadn't prepared me for. Tall enough that I had to tilt my chin up to see his face, broad shoulders filling out the black suit with the kind of quiet authority that made the expensive fabric look like armor.

His jaw was sharp, clean, the thin scar running from below his left ear to the edge of his chin cutting through the dark beard like a signature. His hair was swept back from his face, not a strand out of place, and his eyes...

His eyes were the color of a winter storm. Gray and cold and utterly, terrifyingly still. Emotionless if I say so myself.

He reached out then.

I flinched so hard my head hit the wall.

His hand slowed. Then continued. His fingers, warm, slowly touched my jaw. Just my jaw. Tilting my face up toward his, his eyes examining every inch of my face.

I gulped down again. If I could have entered the wall, I would have. I would have dissolved into the stone and never come back.

"Are you scared?"

My eyebrows dipped into a frown. What an understatement.

Am I scared? Who wouldn't be in such a situation? As much as I would like everything to end, I didn't want to have a bullet through my head.

My breaths were coming out in short gasps.

Air. I needed air. My lips were trembling and I couldn't stop them and I didn't answer because I didn't trust what sound would come out of my mouth if I opened it.

He studied my silence.

Then the corner of his mouth curved. His eyes lit up like a vampire who seemed to feed on the fact that I was scared of bim. A smirk that said he already knew the answer and found it interesting.

He looked as if he ate fear for dinner at that moment.

He leaned closer, his eyes darkened like a wolf about to pounce. His cologne reached me before I could steel myself against it. Dark and warm sandalwood and something like expensive leather, the kind of scent that had no right to make your lungs want more of it.

"Palomita," he said softly.

I blinked. The word was foreign on my tongue, strange in my ears. Was that... Italian? Spanish? I didn't know.

Was it an insult? Does it mean foolish girl? My confusion must have shown on my face because his smirk deepened.

"You don't understand," he observed, his accent slipping out then.

I shook my head slightly, the movement barely visible.

"Good," he said. "You don't need to."

His hand dropped from my jaw but his eyes didn't leave my face. They traveled down slowly,like he was cataloging every inch of the white lace barely covering my body beneath the fur coat.

"I don't like it when my things are touched," he said, his voice dropping lower. "When someone puts their hands on what belongs to me–"

He trailed off. His gaze had stopped moving. Fixed on something lower.

Was my fur coat opened and he could see the thin lace and my breasts?

Did it make him...aroused? The thought suddenly sent a shiver down my spine, goosebumps filled my skin as I felt my nipples slowly hardened.

Oh God. Please no. I wasn't ready for this yet.

I followed his gaze instinctively, looking down at myself, and my stomach dropped.

Blood.

Dark red stains splattered across the white fur coat. Mr. Armani's blood. It must have sprayed when... when Dante...

"Tsk." The sound came from Dante, sharp with disapproval.

My eyes shot back up to his face. He was staring at the blood on my coat with something that looked almost like annoyance. Or maybe amusement. I couldn't tell which was worse.

"The irony," he said quietly, reaching out to touch one of the red stains with his fingertip. "A dirty place and they dress you in white clothes. Blood on virgin lace." His eyes lifted to mine. "Is this the convent's idea of mockery? Dressing their nuns like brides and sending them to slaughter?"

My throat closed.

I couldn't answer. Couldn't defend. Couldn't explain that I didn't know, that I had just put on what they told me to, that nothing about tonight made sense.

"Or perhaps," he continued, his finger still tracing the bloodstain, "it's meant to be symbolic. Purity destroyed. Innocence sold. The sacred made profane." His smirk returned. "How poetic."

"I didn't-" My voice came out as a whisper. "I didn't choose-"

"No," he interrupted smoothly. "You didn't choose the dress. You didn't choose to be here. You didn't choose me." His hand moved from the coat to my chin again, forcing me to look at him. "But you chose to take someone else's place, didn't you, palomita? You volunteered for this."

How did he know that?

"Yes," I breathed.

"Why?"

The question hung in the air between us. Behind him, the club pulsed with life–music, laughter, the clink of glasses. But in this small space between the wall and his body, there was only silence and the weight of his gray eyes demanding truth.

"Because..." I swallowed hard. "Because I'm selfish."

His eyebrow raised. "Selfish?"

"I couldn't watch another person suffer because of me," I said, the words tumbling out before I could stop them. "I'm always... I'm always making people suffer. My mother. My sister. Everyone. So I thought maybe this time I could–"

"Save someone?" he finished for me.

I nodded.

He stared at me for a long moment. Then he laughed-a low, dark sound that made my skin prickle.

I felt like a fool for speaking in the first place. This is one of the reasons why I keep my thoughts to myself. How dare I speak? Tears prickle at my eyes as his chuckle traveled through the music.

"You're not a savior, palomita," he said. "You're a martyr. And martyrs don't save anyone. They just bleed like fools."

He stepped back slightly, his eyes traveling down my body again with that same calculated assessment.

"Come," he said, turning away. "We're not doing this here. My mood is ruined anyway."

"Where–" I started.

"Rule number one," he said without looking back. "You don't question me. You follow."

He walked toward a door at the back of the club, expecting me to follow.

I looked at the blood on my coat. At the spot where Mr. Armani had died. At the people dancing like nothing had happened.

If I were to run, I would probably end up like Mr. Armani. But isn't that a good thing? Didn't I want to die... maybe it would be the perfect opportunity.

What was I thinking? The moment I step away from here, it would be a bullet through my body.

And imagine the excruciating pain that would follow if I didn't die immediately.

I took a slow breathe.

Suck it up Celeste, it would be over before you know it.