~THE BASEMENT OF THE DEVIL~
The Romano estate stood like a wound against the night sky—cold marble, iron gates, and shadows that stretched long and merciless across the land. It wasn't just a house; it was a fortress built on blood and fear, and every brick whispered the name of the man who ruled it: Alessio Romano.
Thirty years old, though his presence felt eternal, Alessio was the devil stitched into flesh. The men who served him bowed not because of loyalty but because of terror; they knew he was not a man of hesitation. He killed fast, clean, and without regret. They said if you looked into his eyes long enough, you could hear your own grave being dug.
That night, the estate's silence was cut by a phone call. His men had gone to collect what was owed by a poor family in the city—pathetic, nameless in the grand scheme of his empire. Money, land, blood—it was all the same to Alessio. But when the family confessed they had nothing left, the voice on the other side of the phone grew quiet.
"Then take their youngest daughter," Alessio ordered. His tone was flat, unshaken, as if he had asked for no more than a glass of water. "If they can't pay, their blood will pay. Their lives will suffer. Their screams will echo. And she will rot here until I decide otherwise."
The parents did not resist. They sold her. Their eyes, greedy for survival, turned away as their daughter fell to her knees, begging, sobbing, clutching at their hands. They ripped free of her grasp. They chose themselves over her.
Her name was Elena.
Nineteen years old, she was soft where the world was cruel. Long, ink-dark hair cascaded down her back in waves, her eyes wide and brown, the color of earth after rain. Her lips were soft, trembling as she cried, her skin pale from nights without sleep. She wasn't the kind of beauty Alessio was accustomed to—the painted women of nightclubs, the sharp-featured socialites who clung to power. No, Elena's beauty was quieter, fragile, like glass about to shatter.
And so she did shatter, when her parents shoved her forward into the hands of men dressed in black. She screamed as their grips locked onto her arms, dragging her through the dirt, her pleas drowned by the growl of an engine.
Please, Mama. Please, Papa. Don't do this to me. Don't let them take me.
But they only turned away.
The Romano men followed their master's orders without hesitation. They did not deliver Elena to a guest room or any semblance of comfort. They threw her into the basement.
The door groaned as it opened, and the stench of damp stone crawled up her throat. A single light flickered above, swinging slightly, throwing shadows against the walls. The basement wasn't empty. At its center stood a bed—too large, too imposing, its sheets black like mourning. Beside it, a single chair. Nothing else. No windows. No escape.
The men shoved her inside and shut the door.
Elena stumbled forward, her knees hitting the cold floor. She scrambled up, her hands clawing at the locked door, pounding until her fists turned raw.
"Please! Let me out! Please, I didn't do anything!"
No one answered.
Hours bled into hours. She screamed, cried, begged, until her voice was nothing but a rasp. The silence pressed into her ears, thicker than blood. Her body curled onto the bed, the mattress swallowing her small frame as tears soaked the pillow. She slept not because she was calm, but because exhaustion claimed her.
Above her, in a room painted with murder, Alessio Romano wiped blood from his hands. His knuckles were split, veins bulging against his skin, his tailored black suit splattered red. His hair—dark, messy, pushed back by sweat—clung to his forehead.
The night's work had been satisfying. Three men dead. Their bodies dumped where no one would find them. But satisfaction didn't linger. It never did. Alessio wasn't built to enjoy; he was built to hunger. Always needing more.
He poured himself a drink, the burn of whiskey trailing down his throat, and wandered to the room filled with screens—the cameras that watched every inch of his estate.
He stopped when he saw her.
The basement camera flickered, showing the girl curled on the bed, her chest rising and falling in uneven breaths. Even in her sleep, her fists were clenched, her face twisted in pain.
Alessio set his glass down. His eyes narrowed.
He hadn't seen her until now. He hadn't cared to. She was supposed to be just another possession, a body to remind others what happened when they couldn't pay. But there was something about the way she looked—soft, untouched, a lamb dropped in the devil's den—that made something inside him stir.
He descended the stairs, the sound of his footsteps echoing like thunder. When he opened the basement door, the air shifted.
Elena didn't wake. She lay still, vulnerable, strands of her hair tangled across her cheek.
Alessio crossed the room and sat on the chair beside the bed. His elbows rested on his knees, his large hands folding together, veins rippling under his skin. He studied her the way a predator studies prey.
Tall, broad-shouldered, wrapped in black silk and blood, Alessio looked more like a fallen angel than a man—one carved from shadows and sin. His jaw was sharp, his stubble dark against pale skin. But it was his eyes that could unmake a soul—gray, steel-hard, yet gleaming with something unholy.
He sat there for hours. Watching. Breathing. Waiting.
Morning came, but in the basement, there was no sunrise. Only the groan of the door unlocking.
Elena stirred, her eyes opening slowly. At first, she thought she was dreaming—the figure on the chair was too unreal, too imposing to be human. But then his gaze met hers.
Her body froze.
The man was young but carried himself with the weight of a thousand lives. His suit was black, perfectly cut, though his tie hung loose as if strangling him would take too long. His hair was a mess of dark strands that framed his forehead, but it didn't make him look untidy. It made him look dangerous, wild, untamed. His hands—oh God, his hands—veiny, long-fingered, powerful enough to strangle or cradle.
He was beauty and violence in the same breath.
"W-where am I?" Her voice cracked.
Alessio didn't answer. He leaned back in the chair, eyes narrowing, drinking her in. Silence stretched until it felt like chains wrapping around her throat.
Finally, he spoke, his voice deep, rough, the kind that sank into your bones and stayed there.
"You belong to me now."
Elena shook her head violently, hair whipping around her. "No. No, please, you don't understand—I didn't do anything! Please let me go!"
Alessio's lips twitched, not quite a smile, more like the shadow of one.
"You don't need to do anything, little lamb," he said, his words soft but sharper than a blade. "You exist. That's enough. And because you exist, you are mine."
Her body trembled. She scrambled off the bed, pressing against the cold wall, desperate to put distance between them.
He stood then, and the room seemed to shrink around his height, his presence. He walked slowly, like a storm taking its time to destroy, and crouched before her. His fingers brushed her chin, tilting her face up.
Elena's heart hammered, tears streaking down her cheeks.
His gray eyes devoured her fear, and for the first time, Alessio felt a crack in his iron chest. Not weakness. Not pity. Something darker.
"I will give you this warning once," he whispered, his breath hot against her ear. "Run if you want. Scream if you want. Break yourself against these walls until your bones splinter. But understand—"
He grabbed her wrists, pinning them above her head, his strength unyielding. His voice sank lower, darker than death.
"You can run to the ends of this earth, Elena. You can bleed yourself dry trying to escape me. But when you stop… when you fall… when you collapse from despair… it will be my arms that catch you. And you will learn, again and again, that I am the nightmare behind every door you open. The shadow on every road you take. The chain around every breath you breathe. You will never outrun me, because I am already inside you."
Her body went cold. The words cut deeper than any blade.
Elena realized then—this wasn't just a man. This was the end of the world wrapped in skin.
And she belonged to him.
The walls around me were damp. Mold crept in the cracks like veins on pale skin, swallowing what little light the single bulb offered. I had screamed myself hoarse, my throat raw, lips split and dry. Nobody came. Nobody would ever come. I knew that now. My own parents had traded me like cheap furniture. Their youngest daughter for another chance at breathing.
My nails bled from clawing at the steel door. My arms trembled as I beat against it again, but the door didn't even groan. It was a vault—thick, unbreakable, meant to keep me in, meant to erase me from the world.
The bed looked wrong. Too large, too deliberate, dressed in silk that didn't belong in a dungeon. A hunter's trophy room—that was what this was. And I was the prize.
At some point, exhaustion dragged me to the mattress. My eyelids burned, but the mattress beneath me was too soft, too clean. It mocked me. Every breath tasted like iron, like rust. Tears glued my lashes together until finally—mercifully—I sank into a shallow, haunted sleep.
But I wasn't alone.
---
Above me, in another world, Alessio Romano wiped blood off his hands like it was paint. His suit was still pristine, dark as midnight, but his knuckles were raw and split. Someone had defied him tonight. Someone had begged for mercy, and he had given them none.
Alessio never did.
His men waited outside his office, too afraid to breathe loudly. He ignored them, walked across the marble floor, and poured himself a glass of whiskey. His body was fire and ice all at once—veins swelling in his hands, his chest rising and falling too fast.
But then his phone buzzed.
One message from his men stationed at the basement: *She's asleep.*
A slow, cruel smirk tugged at his lips. Without answering, Alessio walked through his labyrinth of a mansion, silent as death. His footsteps echoed like thunder down the steel stairwell until he reached the bottom.
The cameras were mounted high, black eyes recording every move in that locked room. He watched the feed for a moment before going inside. And then he saw her.
The girl.
His possession.
---
I don't know what pulled me awake. Maybe the shift in air. Maybe the weight of a gaze that burned too deeply to ignore. My lashes fluttered open, and for a moment, I thought I was still dreaming.
He sat in the chair beside the bed.
Tall. Too tall to be real. His shoulders stretched his black suit, his tie loosened but still immaculate. His hair—dark, messy strands—framed a face carved from cruelty itself. A jaw sharp enough to cut, lips pressed into a line that looked like a threat more than a shape. His eyes… God, his eyes. They weren't brown. They weren't black. They were voids. A storm contained in two sockets, drowning everything they looked at.
Veins climbed his hands, strong and pronounced as they rested on the armrests of the chair. He wasn't slouched. He wasn't relaxed. He was waiting. A predator who had already won.
I scrambled backwards on the bed, dragging the sheets with me, clutching them like a pathetic shield. "Stay away from me," I rasped, my voice fractured from screaming.
He tilted his head slightly, a gesture so subtle but so terrifying it made my skin prickle. "You beg as if begging means something."
His voice was low, a blade sliding through velvet.
"Why?" I whispered. My body shook. My lips trembled. "Why me?"
Alessio leaned forward, forearms braced on his knees. The veins in his hands bulged when he clasped them together. He studied me like one studies a painting. No rush. No mercy.
"Because," he said finally, "your father gave you away. And I don't return what's mine."
---
I shook my head, choking on tears. "I'm not yours."
The corner of his mouth lifted in something that wasn't a smile. It was darker than that. He rose from the chair, his height swallowing the room, making the ceiling feel too low. Every movement screamed control. I pressed myself against the bedframe until the metal dug into my spine.
He didn't touch me. He didn't have to.
Alessio bent down, his shadow swallowing my small frame. "Not yours," he repeated softly, almost curious. His fingers ghosted over the bedpost above my head, veins shifting, muscles tightening. "You'll learn, little one. Ownership is not a choice. It's a fact."
I held my breath, praying he'd turn and leave.
Instead, he straightened, walked to the camera in the corner, and turned it slightly away—just enough. The air shifted. It wasn't protection. It was a warning. What happened now wasn't for anyone else's eyes.
"You'll sleep here," Alessio said, gesturing at the bed like it wasn't already mine. "You'll eat when I allow it. You'll speak when I demand it."
"And if I don't?" My voice broke, but I forced the words out.
Alessio turned back to me. His stare carved straight through my chest, splitting bone, hollowing me out. He walked back, leaned down again until I felt the faintest brush of his breath.
"Then I'll break you," he whispered. "Piece by piece. Until you forget you ever belonged to anyone but me."
---
He left me after that. Just stood, fixed his cufflinks, and walked away like the devil returning to his throne.
The door slammed shut. The echo rattled my skull.
I curled into the sheets, the taste of his words still thick in my throat. My parents had abandoned me, but Alessio… Alessio had claimed me. And something deep, deep inside me already knew—no matter how hard I ran, no matter how many times I screamed—he would always find me.
He had already begun.
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