His Virgin Stripper

22- All Too Familiar

Marcello

The clerk hissed in pain, a sharp, ragged sound that echoed off the sterile walls of the front office as the reality of his situation fully set in.

I released my iron grip on his wrist, stepping back slightly just to watch him collapse, his body hitting the floor in an uncoordinated heap, gasping like his life depended on it.

He clutched his forearm desperately, but his ruined, dislocated knuckles couldn't form the grip necessary to stem the flow. Crimson blood pumped from the open artery in a steady pulse, pooling around his knees and staining the cheap floor tiles.

He looked small down there, stripped of his explosive speed and reduced to a desperate animal trying to hold onto his leaking vitality.

Yet, as he lay there panting, his chest heaving violently as his strength rapidly drained into the floor, the bastard managed to pull his lips back into a small, defiant smile. It was a weak, trembling smirk, but it was there.

I leaned against the edge of the wooden counter, crossing my arms as I looked down at him with a cold, analytical detachment.

His expression told me everything I needed to know about his psychological state.

He wasn't smiling because he believed he was going to survive this; he was smiling because he was terrified of what would happen to him if he talked.

He was probably threatened by whoever had hired him; held under a leash so tight that dying by blood loss in a rental office seemed preferable to the alternative. But men like him always forgot who they were dealing with at that moment.

They thought their employers were the apex predators of the world until they found themselves staring into my eyes. He would break eventually. Every single one of them broke under the right pressure. It was just a matter of adjusting the vice until the bone gave way.

"You think you're being brave," I said out loud, my voice dropping into a dangerously calm, low register that easily cut through his frantic gasping.

"You think whatever threat they used to put you in this room makes you untouchable. Let me correct that illusion for you. You are nothing compared to the people I have broken information out of in the past.”

I straightened up, walking towards him. “You are a low-level asset playing a high-stakes game. I have dissected hardened Dons who controlled entire territories. I have dismantled elite assassins who were trained from childhood to swallow cyanide before speaking.”

My feet carried me in slow circles around him, replaying the look they’d all had.

“They all thought they could hold their secrets. They all smiled just like you are right now. And every single one of them begged for the sweet release of a bullet before I was even halfway finished with them."

As the weight of my words settled into the quiet room, I watched him closely. I could see the color drain out of the clerk's face; the stark, sickly gray of terror. Sweat coated his forehead as a violent shiver rocked his body.

The arrogance in his posture withered, his chest hitching as the psychological armor he had built up began to crack under the reality of his position. He realized I wasn't just a target he had failed to hit. I was his executioner, and I had all the time in the world.

I reached out, grabbed the heavy metal folding chair sitting by the corner desk, and dragged it across the floor. The metal legs shrieked against the linoleum, a harsh, grating sound that usually meant order in offices, but out here, it just meant pain.

I placed the chair right in front of the clerk, positioning the heavy metal legs directly on top of his crumbled, dislocated knuckles. Then, I sat down, deliberately shifting my full weight onto the chair.

The metal dug straight into the fractured joints of his hand. The clerk let out a deep, agonizing groan, his body arching off the floor as the pressure ground his broken bones together.

His face contorted, sweat breaking out across his forehead as he tried to pull his hand away, but the heavy chair didn't budge an inch. I sat there comfortably, resting my elbows on my knees, staring directly down into his pale, sweating face.

"Let's simplify this before you pass out from the shock," I murmured, my voice smooth and devoid of pity.

"Will you tell me the easy way, or should I do it the hard way? Give me the name of the person who bought our coordinates, and I might let my men patch that artery before you bleed dry. Keep your mouth shut, and I will make sure the next ten minutes feel like an absolute eternity."

The clerk didn't answer me. He choked back another groan, his teeth grinding together so hard I could hear the enamel click, but he kept his jaw locked tight, refusing to utter a single syllable.

A tiny, dark tilt returned to my lips as I looked at his stubborn silence. I shook my head slowly, letting out a soft sigh of feigned disappointment.

"I didn't want to do this," I whispered, my voice sounding completely calm, almost conversational, as I locked my eyes onto his remaining good one. I let the weight of the statement hang heavily in the air between us, letting him feel the lack of malice– and the lack of mercy behind it.

"You pushed my hands. You didn't leave me a choice."

I reached down, my fingers wrapping around the hilt of the hunting knife I had placed on my lap, ready to begin what I would call having a little fun. I wanted to see how loud he could scream when the steel met the sensitive nerves underneath his fingernails.

I wanted to see how long his silence would hold up against the cold reality of my blade.

But just as the edge of the steel touched the skin of his wrist, the heavy glass door of the reception office swung open with a sharp, violent bang.

I slowly raised my head, my eyes cutting across the dim room toward the entrance. Dante stepped through the threshold, his large, imposing frame casting a long shadow across the blood-stained floor.

He was breathing heavily, his vest dusted with white drywall powder from the ongoing skirmish outside, which had significantly grown quieter but his grip was absolute. He was dragging a man behind him by the collar of his jacket, forcing him forward into the light of the office.

The captive stumbled, his boots sliding through the slick pool of blood on the floor as Dante threw him down onto his knees right beside the trembling clerk.

The man was covered in bruises, his clothes torn from a frantic struggle, but as his face lifted toward the flickering fluorescent light, the smirk on my lips widened into a full welcoming smile.

The face was all too familiar to me.