La Notte hummed with dim chandeliers, smoky jazz that slithered through the air, and perfume laced with secrets. I lingered at the bar alone, swirling what was left of my bourbon—third glass, maybe fourth. The ice had drowned into water. Heat from the race still throbbed under my skin, though the sting of losing pressed down heavier than the liquor in my veins.

I should’ve taken it.

I would’ve, if no one had sabotaged my ride.

But instead, Dahlia left with the trophy—and Leander, my so-called protector, shadowed her like she had him under some spell.

I don’t know how long I sat there. Long enough for the room to bleed thin of people. Long enough for my bitterness to harden into something sharp and steady.

Then the door swung open.

Dahlia walked in, radiant as ever. Leander followed, her obedient knight. A laugh slipped out of me, low, bitter. Of course.

Leander’s gaze snapped to me immediately. Dahlia blinked, all fake innocence.

“Oh! Raven,” she chirped, voice dripping honey. “Didn’t think I’d see you here. Come on—join us, we’re celebrating!”

I didn’t give her the courtesy of an answer. I rose, smoothed my dress down with slow precision, and brushed past them like they didn’t exist. The bassline throbbed against my chest as I climbed onto the stage without hesitation.

If they wanted spectacle, I’d give them one.

I danced—wild, unrestrained, dangerous. The lights bathed me, and soon men circled close, their hands twitching, their stares starving. I moved like smoke, untouchable, letting their hunger fuel me.

Then Leander was there, forcing his way forward. His jaw was set, his eyes narrowed, as if he had some right to intervene. As if I belonged to him.

But Dahlia’s voice carried over the music: “Let my sister dance,” she said, graciously, like she was blessing me with her mercy.

I locked eyes with Leander, lips curling. “What’s the matter? Jealous?”

For a moment, I drowned in it—in being watched, in proving I didn’t need them.

Then I heard it. The words that weren’t meant for my ears.

“Raven’s pathetic. That’s why she’ll never come close to you, Dahlia.”

The sentence slid through me like a blade. Precise. Icy.

The music cut.

“Attention!” the MC roared, his voice echoing through the haze of jazz and smoke. “Tonight’s main act—old-fashioned justice! Place your bets!”

The crowd surged toward the iron cage at the club’s heart, money flying, glasses spilling. I stayed where I was, lazily swirling my wine as if I had nothing better to do than watch predators tear each other apart.

The gates screeched open.

Two panthers prowled out, sinewy and restless. One wore a collar tagged red—“Vesuvio.” The other, blue—“Lucifero.” The crowd lost its mind.

“Five hundred on Lucifero!”

“Two grand on Vesuvio!”

Dahlia’s voice chimed above them all, syrupy and smug. “A million on red,” she declared, leaning into Leander. Her grin darted toward me. “What about you, Raven? No bet? Or too broke to play?”

I lifted my glass, savoring a sip, then smirked. “I don’t waste money on beasts that don’t walk on two legs.”

Her smile cracked—barely noticeable—but it was enough. Leander stayed silent.

Down below, the cats circled, muscles rippling under strobe light, throats rumbling. The crowd’s hunger thickened with theirs.

Then—shrill. A single fire alarm beeped. Then a second, quiet. And then—boom.

The curtain behind the bar ignited, flames roaring outward.

Screams ripped through the air. Bottles burst. The red light was replaced by real fire. Bodies shoved toward the exit in a panicked tide.

The cage’s lock wailed under pressure, then split wide. Metal shrieked.

The panthers were free.

One bolted into the crowd. The other fixed its yellow gaze on me.

Shit.

I bolted upright, the wine glass shattering at my feet. I ran, heels pounding the slick floor, but Vesuvio was faster. Pain detonated in my thigh—teeth tearing into muscle. My body slammed to the tiles, blood slicking beneath me.

Gunshots cracked.

Leander.

He put Vesuvio down—cold, precise.

But he didn’t reach for me.

He turned straight to Dahlia, gathering her up, cradling her like she was something precious. Whispering reassurances into her hair as fire ate the ceiling.

The room screamed. Someone shouted my name, distant, warped. I lay bleeding, abandoned, flames closing in. And all I could think was:

Even here, in the mouth of hell, Dahlia still walks away the victor.

---

I woke to antiseptic biting my nose and pain stitched deep into my bones. My body ached as if I’d been dragged across glass.

The upside? No burns. Just a torn leg wrapped like shrapnel had kissed it. I should’ve been thankful. But gratitude doesn’t survive when betrayal beats louder than agony.

I remembered the fire. The screaming. My blood painting the floor. A hand—rough, unfamiliar—dragging me out while the inferno roared.

Not Leander’s hand.

A stranger saved me. Not the man who swore he’d always protect me.

The door creaked. And then came the sound I hated more than fire alarms.

Dahlia’s fake sobbing.

She collapsed against Leander, his arms around her as if she were the one torn apart. Her crocodile tears wet his shirt as she whimpered, “I shouldn’t have been there… Raven only got hurt because of me…”

I nearly laughed. Nearly ripped the IV from my arm just to slam her against the wall and see if she could still cry without an audience. My fingers twitched with the urge. But I lay still. Hollow.

Then Leander’s voice—low, soothing. “Don’t say that,” he murmured, caressing her face like she was glass. “If I had to do it again, I’d still choose you.”

And that broke me clean.

Because he meant it. He chose her. Always her.

I shut my eyes. Not for sleep. But to erase it.

Erase the image of my boyfriend—my supposed protector—shielding her while I bled out alone on the nightclub floor. Erase the truth that in this twisted story, the villainess always claims the crown. And me? I’m the girl left behind, burning over and over.

“Oh my God, you’re conscious!” Dahlia exclaimed as she swept into the room, her wide eyes already shimmering with ready-made tears. She clasped my hand dramatically, like we were two sisters forever bound by calamity. “Raven, are you in pain? This is all because of me—I’m so, so sorry—”

I didn’t watch her face as a whole. I focused on her lips.

Because I saw it—that flicker, the twitch at the corner of her mouth, that cruel little curl of satisfaction before she rearranged her expression into grief.

“You’re blocking the window,” I murmured flatly, voice thin but sharp. “Hard to fake recovery when you’re standing there, cutting off the light with your cheap performance.”

Her lower lip trembled. Convincing. Almost award-worthy. Then Leander’s phone buzzed. He muttered something, stepping out with a look that promised he’d be back in a minute.

The door shut. Silence.

Dahlia’s mask dropped instantly.

Her spine straightened, her eyes went cold. A different creature stood before me.

“Well, well,” she drawled, brushing imaginary dust off the white sheets near my leg. “You’re still breathing. Pity.”

I said nothing. Just stared.

“I wanted your guts scattered across that floor,” she whispered, venom coating every syllable. “But no—some faceless fool had to haul you out like the pitiful stray you are.”

She leaned down, lips nearly grazing my ear. Her breath scalded. “Leander would’ve left you to the fire. If no one was watching, he wouldn’t have spared you a second glance.”

My body moved before thought caught up. My hand lashed out. The slap cracked through the sterile hospital air like a pistol shot.

She staggered back, clutching her cheek.

And then the door opened.

Leander reappeared, his gaze locking on Dahlia’s trembling face.

“What the hell happened?” he barked, striding over. “Raven, what did you do?”

“She struck me!” Dahlia whimpered, collapsing into his arms like a shattered doll. “I only came to see if she was okay, and she… she attacked me!”

“You’ve gone too far,” Leander snarled at me, fury burning in his voice. “From this moment forward, I am no longer your bodyguard.” His finger stabbed toward me like a blade. “We’re finished.”

Something deep inside me cracked wide open.

“For once,” I rasped, raw and broken, “did you ever truly love me?”

Dahlia sniffled, resting her head against his chest like she had won a prize. “Leander… maybe I should leave. Let you two settle this—”

“No,” he cut her off, tightening his hold on her. “Stay. You need to hear this.”

Then his eyes locked onto me. Unflinching. Cold. Certain.

“I never loved you, Raven. I used you. You were nothing more than a doorway to Dahlia.” He didn’t waver. Not once.

“You were just convenience. A warm body. A pastime. Dahlia is the only one I’ve ever wanted.”

Breathing felt like swallowing acid.

He stepped closer, voice dropping like the edge of a blade.

“If you ever touch her again, if you ever raise a hand to her, it won’t end with a slap. You’ll deal with me.”

And then they walked out—hand in hand, without even a glance over their shoulders.

I sat there, broken open in ways no doctor could ever stitch back together.

---

When I was released from the hospital, I didn’t crawl home to lick my wounds. I went straight to my father’s estate.

The study still reeked of smoke, liquor, and old betrayals. My leg burned beneath the bandage, but I walked as if it didn’t. Pain was better than pity.

At his desk, I pulled open the bottom drawer—the one only gloved hands dared touch. Wrapped in black velvet lay the punishment paddle. Obsidian-stained yew, carved with cruel, jagged ridges. Not ceremonial. Not for show. A family tradition, soaked in discipline.

I rested it across my lap. Waiting.

“Bring him in,” I ordered the butler.

Leander entered like a shadow, shoulders squared, jaw rigid. A soldier awaiting trial. His eyes landed on the paddle, then flicked to me. He didn’t flinch. Just silence.

“You swore an oath,” I said, voice iron. “That ring you still wear around your neck—you made vows with it. You promised to protect me. You don’t get to walk away. Not without blood.”

He opened his mouth, but I cut him off.

“You shattered it. That means I take tenfold in return.”

I rose, limping but unbothered, circling him like a predator circling prey. “Ten lashes. Or one strike from this.”

The paddle hit the desk with a heavy thud. Final.

Leander’s jaw clenched. “If that’s what it takes to make things right… then do it.”

Those words hurt worse than my wounds.

Because I didn’t want right. I wanted pain.

He shrugged off his coat. Then his shirt. Turned his back without hesitation.

That’s when the doors slammed open.

“Raven, stop!” Dahlia shrieked, her dramatic white dress fluttering behind her like she’d stepped off a stage. “Don’t hurt him! If anyone should suffer, let it be me!”

I didn’t blink. “Get out of my way.”

“No!” she wailed, tears streaking her face with perfect precision. “I won’t let you do this! He’s not the villain—you just don’t understand—”

“Dahlia.” Leander tried to pull her back, his grip firm but gentle.

She clung tighter. “No, I won’t! I won’t let her—”

Something inside me snapped. I raised the paddle. She threw herself in front of him.

The strike cracked through the room.

Her scream was raw. Real. Blood bloomed across her flawless dress, staining it scarlet. She collapsed.

Leander caught her before she hit the floor, trembling as he held her. His fist curled tight, his jaw locked.

She wept against him. He looked at me.

I’d never seen eyes like that.

“I warned you,” I said softly, gripping the paddle firm. “Defiance has consequences.”

His voice shook, quiet but steady. “You’re sick.”

“She stepped between us.”

“She always will,” he said, gathering her carefully, his touch tender even through her pain. “And now you’ve made the mistake of your life.”

He turned for the door, every muscle tight with restraint. Just before leaving, he paused, casting me one last look.

That look wasn’t hatred.

It was a vow.

“I told you there’d be punishment,” Leander said, his voice low and final. “Yours is coming.”

Then they vanished. The doors boomed shut, leaving me alone with the echo.

Three days after the hospital incident, I went to try on a wedding dress.

By myself.

No entourage of bodyguards. No paparazzi waiting outside. No self-satisfied future father-in-law clapping me on the back. Just me, stepping into a worn-out boutique tucked in the shadows of a defaced old church wall. The proprietor was an aging Russian seamstress, half-blind, half-silent—her lips always occupied with pins or thread.

It was perfect.

I chose a gown without even checking the price. Pulled it over my shoulders, stared at the fractured mirror, and for a fleeting instant imagined an alternate life—one where none of this had unraveled, one where the man waiting at the altar wasn’t cruel. Or worse… wasn’t turning me cruel.

I slipped out the back into the alleyway for a smoke. My heels tapped against concrete, veil still tangled in my hair. The cigarette barely touched my lips before a rag pressed down hard over my mouth.

Sickly sweet chemical. Too sweet.

Chloroform.

I fought. Hard. But the haze seeped into me fast, crawling through my veins like poison. My muscles went slack, vision tunneling. I collapsed before the cigarette even hit the ground.

---

I came to coughing on my own blood.

Blindfolded. Wrists roped behind a chair. Back screaming from some earlier strain. My mouth was a graveyard of copper, cotton, and dust.

The place smelled of wet stone and gasoline. Somewhere underground, I guessed. A faint fan whirred overhead, water dripping at irregular intervals. My skull pounded with each beat of my heart.

Then it began.

A paddle lashed across my back—sharp, merciless. Not the one I had once wielded.

My body convulsed, lungs refusing air. The pain was so clean, so absolute, my mind fractured. I couldn’t scream. Breath itself was impossible.

Every strike carved fire through me, nerves lighting up in agony. My teeth ground together, but still I made no sound. The silence became its own rebellion.

I lost count quickly. Past twenty, past thirty. My body quit flinching, though the torment didn’t lessen. My brain tried to switch off, but the suffering kept dragging me back.

Fifty, maybe more. By then I was unrecognizable—skin torn, blood soaking the ropes, metallic taste drowning my tongue. The agony blurred into something grotesquely familiar, as if my body had accepted this as ritual.

Then came a voice.

Muffled, distorted by static.

“It’s done, sir.”

A pause.

“Send her back.”

My breath froze in my chest.

Leander.

The world stopped.

He had ordered this.

The bastard arranged every blow, every scream. Not for discipline. Not for justice. Not even for Dahlia’s theatrics. This was punishment—mine. His punishment.

Shock crushed me. My body betrayed me, refusing even the instinct to rage. I wanted to scream, to fight, to spit blood in defiance. But nothing came. Just the iron tang filling my mouth as the darkness pulled me under again.

---

When I surfaced, I was in another hospital bed. White sheets. IV piercing my arm. Pain clinging like a second skin. Nurses whispered outside, their voices carrying like gossip through the corridor.

“That man in the VIP suite—dreamy. Stayed up all night by his girl’s bedside, holding her hand.”

“She’s barely bruised. But the one in 106? Looks like she’s been flayed alive. Not a single visitor.”

Guess which room number was mine.

I tore the IV out, the sting meaningless against everything else. The world swayed, but I dragged myself into the hall, leaning on the wall like a crutch. Each step split me open again, but I refused to stop.

And there he was.

Leander.

Outside Dahlia’s room, gently pressing a glass of water to her lips as if she were fragile porcelain. She fluttered her lashes, murmured something syrupy. And he smiled.

He smiled.

Wiped a stray drop from her mouth with his thumb. Tender. Intimate.

My throat constricted—not from jealousy. Not anymore. From the absurdity. The cruelty. I nearly died because of him, and here he was babysitting a fraud who trembled at her own shadow.

My back was an open wound, my body a map of suffering. But my heart? That was the part he’d truly destroyed. Shredded it with words, actions, betrayals.

I didn’t cry. Not then. Not ever again. I’d sooner choke on my own hurt than give him the triumph of seeing me break.

---

No flowers. No escorts. No family apologies. Just a nurse silently handing me discharge papers and a plastic bag containing my ruined dress and heels.

My father? “Abroad on business.” As always.

I hailed a cab to my villa. Every pothole made my ribs scream, but I sat still, stiff, forcing myself not to flinch. Pain had already become my companion—one I could carry like luggage.

Inside, I didn’t unpack. Didn’t shower. I sat on the velvet chaise, staring at my phone until my fingers dialed his number.

He answered on the second ring.

I didn’t give him room for a single word.

“I know it was you.”

Silence.

“I know you had me drugged, chained, whipped to the bone. Every scream—I know they were on your command.”

“How—”

“Doesn’t matter, Leander. Or should I say… Winston Salerno?” His sharp inhale bled through the receiver. I let a cold smile shape my mouth. “Whatever torment you gave me, I’ll carve back into you. Tenfold. That’s a promise.”

Then I ended the call.