The lock clicked with the finality of a coffin lid sealing shut.
Anna spun around, her sneakers squeaking against concrete as adrenaline shot through her system like electricity. She pounded her fists against the steel door, the metal cold and unforgiving beneath her palms. "Victor!" Her voice cracked with desperation and disbelief. "You can't do this! Let me out!"
Silence answered her. Nothing but suffocating quiet and the oppressive darkness of the storage room that had become her prison. The echo of her own voice bounced off concrete walls and died, leaving her alone with the thunderous sound of her own heartbeat.
The room was maybe eight feet by ten feet, designed for storing club supplies and contraband that needed to be kept away from prying eyes. It smelled of dust, old motor oil, and stale cigarettes: the accumulated funk of decades of illegal storage. Boxes of spare parts lined the walls like tombstones, and coils of rope hung from hooks like nooses waiting to be used.
The single bare bulb overhead buzzed once with electrical complaint, then flickered out with a soft pop, leaving her in shadows so complete they seemed to have weight and substance. No windows. No clock. No way to measure time or maintain sanity. Just four concrete walls and the echo of her own increasingly ragged breathing.
She screamed until her throat went raw and her voice cracked like old leather. She pounded on the door until her knuckles split and bled, leaving dark stains on the steel that no one would ever see. She kicked and clawed and begged, but no one came. No one even acknowledged that she existed.
The first day (though she had no way to know it was a day) she clawed at the door frame until her fingernails split down to the quick, painting the concrete with streaks of blood that looked black in the darkness. She shouted until her voice was nothing but a whisper, then shouted some more until even the whisper died. Hunger gnawed at her belly with teeth like broken glass, thirst turned her tongue to sandpaper, and the silence pressed down heavier than concrete slabs.
She found a corner where two walls met and curled up like a wounded animal, pulling her knees to her chest in a futile attempt to make herself smaller, harder to hurt. But there was no hiding from the darkness that lived inside her own mind, no escape from the questions that circled like vultures: How long will he keep me here? What if he forgets about me? What if I die in this room and no one ever finds my body?
By what she guessed was the second day, she stopped shouting. Her voice was completely gone, reduced to painful croaks that accomplished nothing but reminding her of her powerlessness. Her body was weak, trembling with exhaustion and dehydration. She rocked back and forth in her corner, matching the rhythm to her pulse like a metronome counting down to madness.
Her mind began to play tricks on her in the unrelenting darkness. She saw shapes moving in the shadows, heard voices whispering her name, felt insects crawling across her skin that weren't really there. Time became meaningless, an abstract concept that had no place in this concrete tomb.
But deep down, beneath the fear and desperation and growing madness, she understood what was happening. This wasn't random punishment for running away. This was systematic conditioning, psychological warfare designed to break her will and rebuild her in Victor's image. This was correction.
By the third day (or what felt like the third day in a universe where time had lost all meaning) she didn't even try the door handle anymore. She just sat in her corner, waiting for whatever came next with the passive acceptance of someone whose spirit had been methodically dismantled piece by piece.
When the hinges finally squealed with the sound of freedom, she barely reacted.
Light speared into the room like a physical assault, brilliant and painful after so long in complete darkness. Anna threw her hands up to shield her eyes, squinting through tears as her retinas struggled to adjust to illumination that felt bright as the Nevada sun.
Victor's silhouette filled the doorway, broad shoulders and commanding presence making him look like some kind of dark angel come to deliver judgment. Two of his men stood behind him in the corridor (she could see their shapes but not their faces), but they didn't speak. They didn't need to. Their silence was part of the theater, part of the lesson being taught.
Victor stepped into the storage room with careful deliberation, his expensive shoes clicking against concrete as he approached her corner. He crouched in front of her with the fluid grace of someone completely comfortable with violence and intimidation. His cologne cut through the accumulated stink of dust and her own fear-sweat, sharp and clean and utterly civilized.
"You done fighting me yet?" he asked softly, his voice carrying the patient tone of a teacher checking a student's progress.
Anna's cracked lips parted, trying to form words that wouldn't come. Her throat was too damaged, her tongue too dry, her spirit too broken to manage even a whisper. Only a dry rasp emerged, the sound of dead leaves scraping against concrete.
Victor tilted his head with scientific curiosity, studying her like a craftsman examining his handiwork for flaws that might need correction. His cold blue eyes cataloged every detail: the hollow cheeks, the bloodshot eyes, the way her hands trembled with malnutrition and psychological trauma.
Then, satisfied with what he saw, he offered his hand.
For a heartbeat that lasted an eternity, Anna thought about refusing. About spitting in his face with what little moisture she could summon, about clawing at his eyes with her broken fingernails, about going down swinging like her father had taught her. But her body betrayed her, reaching for his offered palm before her conscious mind could overrule the animal instinct for survival.
Her trembling fingers slid into his hand like a prayer seeking absolution.
He pulled her to her feet with surprising gentleness, steadying her wobbling legs like a man helping a wounded bird learn to fly again. His touch was firm but not cruel, possessive but not violent: the hands of someone who understood that broken things required careful handling.
"That's better," he murmured, approval warm in his voice. "Much better."
The two enforcers stepped aside as Victor guided her down the corridor, their deference to his authority absolute and unquestioned. Anna's legs wobbled with every step, muscle atrophy and dehydration making simple movement an exercise in controlled collapse. She had to concentrate on each footfall, each breath, each moment of remaining upright.
The clubhouse buzzed with normal life around them: laughter echoing from the main room, classic rock pounding from speakers, the familiar clink of beer bottles and pool balls. The sounds of brotherhood and camaraderie that had once seemed welcoming now felt distant and unreal, like audio from a movie playing in another room.
No one looked at her as they passed. No one met her eyes or acknowledged her existence. Whether from fear, embarrassment, or simple indifference, she couldn't tell. She'd become invisible, a ghost haunting the edges of a world that had moved on without her.
Victor led her to a small bathroom off the main corridor, fluorescent lights humming overhead with the same electrical complaint as the bulb that had died in her prison. Anna caught sight of herself in the mirror above the sink and barely recognized the hollow-eyed creature staring back.
Face pale as old bone, lips cracked and bleeding, hair tangled into knots that would take hours to brush out. Dark circles under bloodshot eyes that had seen too much darkness, lost too much hope. The girl in the mirror wasn't Anna De'Leon anymore. She was someone else entirely, someone who'd been broken down to essential components and reassembled according to Victor's specifications.
He set a glass of water in front of her on the porcelain counter, the liquid clear as absolution. She grabbed it with shaking hands, drinking desperately until it was gone, water spilling down her chin and soaking into her dirty shirt. The coolness soothed her damaged throat but did nothing for the deeper injuries that would never fully heal.
Victor reached out with his thumb, wiping away the spilled water with movements that were almost tender. His touch was gentle, paternal, carrying no threat of violence or punishment. Just the care of someone tending to valuable property.
"See what happens when you listen?" he asked, his voice soft with satisfaction. "See how much better everything is when you trust me to know what's best?"
Anna nodded weakly, too exhausted and broken to argue with the logic of her own defeat. Fighting him had brought nothing but suffering. Compliance, apparently, brought water and light and the promise of eventual freedom from concrete tombs.
"Good girl," Victor said, the words carrying approval that felt better than it should have. "From now on, you don't question my decisions. You don't run from my protection. You don't pretend that survival is possible without me. You understand what I'm telling you?"
Anna's voice was hoarse and damaged, but she managed to force out the word he wanted to hear. "Yes."
Victor smiled with genuine warmth, the expression transforming his face from predator to protector. He pressed a soft kiss to her hairline (a blessing, a claim, a promise wrapped in affection) before stepping back toward the door.
"Clean yourself up," he said, his tone casual as if nothing extraordinary had happened. "Take your time. When you're ready, come find me. We have things to discuss."
The door closed behind him with a soft click, leaving Anna alone with her reflection and the weight of absolute surrender.
She gripped the porcelain sink with white knuckles, staring at the stranger in the mirror. Hollow cheeks that spoke of hunger and desperation. Bloodshot eyes that had seen the inside of hell. Fresh bruises on her wrists from pounding against unyielding steel, older bruises on her cheek from Victor's corrective slap.
A ghost wearing Anna's face, shaped by three days of systematic psychological demolition.
Her stomach churned with a mixture of self-loathing and reluctant gratitude, but she couldn't look away from the mirror. Couldn't stop cataloging the ways she'd been changed, marked, claimed by forces beyond her control or understanding.
She didn't recognize who she'd become. Worse, she wasn't sure she wanted to remember who she'd been before.
The girl in the mirror was Victor's creation, and Victor's creatures survived by accepting their place in his carefully constructed world.