The air in the room was stifling—thick with tension, with heat, with unspoken words that crackled like static in the silence. It clung to my skin like sweat and sank into my lungs like smoke. The kind of silence that didn't mean peace. It meant danger. It meant something was coming.
Salvo's fingers tightened around the belt now looped snug around my throat. Not choking. Not yet. Just there. A reminder. A warning. A promise.
"Now…" His voice was low, intimate. A murmur meant only for me. "Open your mouth."
The words didn't explode. They struck. Quiet. Measured. More terrifying than any scream. They rolled off his tongue like silk over a blade.
It was the kind of calm that only came before chaos.
I hesitated.
A single second.
Too long.
His grip tightened ever so slightly, just enough to make my breath catch.
"Don't make me repeat myself, tesoro," he said, his voice still calm, still deadly. "If you're going to act like a brat, I'll treat you like one."
