TOXIC (Dark Mafia Romance)

Chapter 11 (mature s*xual content)

WARNING: MATURE SEXUAL CONTENT

Pakibasa po ang warning sa simula.

I DIDN'T know how we got back to the penthouse.

De Luca slipped the mask over my eyes again as we climbed the stairs.

Nasa parking na kami ng hotel ng mga Almeda nang tanggalin ng binata ang piring sa mga mata ko.

I got into the elevator still feeling numbed and cold.

When we got into the unit, I forced my trembling legs to move toward the hallway leading to my room.

Paulina's screams kept echoing in my head, the image of blood and gray matter splaying all over her face and body flashing in a loop in my mind.

"Do you understand now, Principessa?" De Luca's harsh voice stopped me.

I couldn't look at him. I just stood there, both my mind and body unmoving.

"Do you understand now what you're getting into?"

Shaking, I forced my body to turn.

De Luca stood in the center of the living space, the wall of windows behind him. The vast ocean and endless evening sky spread out at his back. He should have looked inconsequential against the vastness of the sky and sea, but he stood there like a god–his muscular body clad in a dark suit daunting, his sculpted face chilling, and his dark eyes, all flinty and icy, bore into mine as if he owned everything.

"Was he a criminal?" garalgal kong tanong. "That man, was he a criminal?"

Alessio De Luca cocked his head, and the mundane action sent a terrifying image in my mind of him tilting his head as his men followed his wordless orders.

"Does it matter?" His glacial eyes and baritone voice were both flat.

I wrapped my arms around my waist as my body shuddered. That was a good question. Did it matter? Did it make a difference?

I shut my eyes tight.

Would it make things better if the man was a criminal, too? A criminal killing another criminal. If that was the case... at least one thing was for certain, there would be one less evil in the world.

"He was one of the men who attacked your bodyguards outside the women's restroom," De Luca intoned. "He was there to kidnap you."

I already thought of that.

Naisip ko na na tauhan ni Paulina Linares ang lalaki, at isa siya sa mga nahuli nina Frank kanina na gustong pumasok sa women's restroom kung nasaan ako. That man was probably one of the men who would have been waiting for me in that abandoned house at the cliff, too.

Napadiin ang mga daliri ko sa aking braso.

What would they have done to me if De Luca had not intercepted me and I had arrived at the abandoned house as they had planned?

"His name was Ronaldo Bautista," De Luca droned in that same uninflected voice, and I lifted my gaze back to him.

He crossed his brawny arms over his muscular torso and slanted his head as he stared at me as if he were watching some new species of animal under a microscope.

"He used to work for a politician in Laguna as part of the man's private military. He had been charged with multiple assaults and murder, but everything was swept under the rug. He had no legal conviction. Is that enough?"

My stomach churned. Was that enough?

De Luca cocked a brow at me. "Do you believe killing a criminal makes it less immoral, Principessa? That it would make me less of a criminal?"