The Untouchables

18. Torture

Carlos grabs the gun from his pants and shoots up to the ceiling, then presses the hot barrel against the slit of my pussy and hell reveals to me as it never did. I growl like an animal to resist the pain, completely under his control, sweating.

The more the hot metal stays on my flesh, the more it hurts. In just a few seconds I try to raise up, but Quintero puts his hand around my neck and keeps me down, thrusting the barrel inside of me.

"Stop!" I yell, knowing that nobody's going to help. I wish I could die right now.

As Carlos starts moving the gun in and out my burnt sex, I can't help but cry out loud like a child.

Finally, he quits torturing me. I notice that only a few moments after he stopped, as the pain starts to diminish while Carlos keeps me still with a hand on my tummy and drinks tequila with the other.

"Are you done screaming? It's fucking annoying," he says, raising an eyebrow. Then he chuckles, hiding his smile behind his empty glass. "Sorry, I couldn't hold it anymore. You're pathetic."

I try to reorder my thoughts and ignore the twinges of pain in my heart, remembering how I got into this situation. "Are you going to help me now?"

"You haven't suffered enough yet."

"You don't know how much I've suffered," I say, and I'm not talking about the present moment anymore. "We're done here."

"Great. Go find someone else to pay your debts," he says, pouring liquor into his glass.

I crawl away, dragging myself to the exit, defeated as I feel like I could cry out my own blood and it wouldn't make a difference to him.

"It was fun to humiliate you," he adds, walking past me to close the exit door. "Give me a minute."

"For what, you bastard?"

He ignores me, calling someone on the phone. "Rafa? Si no sigue colaborando con la Srta. López, no entregaré su mercancía a ningún lado." He hangs up without waiting for an answer, smirking at me.

"Thank you," I say.

But the bastard keeps waiting, towering over me.

"What do you want from me?" I ask.

"I don't like secrets, Gabriela. Tell me how much you hate me," he says.

He enjoys it - my fear, my pain, even my hate and my anger.

"You're a fucking disgusting bastard," I spit, just to satisfy him without crossing the line and lose his help. "What good are you doing to people now, hurting and humiliating me for personal revenge in exchange for a business relationship?"

"I'm just doing what I have to do to earn your respect. Being loved is useless when you're not feared first."

Finally, he opens the door for me with a smile painted on the hard traits of his face. I crawl away, resisting the urge to throw up and his elegant shoes. There's no elegance in the behavior of that man just like there's no grace in my moves.