The basement smelled of iron and wet stone.
Marco Greco smiled, and the taste was rust.
The copper crust on his lip snapped when they’d dragged him down the stairs, fresh red leaking over a jawline gone grey and hard.
He was lashed to a metal chair—wrists bound, ankles locked, one eye already clouding into a purple knot.
He didn't look like a victim. He looked like a man critiquing the service.
Across from him, Viktor Volkov sat, watching the show.
The single overhead light cut a sharp cone between them, the rest of the room swallowed in shadow.
“You’re tougher than I expected,” Volkov said. His voice was mild, almost bored.
Marco rolled his jaw. It clicked, a dull spike of pain. He grinned anyway, his eyes fixed on the man who shared half his blood and all of his father’s fortune.
