Chapter 003

~GIA~

When I got back to my room, I found Anna waiting for me.

She looked surprised and concerned at the same time. It was as if she knew what I had to endure inside Mario's bedroom.

I fought back tears and pretended to be unbothered. I just didn't want to cry anymore.

I was done crying. It gave Mario satisfaction to continue torturing me just to see my reaction.

"Gigi, what happened? I saw the last girl leave a while ago," she asked. Concern in her voice.

"He made me watch as he made love to her," I answered.

"What? Are you serious?" She came towards me, took my hand, and sat down with me on the bed.

I chuckled, "I watched everything as if it was a movie."

"I didn't know he was going to do that," she answered, pitying me. I didn't want her to pity me anymore.

"I am going to get away from him, Anna," I said, looking at her.

"I'll help you," she answered.

"No, I don't want you to get into trouble!" I looked at her. Scared that I might lose her too if Mario found out what we were up to.

"Don't worry, Gigi, we will figure everything out together, but I am helping you get out of this place," she insisted.

I hugged her and sobbed for having someone like her in my life.

She gave me hope when I wanted to give up, and I didn't know how to repay her for everything that she had done for me.

She was ready to risk her life now to save mine. So, I was going to escape with her.

“We will do this if you promise that you will come with me,” I looked at her.

It was the least that I could do to ensure that nothing happened to her when she managed to help me escape.

“This life is all I’ve known, Gigi,” she answered. Sadness in her voice.

“There is so much to live for out there, Anna, I’m never going to leave you behind,” I held her hands, desperate for her to agree to come with me.

She nodded.

It was settled. Anna and I were going to leave together. We just had to come up with a very good plan for how we were going to escape.

Mario had guards and eyes everywhere, so we had to find an inside man to be able to escape.

I also had a side plan to kill Mario on that day we managed to escape.

Our inside man, if successful to get him on our side, was going to be Andrea Bianchi. He was Mario’s right-hand man.

He usually brought me a message from Mario whenever he was not in the house.

He was kinder to me than everyone who worked for Mario. Except for Anna.

So, now that I was allowed to roam around the house, I was going to find a way to draw his attention.

I wasn’t going to make my seducing plan obvious in case he suspected something and informed Mario.

***

A few days later, Andrea was finally around the house.

Mario had left him behind to overlook things, me in particular, while he went out for whatever he dealt with out of town.

It was a perfect day for my perfect plan.

At 12 PM when most of the house helpers went out for their lunch, I went to the kitchen and gave myself a wrist cut, and then splattered the blood on the floor leading upstairs to my bedroom.

He was going to go around the house at that time to check if everything was still in order.

When I got inside my bedroom, I quickly wiped the blood all over my pants on the butt area to make it look like a period.

I then laid myself down on the floor and pretended to have bad period cramps.

Any minute from now, Andrea was going to burst inside the room.

“Gia, are you alright?” he asked as soon as he barged inside the door and rushed to my side.

I groaned before answering, “I’m having a bad period today.”

“I saw blood from the living room. Are you having a heavy bleed?” He asked.

He sounded very concerned, and that was a good sign. "We can call the family doctor and have him check you out if you're losing a lot of blood," he added.

"I'm fine, Andrea, I just didn't have a tampon on. I'm sorry about the mess," I answered.

"It's okay. How about you go and freshen up? I'll get Anna to come and take care of you and get you whatever you may need."

"Alright, thank you," I said politely.

I sat up and then he straightened his hand to help me up, and when he was about to let go of my hand so that I could head to the bathroom, I tripped on my foot and fell. On his arms. Just on time.

He looked into my eyes for a minute longer before he got me back on my feet.

"Thank you. I slipped." I admitted shyly.

"It's okay, I'll go and get Anna."

He left, and I gracefully exited to the bathroom to clean myself up and change my clothes.

When I was done with my bath and waited to see Anna in my bedroom, Andrea was back with tampons and snacks.

"I decided to give Anna a little break and get you these myself."

I got up from my bed with a big smile on my face and went to him.

"Thank you, Andrea, you didn't have to."

"With four sisters in my house, I had a thing or two to learn when a woman was on her period."

I took the tampons and snacks from him with a cheering smile on my face. He was sweet.

Sometimes, I couldn't understand how Mario, being the beast that he was, chose Andrea, a cuddly puppy, as his right-hand man.

It puzzled me a lot. But I guess I didn't know Andrea that much.

"I love marshmallows, thank you."

"So, rest up and put on any movie that you like. Anna will bring you hot chocolate later."

"Thank you."

He gave me a warm smile and then left.

I went to the TV that was in front of my bed and chose a movie to watch. Just as he recommended.

I was giggly inside that my plan was going according to plan.

* * *

"You have to be very careful with Andrea, Gigi. He's a very clever man," Anna warned me.

"Men are like puppies when infatuated," I answered.

I had to have some hope for the success of my plan. If I doubted the plan, then there was no way that it was going to work out.

"Just promise me that you will be careful around him," she answered, looking so sure of her statement. And it worried me for a second.

"Trust me, Anna, he won't suspect a thing," I tried to reassure her and hugged her.

There was no need for her to get worked up like that because I had everything under control.

Andrea had a soft spot for me, and it was very much obvious.

He didn't suspect that I had something up my sleeve.

Besides, I was wearing a long-sleeved shirt, so there was no way that he could have noticed the cut on my wrist.

Even after changing into new clothes, I put on a black and long-sleeved dress.

The bandage on my wrist was not visible. Anna and I were safe. There was no reason for panic.

"Alright. Here's your hot chocolate. Let me get back to work."

"Alright, Anna, thank you."

She smiled at me and then left.

She looked worried, but I was going to do everything I could to make sure that we were both out of here safely.

* * *

A knock on my door startled me as I was already sleeping.

I got up as the person on the door continued to knock aggressively, and I even started panicking.

"Who is it?"

"Open this fucking door, Gia, or I will knock it down!" Mario's voice commanded.

He was angry.

My heart rate skyrocketed, and I wondered if I had done something wrong or if he was back to torture me again since he was gone the whole day.

"It's not locked!" I called out, my voice was trembling.

He opened the door with Anna by his side. She looked scared.

No. There was no way that our plan was uncovered. Andrea surely didn't suspect anything.

"Follow me," he said as he dragged Anna by arm out of the door.

I swallowed hard and followed them to the basement.

When we got inside, a guard locked the door and I gasped from fear of the dark with Mario with us who was capable of anything out of the ordinary.

The guy then turned the lights on.

"What were you two conspiring about behind my back?" Mario asked.

I looked at Anna and then back at him.

"Nothing. We were not conspiring anything," I answered.

He didn't say anything as he walked towards me, took my hand, pulled up my sleeve, and revealed the wrist bandage.

I took a step back from shock. I tried to rewind on how Andrea might have seen the cut, but he didn't!

I faced away from the camera when I got into my room, there was no way I could have been seen.

Besides, the camera only focused its angle on my bed. So, how he knew about the cut didn’t make sense.

Even if Andrea saw the cut, he didn't look like someone who had seen something suspicious.

He would have called me out if he saw something and tried to warn me.

And no one in the house could have seen me other than Andrea.

I made sure that no one saw me, especially Andrea who was in Mario's study during that time.

"How did you get that cut?" He asked.

"I cut myself to sleep better," I lied.

"Where did you cut yourself Gia?" He asked again.

"In my bathroom."

"When did you cut yourself?" He asked yet again.

At this point, I was convinced that he knew everything. I looked at Anna again.

I hoped that he wouldn't do something horrible to her. She didn't deserve any punishment when all this was my fault.

"Last night," I answered.

He chuckled. I breathed when I realized that I was holding my breath.

"Andrea was upstairs when he saw you when you were splattering your 'period' blood on the floor. You were not observant enough to realize that you were being watched," he said and turned his gaze from me to Anna.

"He saw you Anna when you went inside her room and took longer than you should," he turned and looked at me, "So I will ask this again, what were you conspiring behind my back?" He asked.

It became clear that we were busted.

Anna cried. I guess she was right. Andrea was pretending to me all along so that he could find out what I was up to.

"It was my idea, I wanted to help Gia escape!" Anna exclaimed.

Oh, hell no, I wasn't going to let her take the blame for me. I wasn't going to lose her. Not today.

"No, leave Anna out of this!" I said crying, "I wanted to escape, and I thought Andrea was going to be the one to help me! And Anna took longer than she was supposed to in my room because she was trying to talk me out of it!" I added.

"You are my wife!" Mario snapped.

"I will never be your wife!" I retorted.

Yes, we were married on paper. He was my husband by law, and I was his wife, but in our hearts, we were strangers. Enemies.

"Very well, then." He said as he took his gun and shot Anna in the head while I watched.

Her blood splattered on my face.

"Clean this up, Luca." He said to the guard and then left.

I stood there and watched as Anna's head drowned in the pool of her own blood.

I was in a trance until her body was taken off the floor.

Mario had stripped me of the one thing that kept me sane.

He took away my only hope of survival, and then it clicked in my mind that I had no one.