The black sedan rolled to a slow halt in front of a decaying apartment block in the outskirts of the city. Night cloaked the building in shadows, but the lights inside apartment 3C glowed yellow and sickly through cheap curtains.

Vince Moretti, boss of the Moretti family, stepped out first. He didn’t rush. He never did. His men followed — Matteo and Rocco, both grim-faced and silent. They knew this wasn’t a negotiation.

“Third floor,” Matteo muttered, checking the address again.

Vince didn’t respond. The man inside owed him forty grand. Three months past due was an insult. But money wasn’t what made Vince’s blood cold tonight. It was the message Matteo had delivered earlier — about a woman, handcuffed and screaming, and the addict who had her.

The door opened easily.

Inside, the air reeked of sweat, smoke, and something chemical. The place was dim, lit only by the flicker of a TV in the corner and a bedside lamp in the room ahead. Music thumped from a speaker on the floor — something electronic and broken.

Vince entered the bedroom first. What he saw made Matteo stop cold behind him.

The debtor — a skinny, twitchy man named Jared — lay half-dressed atop a woman in her underwear, kissing her neck. She squirmed beneath him, but not with passion. Her eyes were wide and glossy. Her mouth trembled. One wrist was cuffed to the headboard, her arm bruised in blotches of purple and green. She let out a small sob.

On the nightstand beside the bed sat a used syringe.

Vince’s jaw tensed. Jared turned his head, eyes wild, and started to speak.

“What the hell—?”

He didn’t finish. Rocco pulled him off the bed and slammed him face-first to the floor, pinning him there with a knee to the spine.

“She’s drugged,” Vince said softly, going to the bed. The girl flinched when he reached out, her whole body shaking. He didn’t touch her yet. “What did you shoot her with?”

Jared wheezed under Rocco. “It’s not what it looks like—!”

Vince stepped on his hand “Answer.”

“S-Sensory stuff! Just — to make her… feel more. She said no, but I—I paid for it! She was gonna—!”

Vince didn’t care about the excuses. He looked at Matteo. “Get bolt cutters. Gently.”

Matteo nodded and left.

Vince turned back to the girl. Her lips were trembling. She looked like she wanted to scream, but the drugs made it too hard to focus, too hard to understand what was real.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Vince said. His voice was lower now, calm. Not like how he talked to men. “You’re safe. You hear me?”

Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“She’s gonna freakin’ overdose,” Rocco said, glancing at the table. “That’s a triple dose in that needle.”

Vince’s hand curled into a fist.

“Call the doc to meet us at the safe house.”

They worked fast. Matteo freed her wrist without touching her skin more than necessary. Rocco found a blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders. She flinched even from the fabric, the drug still amplifying every sensation.

Jared was whimpering now, face bloodied from Rocco’s knee. “I didn’t mean—she was gonna—she said—!”

“You don’t use women,” Vince said coldly. “You don’t touch women. We do a lot of bad things, but this…” He looked down at Jared like he was nothing. “This ain’t business. This is garbage.”

He pulled out his gun.

The shot was quiet, muffled, and final.

Then Vince turned back to the woman. Her eyes darted around like a deer caught in headlights, she clenched the blanket

“Safe house, Now. She gets whatever she needs.”