Ruiz sat in a leather chair, his eyes fixed on a screen in front of him.
The room he was seated in was nothing like the freezer where Reina was slowly dying. This space was warm, almost oppressively so with dark paneling, and soft lighting from designer lamps. It was one of his family's safe houses, a place where business, the kind that couldn't happen in daylight, was conducted with efficiency and discretion.
On the screen, Reina shook violently in her chair, her face pale, her lips taking on a bluish tint. Through the high-resolution footage, he could clearly see her eyes squeezed shut, her mouth moving as she muttered to herself. Or prayed, or called for someone who couldn't hear her.
His expression didn't change. Ruiz's face remained perfectly blank, carved from stone, revealing nothing of whatever thoughts moved behind those dark eyes. His injured arm was still cradled in its sling, while the other rested on the armrest. Five rings adorned his fingers—silver, each one different, each one expensive. They caught the light as his fingers drummed idly, stilling and picking up rhythm again at intervals.
He hadn't had any rest since Reina tried to kill him in the wee hours of that morning. He'd gone from the club to a private clinic, entertained officers at the clinic, gone home briefly to change clothes, driven to Reina's house to confirm his suspicions and then down here.
Not a single moment of rest.
His mind replayed the phone call that had come through just as he'd climbed into his Mercedes, just as Reina's thrown rock had shattered his side mirror.
"Senhor Ruiz." Almeida's voice, his family's most loyal bodyguard—the one who kept him informed when his grandmother made moves that concerned him. "Your avó just received a call from Principal Oliveira. He's identified the shooter from Club Pita."
Ruiz had gone very still in the backseat, his eyes frozen on his broken mirror.
"The security footage shows a boy entering through the back entrance with the help of one of the club's employees—Franco Oliveira. But it wasn't a boy. Principal Oliveira believes it was Reina Carvalho in disguise. He says his son was tricked by the hysterical young lady."
Of course Oliveira had painted his son the victim and sold her out to save his own. Ruiz would've respected it if the sleazy old werewolf wasn't so predictable.
"Your avó is sending people to collect the girl now," Almeida had continued, his tone carefully neutral. "I thought you should know."
What Almeida meant, what he couldn't say outright, was: "Your grandmother is going to kill her, I just thought you should know."
Ruiz had ended the call and immediately dialed another number. His grandmother had answered on the second ring, her voice sharp and alert.
The conversation that followed had required every ounce of manipulation Ruiz had learned in his eighteen years of being a Souza. He'd played the wounded victim, the offended party whose pride demanded personal retribution. He'd insisted, with just the right amount of deference mixed with stubborn determination, that death was only an escape and that he wanted to be the one to handle Reina's punishment.
His grandmother had grudgingly agreed, insisting that she wanted proof that Reina had actually suffered for what she did, and that she eventually understood what happens when someone crosses their family.
Which was why Ruiz now sat in this room, watching Reina suffer through a camera feed he knew his grandmother was also viewing from wherever she was. Every shiver, every gasp, every moment of her agony was a show to satisfy Ginny Souza's need for retribution while keeping Reina breathing.
On screen, her shaking had intensified. Her head lolled forward, chin dropping to her chest as her breathing became shallow, visible in the clouds of condensation that formed with each exhale.
It had been twenty minutes since she was in the cooler, and a vital signs monitor had been attached under her seat to ensure she didn't progress to fatal hypothermia or suffer a cardiac arrest during the process. One of the officers had returned to attach the sensors to her esophagus five minutes after turning on the cooler for the first time.
So, with the dangerous readings appearing on his screen now, it was time to move to the next stage.
He leaned forward slightly, pressing the intercom button on the desk in front of him. His voice, when he spoke, was as cold and empty as the freezer itself.
"Get her a blanket. Let her warm up a little and then turn the temperature down further."
There was pause. Then the officer's voice crackled through. "Sir? You want it colder?"
"Did I stutter?"
"No, sir. Right away."
On screen, he watched one of the male officers enter the frame. The man carried a heavy wool blanket, a head warmer and hand gloves, the kind used by homeless people on São Paulo's coldest nights. He approached Reina's shivering form and began wrapping it around her as much as the chair and handcuffs would allow—around her shoulders, over her lap, tucking it in where he could. When he noticed a part of her arms couldn't be covered, he uncuffed her, wrapped her up and cuffed her again.
He couldn't clearly hear what she was saying, but Reina's mutterings had become louder as warmth from the blanket slowly began to envelope her. It was clearly taking her an effort to hurl profanities at the officer, who simply ignored as he worked quickly, efficiently, then stepped back and exited the frame.
Ten minutes later, the temperature reading in the corner of the screen began to drop even further. The new clothing layers would keep her core temperature from dropping too fast, and prevent the worst of the frostbite. But the cold would continue to torture her, would keep her trapped in that space between dying and surviving.
Ruiz settled back in his chair, his rings catching the light as he brought his good hand up to his jaw, fingers drumming against his cheek in a slow, contemplative rhythm.
His grandmother would see a girl being punished without mercy. She would see the cold intensifying, see Reina's continued suffering, and be satisfied. She would understand the calculated precision of it. The way the blanket was life-saving even as it prolonged her suffering.
The minutes crawled by. On screen, officers entered periodically—every fifteen minutes or so. They would strike her across the face to warm her cheeks, massage her hands with towels that steamed in the fridge air, working circulation back to parts of her body that were turning dangerous shades of white and blue. Then they would include extra layers of clothing and reduced the temperature even further.
It was torture. Extended, methodical torture. But it was also his mercy. Left to his grandma, Reina would endure far worse, and be eventually killed off. It wouldn't be the first time she would be doing something like that. Actually, her ruthlessness was what instilled fear in the hearts of every underworld leader in São Paulo.
This was mercy. It kept blood flowing through her veins, ensuring that when this was over, Reina Carvalho would still have all ten fingers.
One hour passed. Then ninety minutes.
Ruiz watched it all with the same blank expression, his face betraying nothing even as his injured arm throbbed terribly in its sling. The pain was a constant reminder of why they were here, of the bullet that had torn through his hand, slightly fracturing his humerus.
It ached like hell. Reina had walked into that club with the absolute conviction that he deserved to die. And maybe he did. But it wasn't up to her to decide.
Two hours passed.
On screen, Reina hadn't moved in the last twenty minutes. The blanket rose and fell with her breathing—shallow, but steady. Her face, what he could see of it, was alarmingly pale, her lips tinged blue. But she was alive.
That was enough.
He pressed the intercom button again.
"Bring her out," he said, his voice flat, emotionless. "Drop her at the location we discussed and give her my regards."
He released the button and stood, his movements unhurried, almost lazy. He adjusted his sling, making sure it sat comfortably against his chest. He looked down at the screen one last time, hoping she would be smart enough to let sleeping dogs lie.