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Henri muttered a curse under his breath.
“What did you say?” Victor snapped upright.
Gritting his teeth, Henri snarled, “Nothing. I said nothing. Apart from…five hundred thousand.”
My heart stopped.
Once again, he put a monetary figure on my body and life.
Just how much money does he have?
Cold snow settled on my shoulders.
You idiot, he doesn’t have any money.
He’s a public servant. He doesn’t have anywhere near that sort of cash.
Oh God…even if he bid and won, he wouldn’t be able to keep up the ruse.
Not unless he somehow transferred the promised funds to Victor.
How much longer until back-up arrives?
Surely, there was protocol to these things? Even if Victor’s scrambler had stopped Henri sending out a message, his team should have a Plan B, right? Something to fall back on in case they didn’t hear from him?
My fingertips tingled with lack of blood as I struggled in my hooked manacles. The urge to run ached in my legs, desperate to get far, far away.
Pressure built in my temples. The brightness of the sun made me feel faint. The lack of food and drink, the nonexistent sleep and safety…it all swirled and settled like suffocating fog.
“Six hundred thousand!” a tall man shouted. An exotic girl bowed at his feet.
Henri shot him a scowl.
Victor clapped a hand against his tumbler. “Excellent. Great bids, my friends. Just to make the deal that little bit sweeter…whoever wins can fuck her immediately. Right here. Right now.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Why do you think she’s strung up like a sacrifice?” Crossing the bridge and marching up the steps toward me, he ran his tongue over his bottom lip. “Tied to a maypole, standing on wood. We could burn you like a witch. Bleed you like a hog. Or…fuck you like the succubus you are.” He pressed a doting kiss on my cheek.
It soaked into my system like venom, killing me from the inside out.
Swaying into me, Victor stroked my hair, his eyes almost wistful. “You truly are a stunning little thing, Ily. Tell me…what sort of name is that? Short for something? A nickname, perhaps?”
The urge to spit in his face overwhelmed me.
But then, I caught Henri’s shutdown stare over Victor’s shoulder, and everything he’d asked of me in the library returned.
Don’t fight.
Whatever you do…do not fight.
So…even though it cost me my dignity, even though I ignored every instinct, I didn’t.
I bowed my chin.
Became tame.
Played broken.
“Seven hundred thousand!”
I gasped as my eyes ripped to Roland’s beady ones.
