A keychain. Simple. Black metal. A small engraved cobra curved around the letter O.
My chest locks. For a second, the whole war room, the plan, Matteo, the collar, the word sold, all of it disappears under the weight of this tiny fucking thing she went out to get me. A birthday gift. My first one in years My fist closes around it carefully.So carefully.
The violence inside me shifts again. Sharper. Cleaner. They took her while she was trying to give me something. They put her on a site. They put a collar on her. They think tomorrow is a delivery. They don’t understand. Returning her tomorrow is the last useful thing they’ll ever do.
Shadow’s voice comes from the hall, quiet. “Brother.” I look toward the door. “Logan’s asking for you.”
I slide the keychain into my pocket. Close the drawer. Step back into the hall. Whatever almost broke in that room is gone now. Not healed. Forged into something worse.
Shadow studies my face. Then nods once. No question.
We head back toward Logan’s office.
The clubhouse is moving now. Weapons checked in controlled silence. Vehicles assigned. Medical bags packed. Dom’s screens multiplying. Landon on the phone in a low voice. Logan at the center of it all, directing men like pieces on a board that has only one acceptable outcome.
I step into the office again. The countdown to tomorrow lives in every breath now. She’s alive. She’s close.
And now we do it right.
“You’ve been sold .”
The words don’t hit the way I expect them to. There is no dramatic shatter inside me. No sudden collapse. No disbelief strong enough to protect me for a few extra seconds.
Just hollow clarity. Like a door closes somewhere deep in my chest, and on the other side of it is the last version of myself who believed this might still stop before it became real. It happened.
I stand in the mirrored room under lights that are too bright, wearing almost nothing, with a metal collar biting cold and cruel against my throat, and a man I don’t know says those two words like they’re ordinary. Bought. Sold. Transaction complete.
My fingers curl at my sides, nails pressing into my palms. I don’t speak. I don’t ask who. I don’t ask where I’m going.Part of me is afraid if I open my mouth, I’ll beg, and begging feels like one more thing they can take.
So I stand still.
The man with the tablet doesn’t look at me when he talks. He looks at the screen. Checks something. Swipes once. Nods to the man near the door. “Transfer confirmed,” he says. “Vittorio estate. Tomorrow night.”
Vittorio.
The name means nothing to me. Not really. It sounds expensive. Powerful. The kind of name that doesn’t belong in rooms like this, except I’m starting to understand that rooms like this probably exist because of names like that.
Another man laughs softly from behind me. “Matteo likes pretty things.”
My stomach twists.
The first man glances at him. “Matteo likes expensive things. There’s a difference.”
“Either way, he’ll keep her in line.”
They speak about me. Not to me. Never to me. Like I’m furniture being discussed before delivery. Like I’m something fragile that needs special handling, not because I matter, but because damage affects value.
The man behind me comes closer. I feel him before I see him in the mirror, his body a dark shape behind mine. “Shame we can’t have another turn before she goes,” he says.
My entire body locks. The collar presses harder when my throat moves.
The man with the tablet turns slowly. His face is bored. That’s worse than anger. “Can’t touch inventory after sale.”
Inventory.
There it is again. The word lodges under my ribs. Not girl. Not woman. Not Olivia. Inventory. Product. Something bought. Something transferred. Something kept untouched because the buyer paid for it.
The man behind me makes a disappointed sound. “Rules are ruining the fun.”
