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I don’t want to deal with this shit right now. I want to deal with comforting Sarah.
She’s terrified. She doesn’t know that we weren’t just planning to sell her anymore. She thinks we’ve abandoned her. And now … I’m being forced to do just that.
I have everything to lose; if I lose Sarah, she is everything to me.
I see her eyes shine with tears that won’t fall. Her gaze is full of enough pain that it feels like screaming in my already harried mind. I want to answer those screams, kiss those tears before they can be cried. That’s when I know. I feel the pit of my stomach ring out with the impact of the truth.
I will blow everything up in my entire goddamn life and anyone who comes at me before I let this happen.
I look at Sarah. She’s hurt, betrayed, confused. Of course she is. Sarah doesn’t know how to feel about feeling betrayed when she shouldn’t have discerned any loyalty at all.
But that loyalty is fucking there. No matter how much I’ve fought it.
Now, before I can tell her, the light on her auction block goes off, and I realize that I didn’t fucking act quickly enough.
I’m going to lose her forever.
What kind of fucking monster am I? I decide to run with her, save her, hide her, but seconds too late before I can?
No.
Sarah’s time has ran out.
1
Sarah
The wood is always my favorite part.
A crackling fire on the hearth, a warm cup of cocoa, and a cozy sweater makes Christmas feel like a miracle after the stresses of a tough college semester. I’m home for Christmas at my parents’ house, but something is different this year.
I think my parents aren’t telling the truth. I have a work-study job at school. They say a clerical error is why the school thinks I need one. But I don’t push. I took on a job at my college as soon as the school notified me that I needed to. I’m in school; I’m costing my parents a lot of money. My mother makes no qualms about the fact that she wishes I would simply marry some rich man and not worry about going to school until after I snag a husband. If I consider school at all. My father indulges me, but only to a point. I can tell they are frustrated. I know they must have money problems.
Now, my father is holed up in his study, going on several hours now, instead of us even having a family dinner. Christmas is in two days and I’m stuck upstairs while he deals with some jerk who won’t hold off their business until after the holidays? What’s so bad? Who’s being so rude?
I figure that I should trot my own butt downstairs. Get my own hot cocoa. I have the cozy sweater—check—and I will curl up with a novel after I procure the desired chocolate. Thanks to my dorm mate, I’m reading a saucy romance that heats up these cold winter nights. Better, at least, than the cozy mysteries I usually read.
Now, I swear, I have no intention of bothering my father. But when I hear raised voices, my attention is grabbed. Particularly, the voice I don’t recognize grabs me. A deep, masculine voice that gives me chills the instant I hear it.
“Damien!” I hear my father shout at him, sounding frazzled.
This Damien continues to say something about how it would be in my father’s best interest to do as he was told.
Who is this jerk? He bothers us, interrupting our family time during the holidays, and works my father up to the point that he sounds frantic. Tells him what to do. I can’t help but lean in closer, and my mug slips out of my hand. Uh oh. Both male voices stop. I yelp.
“Sarah?” my father says, with a hint of … hopefulness? Something odd colors his voice. I want to think that he’s just happy to see me, but that seems like a foolish thought, even for an introvert like me. I don’t pick up much in social cues, but that’s due mainly just my naïveté to new surroundings. Something burns in my stomach. That heat pools deep in my belly when I hear that Damien man repeat my name in his delicious, dark voice.
It sounds like Damien tastes my name rather than just says it, and I’m covered in chills again, despite the thick cable knit sweater I’d made between classes this year to keep me warm. All the sweaters in the world won’t sheath me from the chills Damien’s voice creates all over my body. I am painfully aware that I’m not wearing much more than this sweater. Nothing can cover me up enough if I’m in the same room as Damien.
“Come in, won’t you?” my father says. He sounds like the cat who ate the canary. Why? I think he must be mad that I’m spying, and that I’d probably just broke one of my mother’s mugs. Mom will bitch about it, and then in turn my father will have to hear that bitching and he’ll bitch to me about it. Still, I have no real reason to think ill of my father’s intentions. I step inside, wishing I had more than the thin pajama pants on I thought wouldn’t be seen by anyone. I didn’t even have any panties on, not that I should be thinking about that, but I feel naked.
