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“Did you make her stay? I bet she hated you as much as I hate you.” He covers my mouth with his hand, hissing in my ear for me to stay quiet. His hand is so big, it covers my nose too, and I struggle to get a full breath.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he continues, seemingly ignoring the fact I can’t breathe. I struggle against him, digging my nails into his wrists. “You’re not worthy to speak her name.” I begin to see stars, and the blood rushing around my body hums loudly in my ears. I close my eyes and allow the feeling of heaviness to take me.
I’m not sure how long I’m out for, but I wake with Ivan staring down at me. The memories of him covering my mouth hit me and I shuffle away, putting distance between us. “Are you calm now?” he asks.
My eyes widen. “Me?” I exclaim. “I’m not the one who lost it.”
“Why did you come into that room?” he asks, holding my book up as if to remind me.
“I like to read in there. It’s peaceful.”
“The house is peaceful, Grace. Why that room?”
“I just like it. It has a nice view and a balcony,” I lie. It has those things, but it also has a good view of the fields that lay beyond the house, and I’ve noticed the farmers are beginning to stack up hay bales and I was checking on the progress. If I make it out, I can hide behind those as I make my way over the fields, “Who is that woman?”
“None of your business.”
“She is if you’re having sex with her and me.”
“Jealous?” he quips.
“I had a rule. It was important. No sex with other women. I don’t want diseases.” My real reasoning is I don’t want to risk him getting someone else pregnant. His need for me would end and then he’ll kill me.
“As you saw, I was using a condom.”
I pull my knees to my chest. “Is that the kind of sex you like?” When he doesn’t reply, I continue. “Rough, forced?”
“I was angry,” he mutters. “I needed a release.”
“Isn’t that what you have me here for?”
He stares down at the ground. “I didn’t want to hurt you,” he mutters. My heart slams hard in my chest. It’s the first sign he’s shown me that he gives a shit, and if he gives a shit, my plan is working.
“Don’t you feel bad hurting her?” I ask cautiously, in case it’s the wrong thing and he explodes again.
“I don’t know her,” he says with a shrug.
I don’t bother to point out he doesn’t know me either. “She’s somebody’s daughter, sister, cousin. She’s something to someone.”
“But not to me,” he says.
“How would you feel if someone did that to your mum or sister?”
“I don’t have either.”
“Okay, what if it was Lara?”
His eyes burn into mine. “Grace,” he says, his tone warning.
“I’m just saying, someone, somewhere, loves her like you loved Lara.”
“Love,” he corrects, reminding me she’s still at the very front of his mind and deeply embedded in his heart. “I can’t think like that,” he snaps, moving over to the window and staring out. “To me, she is money. A transaction.”
“She’s one of the women you sell on?”
He nods. “And when she’s gone, I won’t think about her again.”
“What happens?” I ask, not certain I want to know the answer, but he seems like he’s in a talking mood, so I take full advantage.
