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“So, what’s your story?” Blondie nudges me with her elbow. “No judgment here, by the way. Not like we have the ground to talk. It’s okay if he made you ‘try out’—”
“What?” I whip my head around, damn the headache. “No! No. No, he…”
Fuck.
He was trying to get me out of here this whole time.
Murdering bastard that he is, Dad was still trying to do the right thing and get me out of here and away from these monsters.
I glance down at myself. I may be bruised and bloody, and my dress is torn, with bloody spatters all over it, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. I’m actually…
Double fuck.
I’m dressed for sale. Which is what that weirdo at the cocktail party earlier must have meant when he called me “exquisite stock.”
“Hey, you’re lucky. Maybe.” The brunette shrugs. “He might come looking for you. Most of us here don’t have any families who will miss us. I sure as fuck don’t. All I have is a love for heroin, a pissed-off dealer, and now, a Japanese pimp about to sell me to the highest bidder.”
The way they’re so… blasé? Calm? I can’t put my finger on it. “Wait. Do youwantthis?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “No one ‘wants’ this. But we can’t fight it, either. Where else are we gonna go? Back to the streets to get arrested again? Because sure as shit no one’s gonna hire me and give me a job so I can go legit and have that white picket fence life.” She snorts a derisive laugh and shakes her head. “This may come as a shock to you, princess, but some of us don’t have lives. We’re already dead. We’re just waiting for the next stage of the underworld.”
I look to the blue-eyed, golden-blonde woman sitting next to me. She silently nods, but I see the tears glistening on her lashes.
And it’s right now, in this godforsaken pit of hell, that I’m struck with the realization that yeah, my life has been shit since the day I was born. Yeah, I have a terrible father and a dead mother, an abusive ex and a capitulating whatever-he-is. I’ve been beaten within an inch of my life. I’ve been taken advantage of. I’ve beenworn down to the very bone. I’ve had my heart ripped from my chest and shattered into a million pieces only for it to be glued back together and shattered once more.
But.
But.
Goddammit.
I’m still alive.
I’m still fuckingalive.
“I’m getting out of here.” I quickly stand up and ignore the way my head spins. I’m alive, I’m not broken, and I’m not going to stick around to find out what the next stage of hell looks like.
But my dramatic escape plans are interrupted by the opening doors at the front of the atrium, followed quickly by a hush over the crowd of women in here. The doors close again, and a cluster of Japanese men in tailored suits walk toward the center of the room.
Raizo Watanabe.
He takes his place as the leader on the small bridge that arches over the room’s manmade stream, bracing his hands on the railing like it’s a podium. “Welcome, ladies. I assume you’ve all had a pleasant evening so far.”
It all makes sense now: the glitz, the glam, the attentive servers and quiet “models” strolling around during the cocktail party. My father has been sourcing Raizo’s slave trade with drug addicts and prostitutes. Homeless ones. Forgotten ones. Women who might actuallywantto be slaves if it means three square meals, decent clothing, and a roof over their heads.
The nausea punches me in the gut harder than before.
Oh, God.That’s me.
I’ve been a slave to Martin. I didn’t care what he did to me in the bedroom as long as it meant I had food, shelter, clothing… a life off the streets for my baby and me. I served him hand and foot in exchange for the meager scraps he’d give me.
And my father sold me to him. Maybe not with money, but all the same, he did.
Raizo smiles as he listens to the low murmur of women agreeing, some of them thanking him for the expensive champagne. “Now, I know this can be a very stressful event, but I promise you, as long as you continue to be the beautiful angels you are, no one will have any problems and soon?—”
“Raizo!”
He stops. If he’s irritated by my interruption, he doesn’t show it. But he does turn to the side where I’m running up to the bridge.
