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Mina looked up, the calm slipping away again. “I-I’m sorry? I-I don’t know what you mean.”
He leaned in, his gaze level with hers, staring her down. “You know exactly what I’m asking for. Give me their names and any additional information that will make my search shorter.”
“W-what are you going to do?” Deep down she knew. Something violent. Maybe something fatal. “I-it was consensual.”
It wasn’t.
No matter how many times she told herself that lie. Nothing with them had been consensual except on the surface in the beginning. When she’d been sold to Brian she’d known she had no real choices, and yet when he touched her, her soul said yes to him.
“No! The response you are looking for here is: Yes. Master.” He crossed his arms over his chest and watched as she wrote down the names of the men who had broken her.
She considered making up names—unsure if she could be the cause of whatever Brian would do to them—but she was afraid she might give him names of real people—innocent people who didn’t deserve whatever he planned to mete out.
“I-I don’t know the names of Jason’s friends…”
“He will tell me.”
Mina was sure that was true. She handed the paper to Brian.
He scanned it. “Is this all you know?”
“Y-yes, Master.”
He folded the paper and put it in the pocket of his sweatpants. He put the empty plates in the sink, and they went downstairs.
* * *
Brian watched Mina undress; this time the self-consciousness had left her.
“Back in bed. You need rest,” he said.
She dutifully got back in, and he pulled the blankets over her. He crossed to the CD player and put in his copy of Chopin’s nocturnes. He put it on repeat just as his mother had once done with the records. As an adult, he’d listened to this disc many nights to go back to sleep. When he couldn’t hurt someone, when he’d run as far as his body would let him and it still wasn’t enough, the nocturnes helped. It was how he’d known they would somehow carry Mina through the withdrawal.
He’d wanted to go to her those nights, hold her, help her through it. But he was unused to putting broken things back together. He didn’t know how to comfort or soothe, and he’d wanted to delay her knowledge of the monster she’d be trapped with forever. He’d wanted everything to be perfect. The music, the collar, easing her through the ceremony. So maybe she wouldn’t fear him. He’d wanted to buy her trust. But there wasn’t enough money in the world for such a purchase.
He couldn’t begin to imagine what had come over him in the auction prep room. He’d planned to be more serious, but when he’d tested the first joke and the fear around her had melted like a block of ice exposed to sun, he just wanted to make her smile more, laugh more. He wanted to see her happy.
He changed clothes and put on sturdy boots. She watched him silently from the bed. She wouldn’t ask where he was going. She knew better than to ask.
“Sleep,” he said. “Everything will be okay.”
But would it? Could it ever be okay? Had it become okay for him?
She hesitated, then closed her eyes. He touched her face, and she leaned into him, her features relaxing. He slipped quietly out of the room and closed the door.
Brian kept a bag in his SUV for occasions like this. The last time had been official business. He’d been sent by Lindsay to stop someone from talking. But this was personal. Almost as personal as his stepmother had been.
He stopped by Lindsay’s office to use the computer to search the names on the list along with the scant details Mina had jotted down that might give Brian a starting point. The internet search filled in the blanks within minutes. He made some notes to add to Mina’s and cleared the search history.
The sun was barely peaking over the horizon when he reached the first name on the list. Jason.
It would be just about time for him to be going off to work if he worked normal hours doing normal things.
The neighborhood was mostly empty—a lot of houses for sale in a new housing development. No witnesses. Perfect. He should have planned things out, and he would after the first one. He just needed to get one of them done. Mina hadn’t realized it, but she’d dug the pen into the paper deeper on this name. This was the one that caused the dreams—that strangled scream she’d made that had woken him from a dead sleep, the sweating, the panic. He knew that scream, that panic.
Maybe he should wait, let Jason be last. But Brian wanted to take this one at the height of his rage. He needed catharsis. Something physical. Something that hurt… someone else.
He grabbed his bag out of the back seat, took one final look around the neighborhood to ensure it was truly deserted, then made his way to the front door.
