My eyes adjust to the lighting, and I see little rooms with green lights on the outside of them. I can’t see inside them, though, because they are tinted. They are stacked like a stadium, and there have to be over 100 of them.
The announcer says, “Let’s give the buyers a little taste of this special purchase.” The guard holding me, who is wearing a mask to hide his identity, pulls me to the side of him and turns me around so my backside is facing the buyers. He steps around and kicks my legs open wide, backing up and pushing my head down so everything is on display, hence the crotchless panties. In a stealth-like movement, he spreads me open with his fingers and dips one inside.
After one finger is in, he shoves another finger in my ass while standing on the side of me.
“As you can see with your own eyes, each hole is intact and tight,” the announcer says giddily.
I black out what the announcer says next and tune in to the last part of it: “5 million. Wow, 10 million, gentlemen. 15 million. Sold.”
My mouth gapes open, and I shake my head. Is that how much they think a human life is worth?
Suddenly, I am pushed forward toward a catwalk off the stage. I try not to trip over myself, and I don’t want to look down to see how high up we are.Just put one foot in front of the other, Cassidy; keep moving forward.I try to hold my chin high while I walk to the other side of the stage, where I see multiple bodyguards waiting there to collect me.
Two of them grab my arms and thrust me into a white room, and the door is immediately locked. I see the other girls in the room sitting on the floor with their heads down, and I am pushed down into a kneeling position.
Rio is at the head of the room, and he shouts, “Now, your training begins to become a true slave to your master.”
“Every time you enter a room, you will look down while walking and immediately get into a kneeling position with your head bowed until you are told what to do.”
He grabs the girl nearest to him by the throat, yanking her upwards. “Can you guess what the words should be that come from your mouth after assuming this position?”
He loosens up on her throat, and she croaks out, “Yes, sir.”
He throws her back onto the ground, and she catches herself on her elbow on the hard floor.
“Close, it’s yes, master,” he says, “You officially have owners now. So, you’re property. You have no rights; you have no say in your life or body. You are nobody now; forget your name and where you came from. You will be known as whatever your master deems worthy of naming you. You will do as you’re told and not bat a fucking eye,” he all but yells at us, daring us to say something against him as he paces the room.
The girl next to me is shivering violently, but like the rest of us, refuses to look up and make eye contact, afraid of any type of punishment.
“Now it’s late; you will return to your cots, and your sex training to make you good little whores starts tomorrow,” he announces. “Stand up and form a line to go back to your room.”
We stand up with our heads down, forming a line that leads out the other side, which I assume is to our part of the warehouse. The guards leer at us, trying to instill fear. They are doing a good job. One of them brushes the shoulder down to the breast of the girl in front of me, and I try not to gag; she flinches, and that was the wrong thing to do. He doesn’t waste any time grabbing her by her hair and punching her in the stomach. She goes down instantly, coughing and trying to gasp for air.
“Get back in line,” he says, and she scrambles up and gets back in line with tears running down her face.
We all but drag our feet back to our cots. When we get there, we go to the ones we slept in the night before. On our beds are what look like new hospital gowns. I quickly tear off the lingerie, toss it on the floor, and secure the strings on the gown. I get under the light sheet they have provided, which feels like sandpaper, and grab the barely fluffed pillow. Rolling over onto my side, I let the tears silently fall down my cheeks as I pull my knees up to my chest.
What kind of hell are we supposed to endure tomorrow? What kind of training are they going to put us through?
CHAPTER THIRTY
I bang my fist against the familiar door repeatedly until I hear rustling behind it. Blair swings it open. She’s in her pajamas, wiping her eyes, and her hair is in those heatless curler things.
“What the fuck do you want, Tyler? Has the sun even risen yet?” She all but yells at me.
“It’s about to, and I need answers before it does.” I scowl back at her.
“What could possibly be so important?” she asks, but then she turns a deadly shade of white. “Wait, is it Cassidy? Is she hurt or something?” Her voice frantically raises to a higher octave.
“I figured you would know about her well-being since she’s been here with you,” I shout back at her vehemently.
Her eyes all but fall out of her head. “No, I haven’t seen her since the morning she left with you to move,” she screeches, completely awake now. “I thought she was just staying with you at your fraternity house.”
“Let me inside right now,” I say as I begin pushing my way through. She can sense my urgency, and she opens the door wider to let me in.
The door shuts, and we move in sync with one another toward the living room, neither one of us wanting to take a seat, fidgeting and pacing back and forth with worry.
“I heard her leaving to help you move that morning, and she sent me a laughing emoji that day at one of the reels I had sent her, and that is the last I have heard from her,” Blair all but shrieks at me.
