Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 106541 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106541 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 533(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
They want you scared.
They want you terrified.
But I won’t give them the satisfaction.
I can obey orders and follow directions, but my fear is mine, and they will never own that.
My focus shifts from the dark and mysterious stranger at the back of the select group when a grumbled comment at my side speeds up my heart. “All guns are checked at the start of the auction. Even mine.”
All guns?
Once again, I stray my eyes across the room, but this time, instead of locking gazes with the men who drooled at me as I was shoved by, I search their hips and ankles.
Guns have kept me in line for the past four years. I haven’t seen a single man without one. They’ve become the norm, so to know a gun isn’t associated with my presence at the moment has sweat beading at the back of my neck and my brain kicking into overdrive.
This may be my only chance to escape.
My eyes shoot back to the instigator of my new heart rhythm when “Katie?” faintly rumbles out of his mouth.
When our eyes lock, his throat works through a stern swallow, and my heart races.
He knows my name, which means…
No freaking way. He knows who I am!
“Help me. Please,” I beg, my voice suddenly returned.
When his bright blue eyes snap down to the lock box his gun was just deposited into, mine drift back to the crowd. As suspected, my fear excites them, and it sends my bids into a flurry. They climb in ten thousand dollar increments until they reach an astronomical amount that announces I’m mere hours from suffering Ivey’s fate.
“I won’t conform to your ways. I’ll never do what I’m told,” I scream before doing the second most stupid thing I’ve ever done.
I run. Again. For the third time in my life.
This time, since my campaign isn’t instantly upended by a man shoving a chloroform-soaked cloth over my mouth, I make it to the back of the gun-empty room with only a bruise or two from spectators trying to stop my flee by grabbing my arm.
I’m about to veer to the left when the man I locked eyes with for almost three minutes nudges his head to the right.
I shouldn’t trust him. No one in this room is trustworthy, but for some reason, I do.
Seconds after veering right, I’m blinded by the midday sun. It is so bright and blistering it stuns me long enough for the man who tossed a hessian bag over my head a nanosecond after I crossed the threshold of Madame Victoria’s compound to catch up to me.
He wraps his arm around my waist and yanks me back with force. I kick out and scream, but within seconds, the jab he hits my neck with has my arms and legs not complying with my brain. I’m conscious but am unable to move or speak.
I have enough drool pooling at the corner of my mouth to consider a diagnosis of brain damage, yet the bids still flood the auctioneer until I’m sold to a new owner then tossed into the sold pile so the next auction can continue.
“It’s okay. Stay as still as possible. The sedative will wear off soon.”
I tilt my head to the side since I can’t trust my throat to swallow the slobber drowning my mouth and stumble onto the man who spoke my name earlier. “H-help.”
He shushes me again before shifting his focus to my hands. I choke on my sob when he doesn’t lessen their weightiness. He doubles it by circling zip ties around my hands and fastening them together.
“N-no, please.” My second word is nowhere near as groggy as my first but still barely audible. “I want to go home.”
“Your parents want you home too, Katie. They’ve never stopped looking for you.”
I peer at him through glistening, tear-filled eyes. “Then help me.”
“I’m trying.” He glares angrily at a small hole between the molding and the roof before assisting me to my feet. “The hierarchies won’t budge. We’re outnumbered.”
I shake my head so fiercely I almost vomit when he pushes me toward my old owner. Col is sitting behind a banged-up table, distributing women like corndogs at a fair. His gleam is as big as a clown, and he’s hoarding his money as if it may soon vanish.
“She’s ready for transport,” the stranger who promised to help grunts out.
Col drags his eyes over my scuffed knees and white face before gesturing for my new owner to present. My face whitens even more when the man I was staring at earlier steps forward. He stands slightly back from a man with dark hair and an evil smirk, but he has as many eyes on him as the man handing over an exorbitant amount of cash for me.
Half the room’s stares are in fear, whereas the other half are revered gawks. It could be the large scar down one side of the blond’s face that attracts unwanted attention his way, but it feels like more than that. He has a haughty arrogance about him but in a demure, reluctant manner.