“You’re the one sent from London, right?” Kaito cocks his head, his dark eyes roving over me. “I can’t remember your name.”
The woman in front of me steps aside, and I know it’s my turn to speak. For a moment, I’m afraid I won’t be able to, my mouth too dry with fear, but I force the words out. “I’m Noelle Giles,” I manage. “And I’m not here of my own free will, no matter what Harry told you. I—”
Kaito laughs. “I don’t know who Harry is. But my men procured you in some fashion, and you fit exactly what I asked for, so long as you’re innocent.” He narrows his eyes. “Youarea virgin, yes?” He grins at me, spreading his legs wider, as if to show off his cock and the women playing with it.He wants to shock me,I realize.He wants to see my reaction.
My heart trips over itself again.What happens if I lie?The wild thought goes through my head, the possibility of escape if I tell him I’m not the virginal innocent he asked for.How would he even know for certain?
The tiger rumbles, shifting on its massive paws, and I change my mind instantly.
“I am.” I stutter out the words, lifting my chin despite the fact that I’m sure I’m visibly shaking by now. My cheeks flush, and I can’t tear my eyes away from what’s happening in front of me. The scene in the bar basement had been disgusting, but this is something else—a display of wanton lust and hedonism that seems almost artful, like a Roman painting. “I’ve never slept with anyone. Only a few kisses, a long time ago.”
Kaito’s smile spreads, and he pushes the two women away as he stands, yanking his robe closed as his cock disappears from view. I can still see the outline of it tenting the fabric as he walks towards me, his gait rolling and cocky, his eyes still roving over me as if he’s imagining what I look like naked.
He stops just in front of me, and I catch a whiff of musk and citrus cologne, the smell of masculine arousal and power hanging around him like a veil. It sends that strange, embarrassing throb through me again, and I pray silently that I’m wrong, that I’m not being given to this man. I don’t think I could bear it.
“I am Kaito Nakamura,” he says, his voice richly accented as he reaches out to touch my cheek with one long-fingered hand, turning my face this way and that. “But I think you knew that already, Noelle.”
His hand drifts down my throat, into the valley of my cleavage in the short silk robe, his fingers twitching to spread it enough that he can see the small curves of my breasts. “You’re very beautiful,” he murmurs. “You would fit into my harem so perfectly.” The tips of his fingers caress my flesh, almost reverently, and I have to hold myself very still not to flinch away. “I’d thought about keeping you for myself—”
Thought about?A glimmer of hope appears, and I grasp onto it with both hands.Maybe he’s not as pleased with me as he seems. Maybe he’ll send me back, and Harry will go back to my plan A. A few nights working off my father’s debts, and then freedom. Home.
That small hope is dashed in a matter of seconds.
Kaito pulls his hand away, straightening his shoulders. “But I have a better use for you, littlekoneko.I have an old friend in need of a gift, and you—” He gestures to me expansively. “—are perfect.”
My heart plummets. “No,” I gasp, realizing that my audience with him is about to be over. I can already see him disengaging, glancing back at the women waiting for him, kneeling eagerly by his chaise to finish servicing his cock. “Please—” I reach out without thinking, grabbing at the sleeve of his robe, and Kaito turns back to me with a withering glare.
“Don’t touch me,surebu!”he snaps. “I have already decided where you will go. Get off.” He shakes me away, and I feel tears prick at the corner of my eyes.
“Please, my brother—I never agreed to leave London. I offered myself to workthere, not to be sold off, trafficked—please! My brother needs me—” I feel like I’m babbling now, the words spilling out, but he barely seems to hear me. He waves a hand, and the kimono-clad woman’s hand grips my upper arm, surprisingly strong for her small size. “Please!” I shriek as she pulls me backward, terror flooding me, all my worries about placating him gone. “Please, I can’t stay here. I can’t—I have to go home! I have to—”
Kaito is already on the chaise, lounging back, flicking his robe open as the two women descend on him again. My last sight of him is his head tipping back, blond hair cascading as the sounds of the women sucking him fill the room. Then the doors close, and my audience with Kaito Nakamura is over.
“Come.” The woman tugs on my arm. “You must go back to your room.”
“I can’t.” I turn towards her, pleading, hoping she’ll have some sympathy. “Please, help me. You’re a woman, too—you can’t be okay with this. My brother is only sixteen, and he’s all alone at home. He doesn’t know where I’ve gone. Please help me leave, help me get back to London. I don’t have any money, but I’ll find a way to reward you—”
The woman gives me a sad, sympathetic smile. “I am very sorry,” she says carefully, as she tugs me back in the direction we came. “I serve the Nakamura house, and you are the property of Kaito Nakamura now. It is not for me to say where you go.”
I stumble after her, panic swirling in my chest. I know no one here. I have no money. No way of leaving—and the only man who has the power to help me dismissed me as nothing. Even he didn’t want me. He plans to give me as a gift—to some other unknown man, in an unknown place.
My life isn’t mine anymore.
“You will wait here,” the woman says, as she escorts me back into the room where I woke up. “Food and water will be brought. You may bathe again if you like. I—” She straightens, her face a smooth mask. “I am very sorry, Noelle Giles.”
My name sounds strange in her accent. Everything here is strange. I start to say something, to beg one more time, but the door closes, and I hear the sound of the lock turning.
There’s no escape. I feel hot tears fill my eyes as I crumple to the floor, my body giving way as the last shreds of hope leave me. I’m terrified for myself, for what comes next, but I’m even more afraid for Georgie, of what will happen to him now, without me there to take care of and provide for him. His entire family is gone, now that I’m not there any longer.
I’ve failed,I think miserably, as I sob on the floor.There’s no way out.
My life as I knew it has come to an end.
6
ALEXANDRE
Iwake up in my dark bedroom, unsure of how long I was asleep this time or what time it actually is. Sleep is mostly what I do now, except for the brief times when I drag myself out of bed to tend to my bodily needs—eating, bathing, and checking the shoulder wound that stubbornly refuses to entirely heal. I often feel feverish, as if it’s making me sick. Still, I refuse to seek medical care for it beyond my own mediocre abilities.