Severed: A Dark Romance (The Taken Series Book 1)

by Dani René

  “Caia Amoretto.”

  Opening my mouth to respond, I can’t find words. Caia’s sister is standing in front of me, and all I want to do is help her, but she can’t know her sister is in the same club she’s standing in. Or at least, in the same city. For her to be here is dangerous, especially if she’s working undercover. Thanos is not a good man on a normal day, but if he finds out Harper is looking for her sister, he’ll kill her.

  “I know who took her,” Harper continues when I don’t respond to her. Those big eyes meet my inquisitive gaze. There’s so much truth in her gentle stare that I want to delve into them and bask in it, just like her sister’s.

  “You’re here looking for Caia?” She nods. “You could get yourself killed. This man is not someone who plays games,” I warn her.

  “Will you help me get her back?” Her eyes glisten with unshed tears, and as much as I want to walk away, I know I can’t. I promised to save Caia once before, and I need to keep that. At least if there’s one good thing I do with my life, it’s to give her back hers.

  “You’ll need to tell me everything,” I inform her, settling in the booth opposite her. The curtain opens, and in walks River with a bottle of tequila and three shot glasses.

  “I think we need these,” he says, shoving me farther into the bench seat. He pours three shots and offers Harper one. She looks sixteen, but from what she’s just told me, I know she’s twenty.

  “Tell me why you’re here.”

  She nods and starts her story. I listen intently, lifting the shot glass, downing one after the other as I listen to the story about the girl I’ll soon be meeting.

  “How do you know she’s here?”

  Harper sighs. “A man called Thanos,” she utters the name that’s been top of my list. “I overheard Daddy talking to him when I snuck into his office years ago. At the time, I didn’t know what it meant. But, two weeks ago, I overheard him on a call. Daddy told the man, Thanos, that he can keep Caia to pay off his debt.”

  “What debt?” River questions, but she shakes her head.

  “I don’t know. She’s been here for four years, Drake. I don’t even know if she’s alive.” Her voice breaks on the last word, and I know I have to shift Thanos up my list. He’s next. “Drake, my sister isn’t the only girl that’s been missing. Caia’s best friend was kidnapped over eight years ago. I remember my sister was distraught about it. When they took her, she was only fourteen at the time.” Harper’s words only cement my resolve. “There’s one more thing.”

  “What?” River asks before I can.

  “I ran away from home. My father . . .,” she whispers. “He’s done things. Bad things.”

  I know exactly what she means. When Malcolm died, we found the videos he had on all his clients. And Caia’s father is one of them. I didn’t know his name at the time, but now everything is falling into place. My father had marked the videos by initial and a number. Her father’s video was labeled A457 for Amoretto. I never did find out what the numbers were, they didn’t have any rhyme or reason.

  I didn’t even recognize Harper, but when she blinks and the tears trickle down her cheeks, I see it. I see the girl from the video, and the alcohol turns in my stomach, causing bile to rise into my throat.

  Meeting River’s gaze, I nod. Offering him the signal he needs to set our plan in motion, I turn to Harper. “We’ll get her back.”

  “Promise?”

  Her voice is timid, her eyes round with fear, and there’s an innocence to her even though she’s lived through those videos that have gotten my father’s clients jerking their dicks. She looks just like her sister; the only difference is she’s not the one my body aches for.

  “I swear.”

  My words are a vow. A promise. And I never break my promises.

  5

  Caia

  The shadows hold me in their warmth.

  At the moment, I’m safe.

  Alone. But I know it won’t last long.

  My eyes blink in the dim light. Cold trickles through me from the chilly breeze sweeping through the room, causing me to shiver.

  My skin, bare to the cold, dots with goosebumps. It’s the same every night. Each time the moon rises and the sun falls, I feel the cold more than I do in the daytime. But the only reason I know night is falling is from the small hole in the wall that tells me so.

  It’s been four years since that day. When time stilled, and I was left with the darkness I wanted to escape. The moment I was taken from one hell and brought to another.

  When I awoke, I was in this cell with no one to tell me what had happened. Scared, alone, and filled with anxiety, I cried until my tears ran dry. I recall the boy with the blue eyes. The one who looked like he was going to save me. I remember bleeding, his hands holding onto me like I was his lifeline, but I slipped through his fingers. I thought I would be free, but now I’m here, still caught in the dark.

  The moment I woke up in this cell, my body had shuddered violently. So much so, I had puked all over my clothes, which he left me in for a week. When I finally got a chance to change into the small white nightdress they offered me, the dress Drake had put me in was crusted with my week-old vomit.

  My captor allows me into his club. He’s given me clothes to wear, made sure my body is inked so the scars below are hidden. My hair is no longer brown; it’s a deep red. And soon, I know he’ll get tired of me because I’m getting older.

  Each day got more difficult. More painful. I was taken into rooms where there were men who would watch me. Some of the men didn’t touch me, but they didn’t need to because their eyes invaded every part of me. Between my legs, my budding chest, they looked at me like I was a meal for them to feast on. But it was the moment I was no longer just on show, that I was a toy to be used, that my mind clicked off, and I no longer felt anything. And I’m numb, turned off from the world surrounding me.

  Each day turned into another, and another.

  And now, four years later, I'm twenty-two, and still, I have no way of getting out. When I work in the club, he doesn’t allow me to talk to anyone. I tried it once, and when he noticed, I was taken into a room and beaten until I passed out. Now, all I do is smile and allow them to do whatever they want. I don’t ask for help. Hope is a fleeting emotion, one I no longer allow myself to feel.

  Broken. Tormented. Angry.

  My captor told me I had an anger problem. There were times I’d fly into a rage. I’d hurt myself. When he saw the cuts on my arms, he whipped me until I couldn’t sit down. That’s when he put the camera in the cell I’m caged in. I know there’s someone watching. I can feel their hungry eyes on me.

  My body shivers once more when I roll over. The red blinking light is bright in the darkness as I stare up at it from the bed. I don’t know when they’ll come for me again, or when I’ll be allowed to go upstairs and be taken to the club, but I have a feeling it will be soon.

  Every time I’m transported there, they knock me out. I know it’s because they don’t want me to see where I am or where we’re going. All I remember is the smell. A cloth drenched in foul-smelling liquid covering my mouth and nose, and I sleep.

  When I get back here, I scream to be let out again, just to be a normal person. I shout and screech until all that’s left is the raw, burning sensation that makes it feel as if I’ve been swallowing razor blades, and I half expect there to be blood coming from my mouth.

  I’ve been in hell for four years, forced to do things I’d never wish on my worst enemy. I only know how long my time here has been because as the sun sets and rises, I count. The stony walls of concrete are my paper, the nail I pulled from the metal frame of the bed is my pen. I make my markings where they can’t see them. Because if they did, I’d be in trouble. Perhaps they’ll finally kill me, but something tells me I’m alive for a reason. I just wish I knew what that was.

  I haven’t been allowed outside, but he has let me go to his dinner parties. But no one there would help me. When I tried begging
a guest to save me, they laughed in my face and told him his doll was being annoying. That night was the worst of all. He’s always violent, but after that one night, I didn’t leave my cell for four days because I almost bled out on my thin mattress.

  The people are dressed in their finest clothes. I’m draped in silk as if I’m one of them. I’m not. I’m merely a plaything for the man beside me. He uses me as his nark. I go in, meet with the men he points out, and I get the information he wants from them.

  I don’t want to do it, but I have no choice. If I refuse, he tells me exactly what he’ll do to Harper. And that in itself is reason enough for me to do what he wants.

  “The man at the table with the silver tie,” William whispers to me. His mouth only inches from my ear. “He’ll be tonight’s target. You’ll find out about his plans to unite the two merging companies he owns.”

  “Yes, William,” I offer.

  Moments later, I’m in the meeting room, as William calls it, with the man with the silver tie.

  “You’re quite the sweet thing,” the stranger utters.

  “Thank you.” Being coy doesn’t come easy to me. Neither does this game I’m meant to play with them. “Would you . . .?” I allow my words to trail off, wondering if this man would be the one who helps me. I allow my bright red fingernail to toy with his tie. Lifting my gaze, I meet his eyes and smile. “Would you help me leave here?”

  He chuckles. The sound is dark and foreboding, and as soon as it leaves his mouth, I realize my mistake. He shoves me backward. Stalking to the door, he tugs it open to find William on the other side.

  “Your little whore is trying to weasel her way into my house?”

  William’s dark gaze lands on me as he shoves the man from the room and shuts the door with a loud thud. My heart hammers wildly in my chest. Breathing is difficult as I try to suck in breaths.

  “You’re a conniving little slut,” he barks, shoving me onto the table face first. The impact causes my body to turn rigid. There’s a soft whooshing sound, and I don’t need to turn around to know what it is.

  The red-hot sting on my skin is evidence that his thick leather belt is licking my ass. Again, and again. He’s grunting with every exertion of the smooth weapon of choice this time. He whips me countless times. I can’t feel anything but burning, the heat of liquid trickling down my thighs, and I know I’m bleeding.

  I don’t cry.

  I can’t.

  My eyes are dry.

  My lips are parted in a silent scream.

  He rips the elegant dress I’m wearing from my curves, and then I’m filled painfully with his thick cock. He’s rock-hard, sliding into my dry entrance, causing a lone tear to trickle from me.

  Three, four, five.

  On the sixth plunge into my body, he groans as pleasure rockets through him. When he pulls from my body, he grips my hair in a harsh hold and shoves me to my knees. His cock, dripping with his sticky white release and the crimson liquid from my body, he shoves into my mouth.

  “Clean me.” His words are venomous. “You deserve this for trying to leave me. Stupid little cunt thinks she’s too good for me.”

  He fucks my face, the tip of his cock sliding into my throat over and over again until he slaps me to the ground and stuffs his shrinking, almost flaccid dick into his slacks. Before he leaves, he spits on my face and chuckles when cower.

  “That will teach you.”

  And then I’m alone.

  I watch as the sun slowly sets from the small hole against the far wall, the orange glow turning to a deep red then purple. The colors like an artist’s brush on a canvas. It only reminds me how far I am from my old life. I don’t remember much. It’s been far too long since I’ve seen someone who I recognized as something other than a monster — someone other than him, Drake Savage.

  His father, Malcolm, was the reincarnation of the devil himself. I remember the old man who made me watch those videos. The horrific scenes still haunt me, playing in my mind like movies on a never-ending loop.

  Then I remember Drake, and I wish he were here. For some reason, he offered me solace in his cold, harsh words. And I wonder if he’ll ever find me again.

  My captor, William Thanos, has given one of the guards an order to teach me to fight. I wondered why he’d do that until I realized it wasn’t to protect myself, but to hurt others he brings down here. Last week, it was an eighteen-year-old boy.

  William threatened to steal my sister and make her do things that made me sick to my stomach if I didn’t comply. So, I did. I slit the throat of an innocent teenager because the man who holds me prisoner told me to.

  So many days have passed, and I wonder just what month or year it really is. All I want is to spend time with my sister, to see her again. Harper was my light. All I wanted was for her to be safe. But when I saw the video of her and our father . . .

  I’m bound to the chair. My head is secure, and I can’t turn away from what’s happening on the computer before me. My mouth is gagged, so no sound can escape besides my mumbling.

  The wand vibrates against my clit as I’m forced to stare at the white images onscreen. It doesn’t take long before the video plays, and I realize I’m being tortured once more.

  A man walks onscreen, but I can’t see his face. Slowly, he unbuttons his shirt. And as he removes more of his clothes, my tormentor’s low rumble is sadistic as he laughs, while the vibration is still poised at my clit, which sparks every nerve in my body.

  The object being forced into me is rough, and I can’t help crying out around the gag that’s bound around my head keeping my lips parted. The sound is accompanied by the video playing before me.

  When the sound is turned up, it’s all I can hear, as if it’s in surround sound. I want to block it out, but I’m unable to. My eyes are wide with shock as I take in the horrific scene before me.

  I’m met with the sounds of the old man onscreen as he grunts in pleasure while he violently forces himself inside the throat of a girl who looks so familiar. It’s a girl I’ve known my whole life. And as if my eyes are glued open, they tear up, and the image onscreen blurs, but nothing can stop me seeing it. Nothing can stop me recognizing the girl whose teary gaze meets the lens. The man moves to offer us a view of her pretty brown eyes — the image of my sister. It’s Harper. There’s no mistaking her beautiful eyes that shimmer with pained tears.

  There’s blood dripping from her nose, and she’s lying upside down. Her head hanging over the edge of the bed. Her bed. I know the blanket my mother bought her when we were younger.

  I watch in horror as she’s violated once more by the old man. When he slowly turns to the camera and chuckles as his cock is lodged in her throat, bile rises from my stomach, but because of the ball gag in my mouth, there’s nowhere for it to go but spill over the sides.

  My heart catapults wildly when his face comes onscreen, and the vibrator against my clit is turned up harshly, causing pleasure and pain to skitter through me like a ten-pound weight.

  An orgasm rocks me when I look into the eyes of my father, and all I can do is succumb to the force of agony that I’m thoroughly fucking broken.

  I’ve been torn from a normal life.

  I’m severed.

  It was at that moment I knew there wasn’t any hope for her. Unless she ran. I pray every day that she managed to get away from him. Deep down, I wish she killed him. Every day since that one, I've prayed my sister killed my father for what he did. Because I know if she didn’t, I would do it. And I wouldn’t feel an ounce of guilt for it.

  He deserves to be tortured. To be maimed while he slowly bleeds out. My blood is on fire, and the need to slice him limb to limb runs rife through my veins. And in this moment, I realize what Drake felt all those years ago. That’s how he spent his life, wanting to kill the man who was meant to love and guide him through life.

  I saw it in his eyes. Each time he came for me, when those blue eyes met mine, I would see deep into his tortured soul. All the time I
spent in that hellhole, I never believed Drake was anything like Malcolm. And even now, I know he’s nothing like the monster who tried to kill me.

  Something tells me that since I’ve passed twenty-one, I’ll no longer be needed, and I’ll find my end in this hell. The men here aren’t fond of older girls. I’ve met one other girl since I’ve been here. She is twenty-one, and I know she’s been here since she was very young. The thought has my body trembling in fear and revulsion.

  But for me, the girl who had everything in a life that’s now a distant memory, I now have nothing. My father gave me all my heart desired. The eldest of two, I was generally the one everyone focused on. Harper would hide in my shadow. Sadness envelops me at the thought of her being hurt in any way. I couldn’t protect her.

  It’s so silent in this basement I wonder where he is. Will he come down here tonight and take me? Or will I have a reprieve from the torment? I never try to fight him anymore; he enjoys it when I do. So, I lie there. A doll. Taking what he gives. The pain, the force he grunts into me with, and the grip on my flesh that leaves blue and purple bruises over my body.

  I’m no longer the princess of an upcoming empire. I’m now a fuck-toy for a man who enjoys depraved, vile things. And I’m his vessel for that. Nothing worth more than he offers. My mind has almost cracked. It’s what he wants. He told me so.

  All this time, I thought I’d be able to get out. All my life, I thought I was strong, that nothing in this world could ever make me lose hope, but this is different. The monsters I’m held by are far worse than anything I’ve ever encountered in my short life outside this place. The agony I’ve been forced to endure has broken my soul. I’ve given up after all this time, because there’s no way I’ll ever be able to survive much longer.

  My body is weak. They don’t feed me enough to be able to fight my way out. The water I drink is murky, clouded over with whatever drugs they’re feeding into my system. I swallow every drop because it’s the only sustenance I get. My fight is slowly fading.