Ashes

by Aleatha Romig

  Mr. Ivanov’s dark stare was upon me, slowly scanning. He lifted his chin with a snap. “I’m content with our deal.”

  “We will be in touch,” the senator said as the woman opened the door.

  Beyond the well-lit porch was a circular driveway lined with trees. Above it all, the early morning sky was a black hole of nothingness. Closer to the ground, leaves rustled in the summer breeze.

  Waiting for Mr. Ivanov was a long black limousine with a driver standing near the open door.

  With only a small amount of pressure upon my back, Mr. Ivanov directed me into the car. Unlike the warm air outside, the car was cool. Indirect lighting allowed me to see that the seats formed an oval; the only openings were on each side at the door.

  Tucking the cape around me, I sat across from the door I’d entered.

  Once Mr. Ivanov was inside and settled on the seat facing the front, the door shut.

  Was I riding to my life sentence or to a new life?

  Madeline

  More than sixteen years ago

  The long limousine pulled away from Senator McFadden’s home. After everything that had occurred, I should be exhausted, yet anticipation and trepidation had me waiting for Andros’s next command.

  Soft music I didn’t recognize with lyrics I couldn’t understand filled the inside of the car. Removing his cellular phone, Mr. Ivanov pushed buttons, sending a text. I busied myself by watching the world beyond the windows. The car stilled as a large gate moved to the side, allowing us to exit. Tall trees, stately streetlights, and iron gates dominated the view until large houses appeared, and eventually we sped up, entering a wide highway. Tall lights on posts showcased the increased traffic.

  With each car we passed or one that passed us, I wondered if the people inside knew that a life such as mine existed. Could they comprehend that within the sleek long black car was a young woman who had just been sold by a man who represents their state?

  After Mr. Ivanov received a message in return, he put the phone back into the pocket of his jacket and turned my way. Without a word, his dark eyes absorbed everything about me.

  Was he disappointed?

  “Sir,” I said softly, “I don’t know what you want me to do. If you tell me…”

  His lips curled upward. “First, as I said, my name is Andros. Others will call me sir, not you.”

  “Yes, sir—Andros.”

  He nodded. “We’re on our way to my plane. It’s late. I’m tired and have business to deal with in the morning. The drive to Detroit is too long.”

  My eyes widened as I imagined what he was saying.

  “Madeline, speak.”

  “I’ve never been on a plane.”

  “The flight isn’t long. I’ve messaged ahead to have something waiting on board for you to eat.”

  As if his words were the cue, my stomach growled.

  “The options on the plane at this short notice are limited,” he said. “In the future, are there any foods my cooks should avoid?”

  “You’re asking me?”

  He nodded.

  “Any food?” I asked, thinking how any food would be welcomed, well, except one. “Maybe peanut butter and jelly.”

  “Noted.”

  The quid pro quo of the cell came back to me. Gathering my courage, I asked, “Andros?”

  He looked my way.

  “What do I need to do to receive food?”

  “I’m not sure I follow?”

  “What do I need to do or what will you do to me?”

  Inhaling, he leaned back and loosened the buttons on his suit coat. “Are you asking if I want or will require something sexual from you for food?”

  Hearing him say it sounded blunt, but it was my question. “Yes.”

  “Is that what was required of Dr. Miller’s girls?”

  I nodded.

  “What…” He crossed his arms over his broad chest. “…did you do?”

  More tears prickled my eyes as the shame of my answer twisted through my circulation. “Whatever they said.”

  “For food?”

  Again I nodded.

  My breath caught and pulse increased as he moved, coming to the seat where I was sitting. The scent of his cologne filled my senses. As he sat beside me, my body stiffened, preparing myself for his next directive. I was already nude under the cape; the possibilities were limitless.

  A blow job. I’d learned there were men who needed that to get hard.

  He could jack off on me. Some men liked that.

  The thoughts swirled, releasing anxiety through my circulation. The idea of being soiled and dirty, covered in his ejaculation, saddened more than frightened me. Despite the exposure I’d experienced, I relished the sense of cleanliness since my shower.

  Maybe he would demand sex. If so, I hoped it would be vaginal.

  “Her anus needs to heal.” I recalled the doctor’s order.

  Andros reached for my chin. “There will be a time when I will have you.”

  My breath caught as I stared into his dark eyes.

  “There are many things I could do,” he went on, “and when I do, I will, and you will agree because we have made a deal. Isn’t that right?” When I didn’t respond, he continued, “A deal for you to stay with your child. Tell me, Madeline, what are your limits? What are you not willing to do to continue that deal?”

  He posed the question as if I had a choice.

  I didn’t.

  Any shreds of my self-respect were scattered on the floor of Dr. Miller’s office the night Kristine left me there. “There’s nothing,” I admitted.

  “Then we don’t need to discuss it, not yet. I told you what I want from you in the short term.”

  Too many things had happened in the last few hours—I couldn’t remember. “I’m sorry. I’m not sure what that is.”

  “Madeline, you are to heal and recognize your worth. No longer are you at anyone’s mercy but mine. I paid for that honor and you agreed. I want you to know that you’re no longer one of Dr. Miller’s girls. You belong to Andros Ivanov and as such, are his alone to indulge. Food is not now nor will it ever be used as a reward or punishment. Necessities such as food, housing, and clothing, everything you will need or want are yours. From this point on, you’re regal and I want you to know that.”

  He said many things, but my mind was still on one. “No sex?”

  He released my chin and ran a large finger over my cheeks. “There will be sex. Not now. First, your job is to heal and take care of that child inside you.”

  After the car stopped and he helped me from the back seat, I wrapped the cape closer. Stopping, I stared up at the large plane, complete with stairs down to the ground.

  “Don’t be frightened,” he said softly as his hand again went to my back. “Flying is safer than driving.”

  He was wrong. I wasn’t scared to fly. I knew fear. This was something altogether different.

  I was awestruck.

  Once we climbed the stairs, within the sparkling white and gold cabin was a crew of three people waiting for his every order.

  “This is Madeline,” Andros said, introducing me as if I weren’t his latest purchase nude beneath the cape, but instead perhaps a guest.

  I couldn’t help but smile at his continued use of my name. I wasn’t girl any longer. I had a name.

  “Before we’re in the air,” he said to the woman he’d introduced as Natalie. “I’ll have a vodka. She’ll have…” He looked my way. “…no alcohol for now.”

  I had never had alcohol.

  “She’ll have…whatever else she wants.”

  Natalie turned my way. Like the woman at the senator’s house, there was no judgment in her expression as if this were a daily occurrence. “Miss?”

  “Water, please, Natalie.”

  After the crew disappeared, leaving us alone in soft white leather seats, me with a water bottle and Andros with a glass of clear liquid, the plane began to move.

  “Did you tell Natalie wha
t you’d like to eat?”

  “Yes,” I replied, before emptying the water bottle.

  He smirked. “And more water?”

  “It’s so good.”

  “It’s water.”

  I nodded.

  It was water, and it was even better than the water at the senator’s home. When I’d twisted the cap, it clicked. This wasn’t a refilled bottle but a fresh one. Once I took a sip, it didn’t disappoint. And now, after consuming one bottle, I longed for more.

  “Once we’re to our home, you will have clothes.” He looked down at my feet, now dirty from walking. “And shoes. I’ll appoint someone to your care. Just tell her what you want. For now, you won’t need anything formal.”

  Formal?

  The word made me think of the white dress Kristine had purchased.

  “I don’t need much.”

  “It’s summer. I’m sure it can all be arranged.” His chin rose. “Madeline, you seem wise. Don’t take this wrong. Tell me about your education.”

  “I-I didn’t finish high school.”

  “Didn’t finish?”

  “I didn’t start. I left my last foster home at fourteen.”

  He nodded. “You’ll have a tutor.”

  “I don’t need that,” I said defensively. “I can read and do math.”

  “Then his job will not be difficult. And for the baby?” he asked. “We’ll need things. What things do babies need?”

  I gripped the arms of the chair as the airplane lifted off the ground. The freshly consumed water sloshed in my otherwise-empty stomach as the lights from the runway disappeared and we continued to rise into the dark sky. Finally, I turned his way. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what babies need.”

  “Then we both have things to learn.”

  After I’d eaten a warm, delicious sandwich made with toasted thick bread, melted cheese, vegetables, and roast beef and consumed a small bag of potato chips as well as two more bottles of water, Andros settled in the seat next to me. In his hand was a small screen filled with baby furniture. Everything was new. There were cribs and small beds called bassinets. There were rocking chairs, dressers, and changing tables. I wasn’t certain I’d ever heard of a table designed for changing diapers.

  “Why are you being nice?” I asked.

  “I’m not. That’s the last word to describe me.”

  “But you are.”

  “I’m simply securing my investment. I’m confident that you and your baby will be worth it.”

  That may have been true that he wasn’t nice and I was his investment, but with my thirst quenched and stomach satisfied, I wanted to believe that Andros was nice.

  As the warmth of his arm rested against mine and I looked from one picture of a nursery to the next, there was no possible way for me to comprehend the truth—that Andros Ivanov’s method was far more devious than that of Miss Warner.

  She thrived on negative reinforcement while capitalizing on her victims’ basic needs. We accepted every debasing and degrading consequence as our only means to survival, as well as that of our child. She exploited our instincts to protect the baby within us, and to that end, we suffered anything she or the customers did in order to keep the child within us alive.

  Andros, with his spicy cologne, expensive suit, dangerous accent, handsome looks, and dark stare was eviler than the devil himself. He understood that further humiliation of an already-broken girl was fruitless. Instead, his strategy was to build me up, support my child, mend my shredded self-esteem, and make me believe I was valuable.

  Only then, only once my confidence was regained, could he truly humiliate me and in doing so, tighten his hold on my future and that of my child.

  Madeline

  Present day

  The scenery of northern Texas passed beyond the limousine’s windows as David drove us to St. Pierre, Marion’s jeweler. When I’d returned to my room after not eating breakfast, imagine my shock at finding the cleaned vanity in my bathroom. All of the cosmetics had been returned to their places and most importantly, the necklace Patrick had instructed me to wear was missing.

  Instead of panicking, I went to the dresser and found the wooden box Eloise had shown me the day before. Removing it from the drawer, I lifted the lid. As it had been before, the necklace was within it. I immediately secured the chain around my neck. With the door to the hallway locked, I stepped to the large windows and peered out at Marion’s ranch. In the distance were trucks and men near the oil wells. I hadn’t seen anyone near the barns or corrals, but there were people. He couldn’t possibly believe I’d be content as a hostage on this piece of land.

  As I stepped into the shower and multiple showerheads rained warm water over my skin and long dark hair, memories I’d forgotten continued to return.

  Forgotten was a bad choice of wording.

  They were memories that I’d successfully compartmentalized away.

  As the water streamed and steam filled the bathroom, I recalled my first shower at Andros’s home. Much like this suite at Marion’s, my assigned suite at Andros’s had been like something out of a storybook or TV show. In the span of twenty-four hours, I’d gone from living in darkness, filth, and bodily secretions to the lap of luxury.

  My room was large, complete with a bed bigger than I’d ever seen. It wasn’t only a bedroom but also living quarters, including an area furnished with a sofa, television, long chair, and tables. There was even a desk for when my studies began.

  The closet was larger than Patrick’s and my room at the mission, and the attached bathroom not only had a big glass shower but also a bathtub with jets that bubbled when a button was pushed. Also like Marion’s home, my suite at Andros’s was on a second floor. Those windows overlooked an inner courtyard—much like a small park surrounded by house.

  Within the next few weeks, Andros would have the room next to mine connected by an inner door and create an attached nursery.

  I hadn’t given my arrival to Andros’s much thought over the years as life became routine. However, now that circumstances changed, I was able to look back and see my willingness to inaccurately credit Andros’s actions as care or concern.

  They said that hindsight was 20/20. In reality, it was clearer even than that.

  Never had I imagined that I was a pawn in a bigger game. Instead, as the starved, broken soul that I was, I willingly accepted each luxury as a building block to my new life. It wasn’t that I didn’t miss Patrick. It was that I pushed away any thought of him as soon as it materialized.

  The day I arrived at Andros’s, I was no longer the woman Patrick loved and married. I’d given him my virginity and now that seemed insane. Over the four months in the cell, I’d allowed man after man to take and abuse my body in exchange for a bite of food. At eighteen, I couldn’t say how many men had used me.

  My heart missed my husband, but my mind told me that he wouldn’t want me anymore, and yet Andros had.

  The similarities and differences between Andros’s acquisition and Marion’s were growing clearer. Marion had said he wanted to save me in Chicago, a romantic gesture that would lead to his proposal. Andros never proposed, yet at the time, I saw his purchase as saving me. I saw his generosity as a romantic gesture. At first, sex wasn’t even part of the equation as it wasn’t with Marion either. And yet both of these men believed I was theirs for the taking.

  Nearly seventeen years ago, I’d misconstrued Andros’s generosity as sentiment.

  Now, with Marion, I knew better.

  During my time with Andros, I learned much more than what I was taught by the tutor. Some knowledge was more important than mathematics, literature, grammar, language, and history. Through the years and life’s experiences, I accumulated knowledge that shaped me as a woman, mother, and mistress.

  As the North Texas scenery continued to pass beyond the car windows and the sun continued to rise higher in the sky, I marveled at not only my change in attitude but in part at the stimulus. What I’d told Marion about having hid
den money was accurate. The plan to leave Andros had been in motion since the first time he shattered the illusion of our relationship. I’d always planned to get Ruby to adulthood and send her overseas for university.

  My plan never included a man, and yet to my shock and surprise, the man I legally married a long time ago not only still lived but wanted me back—maybe until he learned the truth—and even more surprisingly, I wanted him.

  Marion wouldn’t win.

  My life with Patrick wouldn’t be delayed another seventeen years.

  I was done being a commodity that could be bartered, traded, or sold.

  As David drove, the ring in my purse wasn’t my most important piece of jewelry. The necklace around my neck was. While in my room, I’d spoken at length to whoever was listening and explained all I knew about the jeweler, hoping they would get my message.

  We’d made our way from the ranch in and out of populated areas. Once again, the vast plains beyond the windows made me wonder how far outside of Dallas this jeweler was located. The time on my watch read a little before eleven.

  “Mrs. Elliott,” David’s voice came through the interior speakers.

  My neck straightened as I inhaled and exhaled. Pushing the button that I’d been shown earlier, I responded, “David, please call me Madeline.”

  It was a simple fix to the last-name problem.

  “Yes, ma’am, I spoke to Randolph. He’s waiting, and we should arrive there in less than ten minutes.”

  It had been over a thirty-minute drive thus far.

  “Okay. Thank you for the update.”

  “Mr. Elliott also called to be sure you’re well.”

  Well?

  “Please tell him I couldn’t be better.” That wasn’t true, but I was damn well not perpetuating his fraud that I needed mental stability. If the man thought I’d willingly be sold and married off, he was the one with mental issues. “Ask him if he’s learned anything about Ruby.”

  “Yes, ma’am, I will when I let him know we’ve arrived.”

  The view out the window indicated we were entering a more populated area. Buildings and signs told me we were entering a small town. The tires bumped as David pulled the limousine into a small parking lot outside a rather nondescript building.