by Zoey Parker
Almost as soon as I arrived, a woman spotted me and took me by the arm. “Are you one of the items tonight?”
My skin crawled at the name she gave me, but I nodded mutely. She led me to the backstage area, where I saw the other girls—or, items. Many of them were younger than me, and many of them looked as nervous as I felt. I wondered what made them desperate enough to do what they were doing. Did they have sick parents like I did? Or maybe they needed money for student loans, or to make a tuition payment. They might have gone crazy with their credit cards, since a couple of them were wearing what even I could recognize as seriously expensive designer clothing. There was more than one pair of red-soled Louboutins in the group.
They were all so pretty. They made me feel like an ugly duckling in comparison. I shrugged out of my coat and hung it on a wall rack. I had gone with the black dress, which was sleeveless and low over my chest. Mac had insisted I wear my most push-up of push-up bras, and I felt like my boobs were about to fall out at any minute. The dress came to just above my knee, and I wore black patent stilettos. I knew they made me nearly six feet tall, but I didn’t think flats would look right. Besides, any man who was intimidated by a tall woman didn’t deserve my virginity, no matter how much money he had.
Mac had helped with my hair, which was a mass of soft wavy curls. I was used to putting on makeup to look good for work, and I’d chosen eyeshadow to enhance my green eyes, and a wine-red lip gloss to accentuate my pouty lips.
I’d basically done everything I could. It was all up to the men on the other side of the curtain, and whether they thought I passed muster.
The auction began, and my heart instantly leaped into my throat. I could still leave. There was still time. I wouldn’t go on until last, I was told—nine girls were going before me. I assumed it had to be first come, first served. Had I know that, I would have shown up early just to get it over with.
One by one they went out. A few of them looked like they were going to throw up just before it was their turn. I held their hands, and we reassured each other that it would be all right. I noticed how none of them came back afterward. Were we expected to go right to our “date”? I guessed so.
I heard the dollar values thrown around, and it was staggering. Five thousand. Ten thousand. Twelve. Fourteen five. Up and up it went. Who was out there? Each girl’s virginity went for a pretty high price.
Eventually, it was just me, sitting alone. So many thoughts raced through my head, bouncing off each other, clamoring for attention. I was a whore, or at least about to become one. What would my mother think if she ever found out? It would break her heart if she knew I had taken such a drastic step for her. She would never forgive herself. I could never tell her. But she would want to know where I got the money for hospice care. What could I say then? I would have to come up with something when the time came. I had more than enough on my mind already.
Namely, the fact that it was my turn. The last girl to go, Theresa, had pulled down a winning bid of twelve thousand five hundred. Not too shabby. I hoped I could get that much. Otherwise, I’d be humiliated. But Theresa and all the other girls were beautiful. What hope did I have?
I remembered what Mac told me to do in the last moments before going out there. I leaned forward, pulling my boobs more fully front and center. I licked my lips to make them shinier. I pulled all of my hair over one shoulder until it cascaded down past my breasts.
I was as ready as I was ever going to be. And just in time, too, as the emcee was announcing my name.
My hand touched the curtain, ready to pull it to the side, and I instantly decided that I hated every man in that room for what they were doing. But there was no time to think about that, as my name was called and I pulled the curtain aside to face my fate.
Chapter Five
Eric
I had to give Gareth credit for one thing: he knew how to hold an auction.
I hadn’t ridden my bike in. I didn’t want to announce my presence, even if Gareth didn’t know I had it in for him. He was afraid of me taking over the Lightning Bolts, which was why he wanted me killed in the first place. If he knew I was just named president, he’d be more desperate than before to have me taken out. So I drove my normal, everyday car. Next to the Mercedes, Porches and BMWs I saw outside the warehouse, I looked like a bum off the street.
Well, looks were deceiving. I didn’t think having a half million dollars collecting interest across three separate bank accounts was on the same level as the men I was about to come face-to-face with, but it wasn’t anything to be ashamed of either. The club did well when it came to making money. We didn’t fuck around. For years before I went inside I had been stashing cash into my accounts. I lived alone, didn’t need much. Some of the guys had families—some of them even lived in much nicer homes than anybody in a club like ours should own. But the police turned a blind eye. As long as we didn’t make too much trouble for them, they didn’t make trouble for us.
I went inside the warehouse and whistled under my breath. I never would have expected something like what I found. When I realized the auction was in an old warehouse I imagined something skeevy and dirty, with rats in the far corners. This was nice. Upscale, even. It made sense when I thought about the cars parked out front. The men shelling out the dough for these girls wanted to be sure they weren’t dealing with a low-class amateur. They were, of course. He was a piece of human garbage. They didn’t know that.
“Champagne?” A girl in a French maid’s costume held a silver tray my way. I managed not to roll my eyes at how cheesy it was. Then again, when she walked away to offer drinks to three other men, they looked pretty happy to see her. I guessed you had to be a certain kind of slime to be here in the first place.
I couldn’t have cared less about the girls up for auction. Honestly, I didn’t have much respect for them. Then again I didn’t respect women in general—at least not the ones I knew. The girls in the club were nice girls, but nothing to get serious about. The rest of them were, in my experience, cheap, slutty, skanky, greedy or bitchy. Or some of all of the above. They were good for a screw, like the one I woke up with that morning. I still didn’t remember her name. I barely remembered meeting her, or what she looked like. That was as far as it went for me, and I was okay with that.
I looked around the room from where I stood in a corner. The walls were cream painted drywall, blocking the windows. That much made sense—didn’t want anybody peeking in, especially the police if there was illegal shit going on. The lighting was soft, warm. The floors were a practically new hardwood or a really high-quality laminate. Either way, it looked good. Rows of folding chairs sat in front of a stage with a red curtain hung in front. It was like a pageant.
I snorted to myself. Who the hell were these people? Who did this? Was this what men did for fun on a Saturday night when they were jaded by the world? They had had all the fun their money gave them, so they needed something new and fresh—literally.
They had no idea what it was like to experience life. They hadn’t seen half the shit I’d seen or done a quarter of what I had done. I wondered if they ever watched a man being tortured to death when he wouldn’t give information, like I had accidentally walked in on when I was fifteen. Or if they ever got into a motorcycle chase in the middle of the night, going down a dark road with no light except the headlights and the taillights of the bike ahead of them. Or if they ever raced down crowded streets for money. Or if they ever helped smuggle guns and drugs from motherfuckers who would eat their hearts for breakfast. Or if they had ever killed another person. They probably thought the height of thrills was zip lining or skydiving some dumb shit like that. They needed a new hit, something bigger. A virgin.
The auction was about to start, and everybody took a seat. I sat furthest from the stage. I still hadn’t seen Gareth, and I wondered if he even showed up at the actual event. I didn’t see why he wouldn’t, but then he was impossible to figure out. Maybe he wanted to keep his name and face out of it.
I was sure if everybody there saw what he looked like, they’d be grateful.
The first girl came out. She looked scared to death. I felt sorry for her, which was rare for me. I didn’t usually wonder what was going on in people’s heads. Even less since prison. It didn’t do any good to start feeling sympathy. You might start caring, and even put yourself on the line for another person. The only thing I’d ever put myself on the line for was the club—especially now that I was president.
“This is the lovely Josie. Josie, please turn around so the men can see you.” She did an awkward turn in heels that were probably too high for her. I guessed she was around nineteen. Petite, very slim, could have passed for a pre-teen if she wanted to.
“Josie is just eighteen years old.” The woman reading the information off the cue cards looked familiar. I wondered if she was hooked up with the Reign of Chaos. She might even have been Gareth’s old lady. Maybe she was the one who did the collecting at the end of the night. “We’ll take the first bid starting at five thousand dollars.”
I almost chocked on my champagne. Starting at five thousand? How high was it going to go?
“I’ll take five.” One of the guys up front raised his hand. A younger man, maybe mid-twenties.
“We have five up front. Do I have five five?”
“Five five.” An older man. He could have been her father. I clenched my jaw.
“Six five.” The oldest of the three. Grandfather? My skin crawled.
“Seven.” The first guy, the one up front. The three of them went back and forth until the final bid was twelve thousand, made by a man who could have been Josie’s dad. I felt sorry for her. I really did. Why did an eighteen-year-old need to do something like this?
It went on like that. All of the girls came out, one at a time, and all of them had at least three, maybe four men bidding on them at once. I wondered whether it was proven upfront that the girls were actual virgins. Like, how did anybody know for sure? Were they sent to a doctor? If I was spending fifteen thousand dollars on something, and that was as high as one of the girls settled for, I’d want to know it was legit. Maybe there was a gentleman’s agreement. What a laugh. Gareth wasn’t a gentleman.
All of the girls looked sweet. They might have tried to look sexy or sophisticated, but the fact was they were all a bunch of kids. They were scared and innocent. I wasn’t into that. I liked a girl with a bit of an edge to her.
I was bored out of my mind after a half hour. There wasn’t anything going on that I could use against him. Nothing looked illegal. There weren’t any shady side deals going on. The girls looked healthy and willing enough. It wasn’t like he was drugging them. I was disappointed. What a waste of time.
I wondered whether I could sneak out without being noticed. Then, the final girl was called.
“If any of you gentlemen have been disappointed so far because you haven’t found just the girl you’re looking for, you’re in luck. Our final girl is worth saving for last. Her name is Michelle.”
The curtain parted, and the last girl stepped out onto the stage.
The first thought that hit my brain was No way she’s a virgin. They should have had a doctor look her over to make sure.
She was older than the other girls, for one thing. Not old, but not eighteen. Probably closer to my age, and I had just turned twenty-eight three days before my release.
She was also gorgeous. Stone cold, drop-dead. The green in her eyes almost jumped out at me. Her hair was a waterfall over one shoulder. I wanted to dig my hands into it, take handfuls of it, work her up and down my cock. I looked at her mouth, and it shone red and pouty. I started to get hard and couldn’t believe it.
Her body was tight and toned. Her legs went on for miles. She was tall, maybe almost six feet in heels. I would still stand taller than her. She had a grace to her, too. She glided when she walked. I bet men’s heads turned when she walked down the street.
And she looked like she hated every single one of us. I felt it coming from her in waves. She smiled and tried to look friendly, but she was seething inside. The muscle jumped in her cheek. I was intrigued. No way she hadn’t been laid in her whole life. That was bullshit. What was her real story?
I realized I wanted to know. I really wanted to know what she was all about.
“We’ll start the bidding at five thousand.”
“Five!” Two men raised their hands at once.
“One at a time, please, gentlemen. I think you came in first,” the emcee said, pointing to a man sitting in the middle of the room. Fat slob. No way he was good enough for her.
“Five five.” The second of the original two bidders. Young, skinny. A tech millionaire, I decided.
“Six.” The grandfather who first bid on the eighteen-year-old in the beginning.
“Seven.”
“Eight.”
“Ten.”
“Twelve.”
The number kept going up. I knew it was a mixture of two things. First, she was hot as hell. Any man with eyes would wanna sleep with her. Plus, she was last. The guys who hadn’t scored anyone yet were desperate to go home with somebody. They hadn’t been willing to bid so high on the others, but on her they would go for it just so they didn’t have to leave alone.
I watched her. Her eyes went back and forth, finding every man who bid. I could tell from the way her face changed ever so slightly how she felt about each of them. The fatso she was repulsed by. The young guy, she was indifferent. The grandfather disgusted her, of course. Another man, a middle-aged George Clooney type, seemed to appeal to her.
No fucking way was I gonna let that happen.
“Thirty.” I couldn’t believe the word came out of my mouth. What was I thinking? I didn’t want to announce my presence, for Christ’s sake! But I wanted her. Even if it took thirty thousand dollars.
She gasped. I could hear it from the back of the room, over the mumbling of the other men. Some of them were pissed, some surprised. But none of them felt like outbidding me.
“Thirty thousand going once…twice…sold, for thirty thousand dollars.”
I felt like a deer in headlights. What the hell did I do? I bought her. I didn’t know what I was going to do with her now that I had. She stood there like she had no idea what to do. I knew she couldn’t have. I didn’t think the girls were exactly trained beforehand, since none of the others looked like they knew what to do when their time was up.
We stared at each other for a long moment before she left the stage and found her way to my side. The event was starting to break up since all the girls were sold and on their way to whatever their buyers took them. I felt sorry for a few who looked really nervous. It shouldn’t have been that way.
But I couldn’t think about that for long, because my own purchase was standing in front of me. The way she met my eyes with hers almost made me laugh. There was no hiding what she was thinking. I was scum for bidding, even if my bid was twice as much as what the next biggest final bid was.
Maybe I was scum, but I couldn’t think about that just then. Not when she stared at me the way she did. I started getting hard again, like I did when I thought about her going down on me. I fought it back. I wasn’t gonna embarrass myself, walking around with a hard-on.
“So. I guess we should get outta here before they turn out the lights.”
“I guess so.” Her voice was deep, throaty. She was so angry, too. She hated doing this. I wondered what made her go through with it. What would be that important?
I remembered how shitty my house was, but it wasn’t like she was going to take me home with her. Oh well. It wasn’t like I had planned on any of this.
Chapter Six
Michelle
From the moment our eyes met, as I stood onstage and he sat in the audience, I felt drawn to him.
It was silly, like something out of a soap opera. That didn’t make it any less true. Something about the intensity of his eyes, the way he stared so hard at me. As soon as we locked gazes there
might as well have not been a single person in the room besides the two of us. Everything else seemed to blur around the edges.
When he bid thirty thousand, my heart had leaped. Thirty thousand dollars! That meant twenty-five thousand five hundred for me. I could have fainted with stunned relief. Twenty-five thousand. I said the words over and over to myself. It would mean so much to my mom.
But then there was the issue of having to go through with it. Attractive or not, sexy or not, he was a stranger. It wasn’t until I stood beside him in the warehouse that I realized just how big a stranger, too. Taller than me even when I was wearing heels, broad-shouldered, with thick biceps and legs. I wondered what he did for a living, with that barrel chest of his. A body builder? A bricklayer? A bouncer? Something that involved his body, to be sure. It had to be.
