by Fawn Bailey
I woke up to complete darkness.
It must have been nighttime, and I felt disoriented and dazed, but at least I was in the same position I’d fallen asleep in. I was relieved when I realized nobody had moved me or touched me. Everything in the room looked the same, except the vanity chair which was back in its place, and the absence of Pia who must have left hours ago. I had no idea what time it was, but I got out of bed anyway and stretched my limbs.
Pia had been right. I’d really needed the sleep. But she didn’t know that sleeping wouldn’t make me more complacent. Instead, I was filled with a renewed desire to get the hell out of the mansion. I would fight harder than I ever had to put it all behind me, I’d just be sneakier about it. Nobody could know about my plans.
I shook the pills out of the bottle with my back to the camera and hid them in my underwear drawer, wrapping them up in a pair of stockings and pretending I was just changing into a new outfit. I stripped and gathered some clothes before heading into the bathroom. The shower felt pleasant against my tired skin, and I woke up fully under the hot spray beating down my back.
I washed my hair and lathered my body in bubbles. He hadn’t raped me, but he had fucked my mouth. It made me feel so dirty, and my tears mixed with the water running down my face. I promised myself I would have my revenge on the man who had forced this on me. The worst part was, he made me fucking enjoy it, the dampness between my legs growing with each thrust of his cock inside my throat. I’d never imagined it would feel like that. Fill me up, make me choke and make it hard to breathe when my throat desperately tried to swallow.
The worst part was, he had told me it was only the beginning of my training. I didn’t even want to imagine the rest of what he wanted to do to me.
Once I got out of the shower, it was light outside. I got dressed in the leggings from my closet, refusing to get dolled up for my captor. They were dark gray, and I paired them with a simple baby pink tank top.
Someone must have been monitoring the cameras, because there was already a breakfast trolley in my room. It made me feel like they were invading my privacy and I hated it.
I lifted the cloches on the plates and stared at the perfectly arranged Eggs Benedict, the freshly squeezed orange juice and the coffee with plenty of milk, just the way I liked it. How did they know that? I hadn’t told anyone… But I remembered the first time I got breakfast. They had brought black coffee with milk in a separate jug and sugar cubes on a plate. I glanced up at the cameras again. Somebody was definitely watching me. Was it the man who had raped my mouth? I had no way of knowing, but I knew he was the true enemy. So obsessed with everything I did, he kept tabs on me even in the privacy of my room.
After I was finished with breakfast, I did some stretching. It was the first time I’d done that since I’d been taken. But the desire to get the hell out of there was stronger than ever, and I knew I’d have to keep my strength up and keep my body ready if I wanted to go back to my career once I got out of there. There were no more what-ifs. There was only when. When I would get out of there. When I got my life back. When I would make them all pay for what they’d done to me.
I decided I needed to get a better look around the house once I was done with my meal. I would discover where it was, how far to the first neighbor. I needed to be prepared for my escape.
My door was unlocked, and the knob turned easily, which surprised me. I had been told I was free to roam the grounds, but I’d been too beaten up to do it before. Now was the perfect time to do some recon though, and I left the privacy of my room for the growing chatter of the hall as I approached the living area.
There were girls up already, even though it seemed to be early. A few less than last time. This time, they gave me curious looks as I entered the area where a cozy fire was burning, and bookshelves were stacked with reading materials. I stared back, unsure what else I was supposed to do. Were we supposed to talk to one another? Were we even allowed to do that?
I decided to stay on the safe side. I needed to be on my best behavior if I had any hope of convincing my kidnappers I was starting to accept my fate. Of course, I would keep the pretense up until I got my chance to run. I wasn’t going to look out for the rest of the girls. It was my chance to survive, my chance to get away.
They all seemed content with being prisoners, anyway. Most of them were dolled up, eyeing the guards that I’d shied away from like they wanted something from them. It made me sick to my stomach, and I averted my eyes when one of the men looked at me, his eyes drinking me in hungrily. I wasn’t sure what the protocol was. Was he allowed to hurt me, or was that only one man’s job? I knew I would soon find out.
I ignored the girls side-eyeing me and decided to sit in the bay window, so I could stare outside at the beach. But when I approached it, I saw another girl was already sitting in the window, her legs pulled up against her chest. She was so tiny I barely noticed her from the other side of the room. She was also completely naked.
Something told me to approach her, and I sat on the opposite side of the bay window she occupied. She stared straight ahead, seemingly not even noticing me joining her. The girl was painfully thin, bones protruding through paper-thin skin, and her eyes were glazed over, with large blue circles underneath them. She was beautiful. Her eyes spoke of the pain she’d been through, and she must have been a couple of years older than me. She had raven hair, beautiful light brown eyes and porcelain skin. I couldn’t take my eyes off her.
“I see you’ve woken up.”
I looked up to find Pia standing in front of me, her smile warm and welcoming. She didn’t acknowledge the other girl.
“How long did I sleep?” I asked, my voice coming out raspy. I wondered how long it had been since I’d last spoken out loud.
“A day and a half, sweetheart,” Pia smiled easily. “That pill must have really knocked you out.”
I hated the thought of that. I’d lost another day and a half, then. Time I could have spent planning my escape. I hated Pia for forcing the pill on me, though I wasn’t about to tell her that.
“Come on,” she motioned for me to join her. “Let’s pick out a nicer outfit for you.”
Rage bubbled in the pit of my stomach, but I still stood up and joined her, my eyes lingering on the beautiful raven-haired girl.
“Is she okay?” I whispered to Pia, but she ignored me completely and led me back up the stairs, her palm firmly on the small of my back.
Once again, no answer to my question.
Once again, I was shown exactly who had the last word in this awful fucking place.
9
Harlow
I followed Pia back up the stairs, hating how meek she made me feel. I had a will of my own, and I didn’t like her taking my choices away from me. Yet I knew it wasn’t my time to argue, so I just shut my mouth and followed her down the hallway, past my room, and to large double doors.
“Someone’s waiting for you in there,” she told me with a sweet smile. “I bet he’ll be pleased to see you’re feeling better.”
I knew who she meant, and while he may have been excited to see me, I most definitely didn’t return the feeling. When I thought of him on the other side of that door, I wanted to make a run for it. Instead, I forced a fake smile to appear on my lips as I nodded at Pia. She opened the door wide and I walked inside, hearing it shut behind me.
It was cold and dark in the room. Before I could gather my bearings, I felt a hand wrap around my arm.
“Harlow,” he said in a whisper, and I was thrust against him. He reeked of alcohol and smoke, and I resisted his grip, but he wasn’t letting go. “Shh, it’s okay.”
It wasn’t.
The fact that it was so dark in there worried me. Maybe he wanted to get me alone, away from the cameras. Which meant someone else could be watching… Or maybe, he was just a sick bastard who wanted to fuck me, and there was no third person in the game, just him and myself. I hated how my body responded when he kissed my neck. He hadn’t onc
e kissed my lips, and I hoped he never would. But there was no denying the way my body molded to his, trying desperately to fit him like a puzzle piece.
“Sir,” I whispered back, still trying to act like the good girl and play by his rules.
But he didn’t like it. He groaned against my neck and pulled me closer to him, making me feel uncomfortable.
He was handsome. I’d noticed it the first time I met him. He was tall, dark and scruffy, with a rugged look that would make my knees weak in any other situation. But because he was treating me this way, like a worthless piece of meat, I couldn’t bring myself to see him as a man.
“I want you to know my name,” he groaned against my ear, his breaths ragged. “I want you to call me only by my name, baby.”
“I don’t k-know what it is,” I managed to whisper back, trying to dodge his mouth.
Somehow, this was more disturbing than the way he’d treated me previously. I hated the intimacy he touched me with, like he now owned my body and like it belonged to him. I hated him for the familiarity he had with my curves because he’d forced himself on me and explored every part of my body even though I hadn’t wanted it.
He was a rapist. A horrible, cruel man I’d never be able to forgive for what he’d done to me. And somehow, this small stolen moment felt worse than everything else he’d done.
“Please,” I begged desperately, even though I knew it would fall on deaf ears like it had so many times before. “Please, don’t hurt me…”
“You want me to,” he growled, laughing in my ear. “You’re saying you don’t, but I know you’re secretly desperate for this, you little slut…”
I cried out when he spun me around in his arms. My ass was against his cock, and he was hard and throbbing for me, making me hate him even more. I didn’t want him to fuck me, or even touch me. Yet I had already realized my consent didn’t matter in this godforsaken place. And damn Pia, who had brought me here to his waiting arms without giving me so much as a warning.
“My name is Ellis,” he muttered against my skin. “Ellis. That’s what you’re going to call me when there’s no one to hear you scream…”
Once again, I wondered whether we were hiding from the cameras on purpose. Was he trying to avoid someone seeing him with me? It was a mystery, but I had every intention of finding out what the truth was. I wouldn’t stop until they were all punished for what they were doing to me.
There was no way I’d be able to overpower Ellis, and as much as it disgusted me, I knew I had to play his game to my advantage. It would be my only chance of getting out of there, so I had to pretend to be just as enamored with him as he was with me – as if I was obsessed, desperate for him to have me. Because I knew he was desperate, his hands groping my skin and his lips kissing and biting savagely.
“You’re going to kneel for me now,” he said, letting go and grabbing my shoulders.
He didn’t even give me a chance to obey his order, instead shoving me down to my knees himself. I looked up at him, trying to mask the contempt in my eyes with the innocence and need I knew he liked to see so much. I opened my eyes wide and he laughed at me as I licked my lips.
“Can’t wait for more, can you baby?” he asked, palming his cock through his trousers.
It was hard to see in the darkened room, yet still hard to miss the sparkle in his eyes.
He unzipped his trousers painfully slowly, as if he was taunting me, getting me ready for the big reveal. And just as he was about to pull his cock out, all the lights in the room came on and we were illuminated, nearly blinded from the light. We both looked up as if on cue, and sure enough, there was a camera in the corner of the room, on the ceiling. The little light on it was flashing red.
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath, and I watched in confusion as he zipped back up in a hurry.
“What’s going on?” I muttered, but he didn’t answer.
He wrapped his fingers around my hair and yanked me to my feet, and I cried out in pain from having my hair tugged like that. But he didn’t give a shit, marching me to the door and opening it wide. Pia was standing in outside and she looked surprised when we exited.
“Done so soon?” she asked sweetly, then looked into the room behind us and paled. “Fuck.”
“Fuck is right,” Ellis growled at her. “I thought you had things under control.”
“I…” she whispered, but he didn’t wait for her answer.
Instead, he strode up to her, still pulling my hair with one hand, and slapped her hard with the other. She recoiled from his touch, crying out and straightening back up with her eyes furious. A large red handprint bloomed on her face, but instead of focusing her anger on the man who hit her, she turned her attention to me.
“Is she really worth it?” she snarled at Ellis. “You really fucking think she’s worth all this?”
“Shut. Your. Mouth.” He punctuated each word by jabbing a finger against her chest, and Pia’s bottom lip trembled as they stared at one another. “Get her back to her room and get the fuck out of my face before I beat you black and blue.”
He thrust me towards her and I whimpered when she grabbed me. Ellis stormed off, leaving me alone with the one person who scared me more than he did.
There was something about Pia – her calculating, calm demeanor told me she was always anticipating something, always working behind my back. She had ulterior motives, I was sure of it, I just didn’t know what they were yet. But I would make it my mission to find out and use every single one of them against her.
“Come on,” she barked at me, and I followed her meekly down the hallway toward my room.
I knew better than to argue. All there was left for me to do was play the role of the girl they thought I was and do it until I found out what was really happening.
Pia opened the door to my room with her card and shoved me in there, making me stumble. For a second, I was convinced she’d leave me alone, but she walked inside after me and locked the door with her card.
“I don’t know what’s so special about you,” she muttered. “I really don’t. You’re nothing. A scrap of a girl. Too young, not even that pretty…”
She smirked. Of course I wasn’t pretty compared to what she saw in the mirror every day. She was a stunning woman, her features like a model’s, and her body stunningly curvy under the tight clothes she wore. I couldn’t compare to her. She was all woman, whereas I was just a girl. But who was she talking about? Ellis? She didn’t seem like she was jealous of me because of him. Surely they weren’t together. At the very best, they seemed like enemies. Always fighting over one thing or another.
“They all look at you and see that innocence,” she told me, leaning down close to my face, her pretty face twisted in a vicious snarl. “The innocence they took from me themselves… And it’ll be gone before they know it. They’ve already started using you, and it will only get worse.”
She must have noticed the terrified expression in my eyes, and she laughed at me.
“You scared, little one?” she asked mockingly, using the pet name Ellis had for me. “You think you’ll get out of here, don’t you? Well, let me tell you something. I’ve spent over ten years trying to run away, and I was never fast enough for them. And just so you know…”
She came dangerously close to me, her lips lingering an inch away from mine.
“If they catch you running,” she went on softly. “They won’t be gentle. They weren’t with me, either.”
She lifted her pretty blouse and I gasped at what she looked like underneath. Her skin was a mess of scars and faded bruises.
“You like them?” she asked me proudly. “They gave me the scars, the bruises I gave myself. I need them now, you see. That’s what they want to do to you as well. Break you until you crave violence just as much as they do. Break you until you’ll break for them willingly. Until you hurt yourself just to bring them pleasure. Oh, you’re so innocent now… But not for long.”
She shoved her blouse back i
nto her skirt almost violently, giving me a look of pure contempt, muttering something under her breath in another language, then heading for the door. She slammed it behind her, and I heard her locking it with the card, but I was grateful. At least now I would be alone with my thoughts, without her madness or Ellis’s lust.
It still made me wonder.
What was going on here? Who were these men who Pia kept talking about? So far I’d only seen Ellis and some guards, but she made me believe there was someone else there, someone in a position of power over both her and Ellis. I wondered if I would ever find out who that person was.
10
Harlow
1 week later
“You are going to be fucked,” he told me plainly, and the color drained out of my face as he approached me with slow, measured steps. “You are going to be beaten. I won’t be gentle, and the others will be rougher than I ever was. So you should be thankful I’m the one introducing you to this. Someone else might not show you the same kindness.”
It had been a week since I’d last seen Ellis. But here he was, ready to jump straight back into it after his unexplained absence, after he’d cornered me in that dark room.
I glared at him, my eyes blazing with fire as he drew nearer. I was helpless. Tied to the chair like a plaything, ready for him to do anything he wanted to me. And I knew he would. His gaze spoke of the unthinkable things he wanted to do to my body, and I feared him. At the same time, my body was eager to respond. I tried to deny the ache between my legs, the wetness rubbing my thighs together and making my breath hitch. I knew he would find out soon enough though, and I clamped my legs closed again, desperate to hide my body’s helpless reaction from his prying gaze.
“Tell me you don’t want it,” he prompted me. “Come on, little one, it’ll only make me harder.”
