Trust in Me
I’d die for the transgression, an ugly, painful death with no dignity. Fear and an unshakeable desire for survival had kept me from doing it all this time, but now it wasn’t just my own hide, broken and scarred as it was, on the line. There were those nameless, faceless girls who still had hope for a life.
    And there was Tyler. He was counting on me to help him. He’d asked me to distract Carlos. This was the only way I could. So I sucked him and let my face be raped mercilessly. Every rough thrust was like a coin slipped into the game for one more round—he’d be distracted that much longer. Tyler would be that much safer. The piercing pain of Carlos’s dick popping into my throat, the acute cramp in my neck from craning upward, the hands tight in my hair were the ride itself, a fun-house torture chamber.
    He came with a soft grunt, music to my ears. Salty liquid splashed into the back of my throat. I swallowed it down, knowing that a single drop lost would only mean more pain. The only people who said that you attracted more bees with honey had never been whipped.
    Only once I had balked at swallowing. My childhood training had taught me a lot of things about being a woman, but that particular lesson had been missing. I’d been surprised at the gush of ejaculate. I’d gagged and coughed it out. My punishment that night had been to swallow from every man Carlos had working for him. I learned that lesson well.
    A soft beep pierced the curtain my mind had constructed to protect me from reality, the innocuous bleep of the cell phone incongruous to the noxious blend of blood and rage that hung in the air.
    “Tyler. You back yet?” Carlos snapped. “All right. I’ll be up in a minute.”
    The phone clapped shut and his boots stomped away from me. Without a word, he left, shutting the door and closing me in darkness. I hung my head and slipped away.
    * * *
    My jaw felt like it had turned to stone, clenched shut. Only the low moan emanating from it—from me—told me I was alive. I didn’t want to move. Even in the cocoon of sleep I knew that as soon as I became conscious, as soon as I moved a muscle, the pain would retaliate. A jealous mistress, pain would be too eager to make up for the time lost to dreams.
    But a body keeps on living. I’d learned that lesson early on. Would he come back? Was my punishment over? God, let it be over.
    I wasn’t in the basement. The smell of blood and leather wasn’t here. I figured Carlos had sent Leo down to free me, to put me back in my room. I just hoped he hadn’t given Leo permission to use me first, like he sometimes did.
    My eyes flickered open, shooting warning shocks of pain through me and signaling the nausea to begin. I was coming back to life, despite myself.
    “Shhh. I’ve got you.” I heard Tyler’s soothing over a mournful wail. It was coming from me.
    His hand stroked down my face in a calming caress, but its path was carefully picked, as if to avoid the bruises there like brambles in a thicket. I’d never wanted him to see me like this.
    I tried to speak again. A croaked sound emerged.
    “Shh, just rest. You’re okay.”
    He sounded so sure, but I had to know. “Where is he?”
    “He’s not here, don’t worry.” But the reassurance came on a razor’s edge.
    I tossed restlessly in the bed, ferreting out every ache, every bruise.
    “Where is he?” I whispered again.
    “He’s out meeting with the suppliers. Trying to calm them down.” Tyler paused. “We got the guy out. You did it.” His voice cracked at the last. “God,” he said, more a sob than a word. “I thought—I never imagined he would do this . Why, Mia? Why do you stay?”
    “Where would I go?” It was a rhetorical question, a flippant answer, but it was the closest thing to the truth. Blinking, I recognized the open ceiling of the warehouse I called home, the exposed rafters and pipes blanketed with dust like moss on a tree. The sheets weren’t slippery like Carlos’s silk or

Similar Books

Not Just a Friend

Laura Jardine

Wind Over Marshdale

Tracy Krauss

Never Call Retreat - Civil War 03

William R. Forstchen, Newt Gingrich

Tell Tale

Sam Hayes

The Flame in the Mist

Kit Grindstaff

Friend of My Youth

Alice Munro

Honor Thyself

Danielle Steel