“To be owned.”
“You recorded her pain like it was data,” I said.
“You sold her voice to men who watched it on loop while she bled.”
His body thrashed. He begged. He choked.
I twisted the blade. Then pulled it free. Then used it again. Not once. Not twice. Until the chair beneath him was red. Until the floor was painted in the truth.
You’d be proud of that one, Camille.
I made it last.
I didn’t speak. I didn’t breathe. She wasn’t screaming. She was surviving. And now? I was vengeance. And Devane was next.
Cloe
I woke to water.
Not gentle. Not clean.
Cold like punishment. Sharp like teeth. It slid down the inside of my thigh and soaked the floor beneath me.
Rough fabric. No soap. Just chill and friction. Someone wiped my neck. My chest. Down between my legs. Not fast. Not careful. Not curious. Just functional. Like they were cleaning a statue. A body they didn’t want to rot before the show.
I didn’t move. My wrists were loose but numb. My feet flat against the floor, slick with cold. The gag was gone. Replaced with nothing. Not silence. Just exposure.
I blinked once. A woman stood in front of me. Late forties. Gloves on. Face neutral. She didn’t meet my eyes. If she had, she might have seen it. The rage. The breath. The echo of the hum still thrumming in my chest.
She didn’t meet my eyes. But her hand shook—just once—when it passed over my ribs. Maybe she thought I didn’t feel it. But I did. Fear recognizes itself.
They dressed me in white. Thin cotton. The kind that clung when wet. No bra. No underwear. No warmth. A dress designed to disappear under light.
She stepped back. Another figure entered. Man. Silent. He shackled my wrists. Ankles. Quick. Mechanical. I didn't fight. Not from fear—from readiness. Stillness was the only rebellion they still feared. He didn’t speak. Didn’t touch anything he didn’t need to.
They didn’t want me real. They wanted me clean. Polished. Framed. When they were done, they left me standing.Naked beneath white. Hands bound. Mouth dry. And breath still mine.
The door opened. Light poured in from above. And I knew the next part wasn’t for me. It was for them. They dragged me by the wrists. The chains bit into skin that was already raw, already torn. My knees scraped the ground when I stumbled, and they didn’t stop. Didn’t pause. Didn’t let me walk. They wanted the picture of resistance. Wanted to show me being pulled. Not carried. Not guided. Dragged.
The door opened. And the wind hit. Not fresh.Sharp.City air spiked with exhaust and ozone and the kind of salt that lives on rooftops. It cut through the thin cotton of the shift like it was looking for something soft to ruin. My skin pulled tight around bone.
They didn’t give me shoes. The rooftop stretched in long strips of tile, bleached and heat-scarred. A single metal pole rose from the center like an altar.
Lights flared from every side—too white. Too clean. Not for truth. For erasure. This wasn’t a platform.It was a fucking auction block.
Glass towers blinking with the lives of people who didn’t know what was about to happen. Who wouldn’t care even if they did. No screams reached this high. No prayers, either. They shackled me to the post. Wrists high. Ankles wide.
The chain stretched my arms until my ribs ached. I was forced to stand. To stay upright. My weight dragged my shoulders down.
But I didn’t collapse. I held it. I wasn't here to perform for them. I was here to remind them what a girl looks like when you try to erase her and fail. The lights came on. Blinding. They caught the cotton shift and turned it sheer. The outline of my thighs visible. My chest. My ribs.
I didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Let them look. Let them see what they made. Let them see what Wolfe would destroy for. A door opened at the far end of the roof.
Ellis stepped out first. The man beside him followed. They didn’t rush. Their footsteps were too soft. Too timed. Like they’d rehearsed this. Like they’d sold girls like me before.
He didn’t look at me. He looked at the money in his hand. And I smiled. Not wide. Not kind. Just enough to bleed. No one ever looks up. But Wolfe always did.
The wind caught the edge of my shift. It lifted it just enough to remind me that I didn’t belong to myself anymore—not in their eyes. It clung to my thighs, my ribs, transparent under the white light bleeding down from above. A spotlight designed not to show, but to strip.
