“Dead? Yeah. Sad fucker.” I slump back onto my haunches and wipe away a bead of sweat on my forehead with the back of my wrist. “Fuck.”
“I’m sorry.”
My shoulders lift. “It’s no loss. It’s just another breadcrumb we’re leaving behind.” Rubbing at that same spot in my forehead, I look past my bloodied fingers and up at Cian. “Well?”
“It was some guy. He sounded pissed and he barked off some address Evri’s expected at and ordered not to be late like last time.”
“Did he give you the address?”
Cian nods.
“Then we go.”
“What about him?” Cian jerks his head toward dead Evri.
“We leave him. We’ve already spent way too long here.”
Over these pastfew days with Cian, I’ve noticed warmth still lingers in him. He carries grief heavily and it weighs down his eyes and slopes his walk, but the way he showed concern for Evri’s body, the way he tips the taxi drivers and adjusts the blankets covering me, shows me there’s still warmth in his heart. He’s a broken man reaching out and I want to reach back. I want to talk about the night we spent together and how amazing it felt to have him inside me again, to be in his arms and feel loved again.
The words don’t come.
More importantly, they can’t, because upon reaching the address given to Cian while pretending to be Evri, we arrive at a private manor that seems to be hosting some kind of gala. The driveway is swimming with cars and fancy-dressed people and after scouring the perimeter, I’m met with armed guards.
After testing the entire perimeter, I meet up with Cian at our agreed meeting place across the street and find he’s arrived first.
“Any luck?” He stands at the window of a small boutique we broke into the moment we arrived with his attention fixed on the manor across the street. Spotlights sway back and forth, music flows, and the stream of vehicles is relentless.
“Nah. That place is pretty damn secure. So, unless you know someone and we can charter a plane to rappel down from the sky, I don’t know how we’re getting in there.”
“What about through the front door?” Cian turns to me with a mischievous smirk on his face.
“Huh?”
He nods behind me to the reclining couch near a collection of boxes. Draped across one arm is a sparkling silver dress with spaghetti straps and a cinched waist. “Where did you find that?”
“This is some kind of donation, goodwill boutique. I found it in the back after noticing the AK-47 in the arms of one of the guards. If we can’t sneak in, then why not walk in like we own the place?”
I squint back at Cian. “And when they take one look at us and see we have absolutely nothing that proves we should be there?”
Cian’s playful smirk widens a fraction. “I’m sure someone in the parking lot is just looking to lose their invitations.”
It’s a long shot but Cian’s right. It’s worth a shot.
After dressing up in the dress and suit he found, we head toward the party and make it past the gate security with ease. There’s a tall man in a charcoal gray suit checking what looks like invitations at the door so, after feigning an issue with the strappy shoes Cian found for me, we target a couple in the middle of an argument near their car. Subduing them is a piece of cake compared to the last people we had to fight and then, arm in arm, we head into the gala with invitations in hand.
No one bats an eye at us and we melt into the crowd with practiced ease. The air inside the manor is cool, drinks in crystal glasses pass us balanced on golden trays, glittering chandeliers hang from the roof, and exquisite paintings line the ornate walls.
“I think that might be real,” I murmur in Cian’s ear as we pass a Rembrandt in the hallway.
Food and drink flow past us at an alarming rate and everyone seems to be having a perfectly great time, but there’s no sign as to what the gala is for. No birthday wishes, no hints of a celebration, nothing.
Until the auction starts and everything clicks.
Dancers clear the stage in the main ballroom, and Cian and I watch on in horror as one by one, slaves in terrible condition are dragged onto the stage and sold. Person after person is hauled under a spotlight and obscene amounts of money are called out all around us until someone is satisfied and the victim is dragged off the other side of the stage, never to be seen again.
I’d read Saoirse’s account of her own slave auction last year, but nothing prepared me for the reality of being involved in one. My heart begins to pound and sweat trickles down my spine as victim after victim is carted across the stage like a prized sow. Through it all, Cian remains frozen at my side like a rigid statue. Slipping my hand into his to calm him, it takes several minutes of me slowly rubbing his forearm with my other hand to draw him out of whatever trance or memory he got stuck in.
“Come on,” I murmur in a low voice against his ear, playing the part of the affectionate wife to anyone who looks too closely. “This is the perfect time for us to sneak about.”
