The room beyond is massive. Theater-style seating rises in curved rows, all facing a raised platform with a single spotlight aimed at its center.
Masked men fill the seats. Dozens of them. Maybe fifty. Maybe more. They're wearing masquerade-type masks. The black kind that only cover your eyes and do nothing to actually hide who you are. They're all wearing tuxedos. All watching the door I just walked through.
All watchingme.
My feet move. I don't tell them to. They just move.
One step. Another. The platform is three steps up.
I climb them.
The spotlight finds me immediately. Hot and blinding.
I can't see the men anymore. Just shapes in the darkness beyond the light.
There's a marker on the floor. A small circle of tape.
I stand on it.
My hands find the silk tie at my waist. I pull.
The robe falls.
I'm naked.
Completely, totally naked in front of fifty strangers who paid to be here.
Who paid to see me.
I turn. Pause. Turn. Pause. Turn. Pause. Last turn. Stand.
A voice comes through speakers. Male. Smooth. Professional.
"Lot Number Twelve. Scarletta Mae Desmond. Age twenty-two. Five feet six inches. One hundred eighteen pounds. Measurements thirty-four, twenty-four, thirty-five. Bachelor's degree in English Literature from Boise State University. Currently unemployed."
Currently unemployed.
Like that's a selling point.
"Miss Desmond's hobbies include writing original erotica on the popular forum DarkDesires under the pseudonym ScarletSins. Her portfolio contains forty-seven completed works exploring themes of captivity, psychological dominance, and forced confession."
No.
No.
"Notable titles include 'Prey,' 'The Arrangement,' 'Captive,' and 'See Me, Spank Me, Cure Me.' Her work demonstrates a sophisticated understanding of power dynamics and submission psychology."
This isn't happening.
This can't be?—
"From her story 'Owned by the Slave Trader,' Chapter Seventeen: 'His hand wrapped around my throat and I stopped breathing. Not because he was choking me. Because for the first time in my life, someone saw the dark parts and didn't look away.'"
He's quoting me. Actual lines from my work. On, and on, and on… He's reading my actual words to a room full of men who?—
"Miss Desmond's intake questionnaire reveals fantasies including twenty-four-hour Total Power Exchange, forced confession, verbal degradation, and permission for her buyer to weaponize her own writing against her."
My face is burning. My whole body is burning.
