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Mr. Foster never let up his frantic pace, his fingers digging into Daniel’s hips with rough possession, yanking them back to meet each stroke.

At last he climaxed with a shout, pulled out abruptly, and pressed a hand between Daniel’s shoulder blades to keep him in place.

“Look at me,” Mr. Foster said, and Daniel realized the man had walked around the table, to the side Daniel was facing. He opened his eyes and saw Mr. Foster’s crotch, half-hard dick and used condom and somehow, impossibly, only a few small smears of blood. “Now be a good little appliance and tell me how much you liked it. Tell me it felt great and you can’t wait until I deign to fuck you again.”

The words came out flat and scratchy-soft, but they came easy. After what he’d just given Mr. Foster, words were nothing. Meaningless.

Mr. Foster smiled. “Thank me.”

That came out easy too. Dead. Toneless. But easy. Mr. Foster didn’t seem to care. Daniel actually suspected he looked dead, slumped unmoving over a table, covered in welts and bright pink contact burns, too tired even to blink. He wanted to ask if he could go home, but home was his little cubbyhole on the top floor of the InfoGlobe dorm, and he knew he might never see that again.

“What do you think, gentlemen?” Mr. Foster asked as he cleaned himself with a wet wipe, and it actually took Daniel a moment to realize that he was talking to the supervisors and not to him. “You think he learned how to be a good little companion?”

“I think he was struggling an awful lot,” one of them said. “Very unseemly.”

“I think you’re right.” Mr. Foster’s hand on Daniel’s back pressed down harder. “All right, Daniel, let’s try this again. This gentleman’s name is Mr. Kreuner. Why don’t you explain to him just how eager a cock-hungry little companion you are, and if you really, really enjoy yourself, then maybe you won’t need to seek further satisfaction with Mr. Dalton here afterward.”

Daniel’s eyes closed in resignation, blinking away tears. “Please,” he whispered to Mr. Kreuner, following orders and begging mercy all at once. “Please.”

Mr. Kreuner bent down and licked Daniel’s neck, and though all the words Mr. Foster wanted fell softly from Daniel’s lips, he couldn’t hear a single one of them over the screaming in his head.

Daniel lay slumped on the floor beside the table, exactly where the men had dropped him, curled in on himself for protection and warmth and because he just couldn’t seem to manage anything else. Mr. Foster had tossed a handful of wet wipe packets on him, and though he knew he was filthy, he hadn’t been able to make himself take them. It seemed he had no control over his body at all—and wasn’t that, he supposed, exactly what Mr. Foster had intended.

He was only alone for moments. Mr. Foster and the supervisors left, and seconds later, a frantic Tim came rushing in. He dropped to his knees beside Daniel with a startled exclamation, laid a hand on Daniel’s shoulder.

Daniel didn’t move, didn’t flinch, didn’t even bother to lift his head as he rasped, “Don’t touch me.”

“Jesus, Daniel, you—”

He hunched his shoulder in tighter, shaking off Tim’s hand. “I said, don’t touch me.” He hated the way the words came out, soft and weak from screaming, but Tim pulled his hand back anyway.

“You need help, Daniel. Let me h—”

“You left me,” he spat, and he could see that his poison went straight to the heart. Tim flinched, hung his head.

“I had no power to stop him, and I didn’t think you’d want me to watch them force—”

“You left me alone with them!” Daniel cried, shoving at the hand creeping back toward his shoulder. It was easier to be pissed than afraid, easier to be pissed than break down and cry. “How could you do that?”

The pain on Tim’s face was stark and satisfying. Tim pulled his hand back again and whispered, “I’m sorry he did this to you, Daniel, and I’m sorry I didn’t stay. I’m really . . . I’m sorry.”

Tim inched closer, and in his shock, Daniel let him; he literally could not remember the last time one freeman had apologized to him for the actions of another. Maybe years. Maybe never. “Please let me help you,” Tim said—no, begged, and that was a first too.

He said nothing as Tim crawled around behind him, picked up a wet wipe, and ripped it open. It sounded exactly like the condom had when Mr. Foster had pulled it from its package. Daniel squeezed his eyes closed, held his breath.

“Shhh,” Tim said, no doubt reacting to the tension in Daniel’s body—the clenched muscles, the rapid breaths. “You know I’m not going to hurt you, Daniel.”

People had been saying that a lot lately. Shame it never seemed to be true.

The wipe, cold and damp, came down on the back of Daniel’s thigh. He twitched, then stilled. Tim kept up a steady stream of meaningless chatter—random words meant to soothe, to keep Daniel grounded—as he worked steadily toward the damage his colleagues had done. By the time a fresh wet wipe touched raw flesh, Daniel had almost, almost managed to unclench. The jolt of pain shocked him out of his stupor and he hissed, curled up his legs.

“Easy. I have to . . . I mean, I could take you to the infirmary instead, if you—”

“No.” Daniel felt a blush creep up his face. He forced his legs apart again so Tim could work. “Please, don’t.” It was bad enough that Tim was seeing him like this, so raw and exposed, so roughly used; he couldn’t bear the thought of a stranger looking at him, touching him, even though he knew he’d bled at least a little, could feel it dried on his balls, his ass cheeks. He wondered if he’d need stitches, how the fuck he was supposed to go to the bathroom for the next week, how the master—a man seemingly so kind and gentle—could ever possibly wish to do something so terrible to him not just once but every single day. He wondered how they expected him to function each night, to sit at his desk and read the news and interview guests and pretend he could still remember what it felt like to be happy.

“You know,” Tim said on an uneasy laugh, “this is so not a part of my job description.”

Daniel almost snapped, Yeah, well being gang-raped isn’t a part of mine, either, but Tim sounded so helpless and uncomfortable that Daniel didn’t have the heart to make things any worse. Besides, he was just a slave, and slaves couldn’t be raped, now could they.