Page 8 of Redemption

Gawain

Two eyes as black as night stare out at me from the tangled mass of blonde hair belonging to the naked woman huddled on the bed. She’s the reason I’m here, and from the look of her, I should have been sent much sooner. The room is dark except for the artificial light flooding in through the doorway. It’s 3 am, and she should be asleep, but instead she’s wide awake, looking as if she wants to run away and hide. Her body, from what I can see, is covered in bruises and bite marks. Her lip is healing from a previous assault, and a muddy green mark highlights where a black eye must have once been. I take a step into the room, and the tension rolling off her radiates out and smacks me in the chest. She’s terrified, and I need to play this carefully.

“Hello.” I lower my voice to a soft, friendly tone. “May I come in?” This must be her room, and despite the horrors I imagine have gone on within it, I need to respect that to gain her trust. This isn’t my first rodeo with a trafficked girl, and I know it won’t be my last. It’s my responsibility within the Cavalieri because, apparently, I have a sweet nature when it comes to women. I think the rest of the outfit have confused my need to fuck as many women as possible mixed up with something more altruistic, somewhere along the line. If it saves another woman, though, I’ll do all I can. I’m not that much of an arrogant prick. I’m just highly sexually charged when the occasion demands, but this is not, in any way shape or form, one of those instances.

“No,” the woman whimpers back to me. “Please, don’t.”

I hold both my hands up in the air to show surrender.

“I’m not here to hurt you. I’ve come to take you away.”

“Y-you c-can’t,” she stutters out her answer and shifts back on the bed, trying to hide herself from me, but with only a bare mattress to lie on, she’s unable to do so.

I dare to take a step farther into the room, and her eyes open wider, her nostrils flaring with anxiety.

“Please,” she begs me. I’m still holding my hands up, but I take the opportunity to lower to my knees and bow before her. Every movement is done slowly to demonstrate I’m not a threat to her.

“You have my word I’m not here to hurt you. My name is Gawain Vincent. I’m part of an organization sent to help you.” I keep my head lowered but raise my eyes, so I can see her. She’s leaned a little forward on the bed, so she can keep all of me in sight and is clearly confused because I’m on my knees before her.

“You’ll take me to another Master?” She shifts farther forward on the bed, and I can see her shaking. Her little hands trembling with nerves.

“No. No more masters. I’m taking you to freedom.”

She gasps.

“It’s a trick. M is testing me.” She takes a hand and reaches between her legs to stroke over her feminine folds. “I know it’s a game because he hasn’t come yet. He’s testing my loyalty to him. It never finishes until he orgasms. Please leave.” The girl turns away from me. “I won’t fail him. He can beat me black and blue, but I’m his. He won’t share me with another man, and I won’t go to one.”

“M?” I question. “Tell me about him.”

“You know about him. You must be a friend of his,” she snaps back at me.

“Ok.” I remain kneeling but lower my hands and place them on my legs. The fabric of my jeans is bunched up tightly around my muscular thighs. I must look imposing to this frightened girl, and like all men, in her eyes, capable of abominable things. Arthur sent me details of her file. She was stolen on a night out two years ago and sold that same night into the life she’s endured since then. We’ve managed to bring down most of the organization who stole her, but it’s taken us much longer to find all the girls that were trafficked. Megan was especially hard to locate, despite the fact she was in our backyard all along. She’s been well hidden and wasn’t brought into the country legally like some of the girls had been. She was smuggled in under the cover of darkness by someone with a lot of money and power. I know Arthur is trying to find out more about this M, but we have no leads on him so far. All I can hope is he’s among the pile of dead bodies I’ve lined up outside this room.

We fall silent, both of us looking at each other.

“Why do you think I’m a friend of M?” I query.

“Why else would you be here, other than to hurt me?” Her reply is blunt, and an indication of how hard I’ll need to work to get her to trust me. She turns back to face me with a glare on her face this time. It excites me to know that all the fire hasn’t been beaten out of her. She’s angry with me because she thinks I’m part of a plan to inflict pain on her by her master.

“Why do you think I’m here to hurt you?”

“All men hurt women. They take what isn’t theirs and twist it…break it.” She holds out her arm, and I can see it’s been broken during her captivity and has not been fixed correctly. I wince. It must have been incredibly painful.

“Do you remember anything of your life before you were brought here?” I lower myself from my knees to a sitting position on the floor. “Did men hurt you then?”

She opens her mouth to no doubt shout at me, but quickly shuts it again and purses her lips together. I can tell that a good memory is flittering through her fragile mind.

“Tell me,” I encourage.

“I…” She hesitates and fiddles with the straggly ends of her hair. “My father. He used to take me to the swings at the park every Sunday morning. He worked really hard, and I didn’t really see him during the week, but Sunday morning was always our time.”

“He sounds like a really kind man. I didn’t spend that sort of time with my father.” I suppress the flash of a bad memory, which surfaces in my head. Now is not the time for me to face my demons. I see a small smile cross over Megan’s face at the memory. But, it disappears as quickly as it came, replaced once again by the thunder of her anger.

“I know what you’re doing. Trying to get me to open up to you, so I’ll leave the room with you, and then I can be punished with a beating.” Her brows furrow together in a stern scold.

“I’ve already told you I’m not here to hurt you. If you leave the room, nothing bad will happen to you. It’s up to you, though.” I push slowly up onto my feet. Megan scoots back against the headboard of the bed, and her eyes go wide again.

“I have a feeling we’re going to be here for a while. I’m going to get myself a drink. Do you fancy one?”

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