Page 22 of Savage Assassin

I feel like nothing more than a piece of meat on display, standing in line to wait for the men to come up and inspect me and the other girls. It feels like the most humiliating, debasing experience of my life.

I know it’s far from over, too.

I’d known that part was coming. We’d all been woken up early this morning by the guards and marched to a room in the main house, forced to sit and wait as, one by one, the girls were taken out and cleaned up for the auction. Diego had ordered us to be done up with simple hair and no makeup, so the actual process didn’t take long. Still, the wait had felt interminable, like waiting for execution.

I’d tried to cling to the hope that there was someone left who could come help me, but it had felt harder and harder by the hour. The worst imaginings were the ones where Diego’s men had succeeded in killing everyone that night–Levin, my father’s men, my family–and that there would be no one left at all to try to rescue me. No one to try to stop the absolute horror unfolding in front of me.

Whoever buys you will have spent a lot of money,I told myself as I sat in the small, warm room with all the other girls as they were taken out and returned one by one. Each of them came back scrubbed clean, hair shiny, and dressed in a clean ivory silk slip, looking withdrawn and nervous–or defiant, in the case of the blonde girl I’d met when I was brought to the cells.They’ll treat you like an investment. Like an expensive collectible. They won’t abuse you.

It was a very small comfort, though. Not enough to keep my stomach from twisting into knots that I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to untangle, my throat tight with fear. Not all that long ago, an arranged marriage was the worst thing in my future. This is far, far worse. Worse even than Diego.

And there’s no way out that I could see, short of a ninth-hour rescue. I couldn’t fight. I couldn’t run. I tried to think of what Isabella would do, what my brave, stubborn, defiant sister would do in the face of this, and I knew the answer before a few seconds had passed.

She would curse, fight, spit, and kick. She would make herself unsaleable, and she would end up sold off to someone whose only joy would be in breaking her spirit. Just as Diego had tried to do when he’d sent her to the bride-tamer.

The difference is, Isabella had had Niall to go after her. To save her. I’m not sure that I have anyone left at all.

Which means that defiance will only hurt me more in the end.

Just be brave,I told myself when it was my turn.Don’t let them see how afraid you are. How much this hurts and terrifies you.And I’d managed it, mostly. I’d kept my chin up as the two women assigned to cleaning us up scrubbed me pink and raw in a lukewarm bath, a humiliating process that had them touching me in places that I’d hoped I would only ever wash myself. They washed my hair twice, wringing it dry and then rubbing me down with towels like a horse after a bath, one of them applying moisturizer to my face as the other dried and brushed my hair, running a lightweight oil through it that smelled like flowers and left it thick and shiny.

The silk slip was yanked over my head, my hair was fluffed up once more, and then I was marched back to the room, to sit in silence and try not to think too hard about my fate until all of the girls were finished being prepared.

Then, we were led out to the courtyard.

I grit my teeth, bracing myself for the inspection. It feels like being marched in front of a pack of hungry dogs, except these dogs are dressed in fine bespoke suits and holding glasses of champagne and tequila and scotch that cost thousands of dollars. I’d walked across a marble floor veined with gold barefoot as we were led out to the courtyard, and the ostentatiousness of it all makes me want to vomit.These men have everything in the world,I’d thought with disgust as we were lined up.And this is what they choose to do with it.

There’s a line to inspect me. Men of varying ages, all of them old enough to be my father and some much older, a few of decent enough looks to at least count as tolerable, but I still don’t want a single one of them touching me.

“Hands off the merchandise,” the guard behind me reminds them, as they look at me with lustful, eager eyes that tell me they’re already imagining me stripped naked, bare for their viewing pleasure–and all of the other pleasures they can imagine, too.

As much as I resent being called merchandise, I’m almost grateful for the guard behind me, keeping these men’s hands off me for now. I feel very certain that the only thing keeping them from grabbing at me and prying me apart for their inspection is the hulking figure behind me.

Much like José.

My chest cramps with hurt at the reminder of José, who I’d thought of as my protector for so long, a harmless crush, someone who would keep me safe and gently chide my sister and me when we got out of hand.What kind of world is this that I live in, that can be so cruel to a man that it changes him so much?The José who had tried to hurt me, and turn me in to Diego as vengeance for his brother, isn’t the same man who had guarded me for so much of his life.

For a brief second, as I’m turning my head away from amucholder man who is requesting that the guard bring me forward and let him get a closer look, I think I hear the sound of a semi-familiar voice. I think I see a semi-familiarface–a chiseled, handsome face with sharp blue eyes, short dark hair, a muscled body that I remember thinking about in ways that I knew I shouldn’t–

It can’t be.

And then he moves past one of the girls a few feet away from me, and I know I’m not imagining things.

Levin.

I feel the look of shock spread over my face in the instant before I manage to shut it down. His eyes meet mine, his face blank except for the barest look of curiosity, and I know what I have to do.

I have to pretend that I don’t know him, that I don’t know why he’s here, even as my entire body starts to buzz with the adrenaline rush of knowing that I at least have a chance at being saved.He’s alive. He’s here to help me. That must mean my father is alive, too. He’s sent him to finish the job he started.

It’s a hope I wouldn’t have dared have a few minutes ago, but now my heart is pounding in my chest. I barely hear the guard telling me to step back into line as the man in front of me finishes inspecting me, my mind racing.

Keep it to yourself. Ifanyonesuspects, it will all be over. Diego will kill him, and your last hope will be gone.

Levin is walking towards me, and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life to look at him with the same bored expression that I’ve done my best to keep on my face for everyone else. I haven’t wanted any of these men to see how afraid I am, how brokenhearted, how lost I feel. I want them to all think that I don’t give a single shit about what they’re going to do to me. And I think I’ve done a pretty good job, so far.

But as he stops in front of me, all I want to do is ask if my father sent him, if he’s alive, and beg for Levin to get me out of here. I want to know what his plan is and how he intends to save me. I want to know what the chances are that I’m going to walk out of here with him and not with one of these other lecherous pricks.

I press my lips tightly together, biting back all of it, looking away from him. I can’t look him in the eye without giving myself away, so instead, I pretend that I can’t bear to look at him at all.

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