Page 16 of Selling Innocence

When the silence got to me, when I couldn’t sit there and stare at an empty bowl any longer, I blurted out the words in my head. “Why did you buy me?”

Hayden spoke without missing a beat. Had he been waiting for me to break first? “Because someone else was after you, someone we’re looking for. I won’t hide this from you because it involves you. We aren’t in the habit of buying women, Mackenzie.”

“Kenz.” At his look, I whispered the rest. “No one calls me Mackenzie—it’s just Kenz.”

Hayden nodded. “Kenz. We’re searching for someone. That person attends the auctions on occasion, but they returned from overseas when the list of items up for sale came out. It told us there was something important there they wanted. That person bid on you immediately, so we bought you out from under them.”

“Is that why I saw you all before the auction?”

“Yeah. We could rule out most of the items, but you were the wild card, the thing we didn’t recognize. We wanted to see if what it was about you he might want, but honestly? After meeting you I didn’t figure you were what they were after.”

“Then why would they want me?”

“We don’t know. Not knowing doesn’t change that it’s true, though. Now that we have you, we can find out why they want you and use it as leverage to draw them out.”

“Leverage? You mean bait, don’t you?”

“Leverage,” Char pipped in. “Leverage implies we’ll trade you for what we want, and I’ve got no problem with that.”

Again, he reminded me that he was an absolute douche.

I ignored him, since his statement didn’t help that much. Instead, I focused on Hayden who actually told me things. “So, who is this person?”

“His name is Lorien Hatchett, but he has plenty of aliases. He’s the last surviving son of the Hatchett family, but he doesn’t do much to run it right now, leaving that to his mother. He keeps a low profile, never appearing in public, living under another name that we don’t know. He’s known for his work as a hired killer. This is the first time I’ve seen him change his plans for something—he even canceled a contract he’d taken to come back—which says that you’re extremely important to him. Given you don’t fit what normally goes up for sale, he probably hired the inhouse finders at the auction to pick you up, then he went so far as to bribe the auction house to ensure he won.”

I frowned. “Then how did you win?”

Vance snorted as if he found my question adorable. “Lorien isn’t the only one with connections. I grease palms better than he does, so here you are.”

And is here really any better?

These men hadn’t done anything to me yet, but that didn’t make them trustworthy. I recalled how often people had cozied up to me in my life, people who had betrayed me just as quickly.

I frowned as I tried to work out everything they’d said to me, to make sense of it all. “If he has that much power, why would he go through an auction like that? Even if he bribed them to win, what would the point be instead of just abducting me himself?”

Char sighed as though annoyed with how little I knew. “There’s a reason people go to this auction—the protection. Everything bought at that auction comes with security guaranteed for as long as the buyer owns it. The auction house will get involved if anyone tries to steal an item purchased there. That is built into the fees the auction house charges. They don’t protect it directly, but by reputation. Not many people want to tangle with the auction house, because they are brutal to people who cross them. I hear those who try to steal things bought from an auction are rarely ever seen again. Rumor has it that they’ve recovered everything that was ever stolen after an auction. By buying you from them, he both ensured he could keep you and that his hands were kept clean.”

“So what are you going to do with me?” I asked, forcing myself to face that head-on. I was at their mercy, and I had no idea what any of this meant in a practical way.

Hayden didn’t answer at first. Finally, he sighed. “We can’t let you go, not right now. First of all, if we did, Lorien would just pick you up. He’s done this much to get you—he won’t give up now. We could get the auction house involved, since you’re guaranteed ours, but then they might realize we were cheating as well. They’re just as likely to target us as him. Basically, you’ve got no real choice but to stay with us.”

I could go home…

If I returned to Nem, to the Quad, they could keep me safe. However, that would mean admitting I couldn’t cut it on my own. It would mean going back to that pretty but confining cage they’d set up for me.

Somehow, even the thought of this danger wasn’t enough for me to do that.

Also, I still didn’t understand this Lorien or what he wanted, how dangerous he might be. I couldn’t ask Nem to take that risk, to throw her into this mess.

Getting back to Nem would mean either telling these men who I really was—talk about a bad idea—or trying to escape, which didn’t seem all that possible right now. It meant that wasn’t much of an option. Guess that means they’re right—I don’t have another choice.

“Will anyone be looking for you if you don’t go back to your place?” Hayden asked.

The answer was yes, at least eventually. Given Jarrod’s promise, Nem and the Quad should give me a little time, but at some point, they’d come looking. Saying that would only cause me trouble, though, so I shook my head. “My parents are gone.”

“No lawyers or anything keeping a close eye?”

Skirting the truth was never easy, but given my poor lying skills, I did the best I could. “I have lawyers, but they won’t notice if I don’t go home.”

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