Page 24 of Auctioned Surrender

She nestles into my touch, and my hand automatically snakes around her neck, pulling her closer. Her breath is wispy and warm against my skin, and the little moan she lets out when I pull her tight sends a thrill of possession through my entire body.

“No one touches you or your family, understand, Doll?” I say, stroking the seam of her lip with the tip of my finger.

Her breathing shallows, her cheeks flush a beautiful pink, and her already wide eyes continue to haze over with desire.She’s the most gorgeous female I’ve ever seen, but I can’t focus on that right now. Instead, I need to make sure she and her family are safe, and in order to do that, we need to find the fucker who invited me to his party, fast.

I barely noticed as we passed through the gates, and if they caught us on camera, we were doing exactly what they would have expected any red-blooded male to be doing with a woman who he had just purchased for fifteen million dollars.

Evers navigates the long drive after passing through the gates, and guns the car hard. He knows exactly where we’re going and wants to make sure we aren’t tailed. I have no concern with his driving abilities. I’ve been partnered with him many times, but Bryanna’s body is pressed firmly against mine and is shaking, most likely from the drugs coming out of her system and the events of the night, but this isn’t helping.

I slide out of my jacket and pull her closer, draping it over her trembling frame. “Look at me,” I say, grasping her chin so that she has no other option but to do as I’ve asked. “You stop worrying. We’re dealing with this,” I say as Evers hits the blacktop of the main road and gives it more gas. Everything has to come together soon. The photos are already uploading to our intel team, and they’ll work around the clock to find out exactly who we’re dealing with.

Bryanna nuzzles into my side, but her trembling hasn’t subsided.

I pull her tighter against me as Evers barrels down the highway, and glance down at her while she blinks valiantly, trying to keep her eyes from closing. The trauma of the day and all the drugs are just too much for her. I put my arm around her shoulder. “Sleep, Doll, we’ll be home soon,” I say, thankful she’s safely in my arms and her family is tucked away, but restless with the knowledge that this is far from over until we put my bidding opponent away.

Bryanna can’t continue to fight her fatigue, and before long her eyes completely close. I watch as she slips deeper into an exhausted sleep and her entire body begins to relax. I push a stray strand of hair from her face and allow myself a few moments to take in her beauty, gazing at the graceful heart-shaped face and the delicate lips that I’ve seen in my dreams night after night, doing things I shouldn’t even be considering.

The attraction I feel for Bryanna is like nothing I’ve ever felt. It’s an almost primal need to keep her protected and safe and to… I stop my train of thought because I shouldn’t be indulging in fantasies about Bryanna, and I most definitely shouldn’t have kissed her. I’ve made it a strict rule never to mix business with pleasure, never, and she’s so damn young. Still in her last year of college, hasn’t even had time to enjoy all the world has to offer, but the way she feels against me, her heart beating against my side and the warmth of her breath on my chest is more than exhilarating. I know for damn sure that it’s not going to be as easy as just following my rules to let her go. This isn’t just a physical attraction; I already know this goes far beyond that.

I glance out at the scenery and ask Evers how much longer it will be until our inevitable car switch; a protocol we have in place to ensure we can detect anyone who may be following us. I know these bastards have the car on camera from when we passed through the gates, and while they may not come after us right away, we can never be too sure.

“A few minutes up the road; we’ll be veering off shortly,” Evers says, glancing at me in the rearview.

We usually switch drivers too, just to be safe, but I don’t want to leave Bryanna alone. “Excellent, can you do me a favor and see if one of the guys can ride with us? I’ll take care of Bryanna,” I say.

“Roger that,” Evers says, his lips curling up at the edges as he tries to keep from smiling at me in the rearview mirror. He calls in my request through the overhead.

Nick answers back. “I’ll ride along. We have plenty of men in the woods and covering the transport. Did she get hurt?” he asks.

“Uh, nothing like that. The drugs are still wearing off, and she’s sleeping. Think Dame just wants to make sure her breathing stays even,” Evers says, his eyes alight with amusement as he sneaks another glance at me.

I can’t help but smile and give him a chin nod of thanks for keeping those jokers off my back. The last thing I need right now when I’m trying to deal with my own feelings is them heckling me about Bryanna.

They know I’m a loner, I don’t do girlfriends, I don’t do attachments, but here the fuck I sit with this woman who has consumed every damn thought since I first saw her picture, and she’s nestled in my arms, exactly where I want her to be.

Evers keeps his foot on the floor, and we careen past a few more miles, and then slow for a sharp right that takes us onto a back road. He ignores the orangeprivate property—do not entersigns that line the fence on both banks of the road. The narrow road splits off ahead, and Evers takes the dirt path that leads us through swampy marsh and overgrown forest until we emerge into a small clearing by a pond.

Nick and Cole jump out of the side door of a white Town and Country van. “I’ll carry her if you want to get your stuff,” Cole says. “I can drive with Evers, and Nick can travel with you and Bryanna.

“I’ve got Bryanna, if you don’t mind grabbing my stuff,” I say, ignoring his offer to carry my Doll. I open the door before scooping her into my arms, sliding out, and walking with her in my arms toward the van. I don’t miss the raised-eyebrow gesturethat Cole throws to Nick, but to his credit he doesn’t say a word, just closes the sliding passenger door after I get the two of us settled into the back, while Nick jumps into the driver’s seat.

Bryanna remains sleeping as we make our way down the dirt path, around the pond, until we reach a paved road at the opposite side of the property. After a short while it merges with a blacktop road, and in less than ten minutes of winding through country roads, Nick navigates us onto the highway again.

Bryanna is comfortably sprawled beside me, her head nestled on my thigh. I pull the blanket, which is draped against the back of the seat, over her slight frame, pushing the hair that has fallen into her face away. She is so lovely that it’s hard to look away, but I have work to do if we’re going to keep her and her family safe, and that’s what I need to focus on.

“Anyone following us?” I ask Nick, knowing that not seeing anyone to this point is no assurance that they haven’t been.

“We’ve had a team surveilling the place, and no cars have left in pursuit, and our aerial team hasn’t picked up anything either, but we both know that could just be to throw us into a state of complacency. We’ll continue to follow protocol, and if intel doesn’t track a tail on us, we’ll stay in New Orleans until you get info on your guy, and take the jet when you’re ready to head back to Chicago, courtesy of Brian,” Nick says.

Brian Carrington, the most successful steel magnate, controls one of the most sought-after resources in the world. He does it with humility and a passion to ensure little businesses across the globe are taken in under the Carrington umbrella, and that employees and their families are well cared for. A man that has more money than he will ever know what to do with, and yet one of the most compassionate men alive. He and Chase Prestian, both equally wealthy and powerful, are the sole investors in our security company, so this mission is more thanpersonal. Brian has entrusted us with finding the love of his life’s niece, and bringing her back safely is exactly what I intend to do.

“Did you get any word on the images of the men from the club? I’ve got a couple descriptions that I can give you, if we want to run through those while Bryanna sleeps. She may be able to give us more detail a little later,” I say to Nick.

“Nothing yet, but we also sent them to Marenah and her team in the trafficking division.”

I only nod; this isn’t going to be as clean as some of the other jobs we’ve had. The fuckers who were in that club are loaded beyond comprehension. These men throw millions of dollars around like they were ten-dollar bills, and they buy women to do with them as they please, and the man with more money than any of them still wants Bryanna.

Men like that don’t stop. If I don’t take him up on his invitation, he’ll come for her and the man who bested him; it’s just a matter of when and where. If we have a chance in hell of learning his identity, it will be through our intel team, coupled with Marenah and the new trafficking division she put together. When Matt fell for the lovely blonde Russian, no one knew at the time that it would send our team plunging into a world of uncovering trafficking victims. She was on a mission when Matt first met her, and she stole his heart the moment he saw her. It was never going to end in any other way than the entire security team getting behind her passion to save women from that plight.

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