I couldn’t get the image of her out of my head—first, the little girl she’d been, dragged from one hell to the next. First my sick father, then hers.

And then the young woman—the woman I’d ripped away from one hell only to thrust her into yet another. Had she ever known peace, or anything close to it? If she had, she never would again with the future I’d laid out for her.

But what the fuck was I supposed to do? The deal had been made. Marcos had finalized it two days ago. And selling a slave wasn’t like selling a car. There was no changing your mind at the last minute—not unless you wanted to lose all credibility, irrevocably. And it wasn’t just my reputation on the line. It was Marcos’ reputation as well. I owed the man everything. My life. I couldn’t do that to him. And even if I was selfish enough to do it, all for some ridiculous feeling for the girl, he wouldn’t allow it. Not for her, and not even for me. I had no choice but to hand her over.

I could take her and run. The idea held appeal, but how far would we get? Marcos would hunt her down to complete the transaction. And he would hunt me down for the betrayal.

There were no options. No way out. All I could do was keep with the plan and make sure she was as well-trained as possible. That way, she’d suffer less under her new master.

Anger jolted through me at the thought of another man touching her, tasting her. It surprised me. I’d never cared about a girl enough to be the jealous type. But when I thought of her body responding to another man in the same way it had responded to me…I wanted to commit murder. I wanted to rip him apart limb from limb, and I’d take pleasure in every second of it.

Fuck!—what had I gotten myself into? She was just another girl, another slave. I’d trained a multitude of them and never once cared about another man touching them. Why now? Why this one?

Because she was different. I’d known it all along. Her uniqueness, her fight, and her fire…they had appealed to me from the beginning. I’d just never imagined those things would make me want to keep her for myself. But god damn it, that’s what I wanted. What was even more fucked up was I didn’t just want the obedient slave. I wanted Scarlett.

But I couldn’t fucking have her.

Fuck it, I thought as something snapped inside and I strode back inside the house. Maybe I couldn’t keep her. Maybe for her own good, I would have to hand her over. But she was going to be mine. Mine!

I was going to make her mine. And I knew it wouldn’t be against her will. No, I didn’t want her that way. I wasn’t going to rape her. I was going to fuck her. I was going to tease and tempt her hot, little body until she was begging for it, and then I would make her mine.

It was a crazed plan born of anger and lust and possessiveness, one with ramifications I refused to even consider at the moment.

I stormed through the house as all the blood in my body drained to my cock. By the time I reached the door to her room, I was already throbbing painfully. I flung open the door…

…and then I froze.

It took a full second to compute what the fuck was going on. I’d been so caught up in what was about to happen that the scene in front of me seemed unreal, a figment of my crazed imagination. But it was real. Too fucking real.

Marcos’ whip came down across her back and she screamed. The sound was nothing like the times I’d spanked her, even with the belt. It was filled with agony, and there were none of the signs of the lust that had wound through her body when I disciplined her. Only agony. It reached inside me and squeezed hard around my heart.

I didn’t remember crossing the room, but I had, and I was grabbing the whip out of Marcos’ hand.

He had her shackled to the bedpost, and the angry red lines that crisscrossed the milky white skin of her back told me he’d only just gotten started. Five, no six of them. But he was just getting warmed up because only a few of them had broken skin. If I hadn’t gotten there, I could tell by the anger in his eyes that she’d done something to rile him, and he intended to teach her a lesson—a bloody lesson.

If I hadn’t come back…if I hadn’t foolishly decided to fuck the girl I had no business fucking…my stomach churned thinking of what he would have done to her.

I looked back and forth between them, knowing I wasn’t supposed to kill him, but fighting the urge every second.

And then my stomach did more than churn. It threatened to expel everything in it. Looking back and forth between them…it couldn’t be.

But it was. I don’t know how the fuck I’d missed it, but it was clear as day now. Her hair, her eyes, her nose…they belonged to her mother. The shape of her face, the jut of her stubborn jaw, the tiny birthmark just below her ear…they came from her father….the man standing behind her…Marcos.

“Get out,” I seethed, knowing instantly he was not unaware of the similarities between them. He knew. He knew she was his daughter, and he’d planned on whipping her, and god only knew what else.

“How dare you,” Marcos seethed back as I unshackled her wrists and pulled her against me.

It was wrong the way she clung to me. I’d hurt her, too. She should be trying to flee both the monsters in the room, but she wasn’t. She was holding onto me for dear life as if she knew I’d protect her.

I would, at least right now. I couldn’t undo what I’d done to her, but I could keep Marcos’ hands—and his whip—off her.

His own daughter. His own fucking daughter. He ‘d had me train her as a slave. He was going to sell her. What the fuck was wrong with him?

“You know, don’t you?” I asked him, already knowing the answer.

He smiled, unperturbed. “Of course I know. What I don’t know is when you started to care so much about a product? She is a means to an end, Derek, and nothing more.”

“Whose end? If you know she’s your daughter, not Donovan’s—and I presume you’ve known all along—whose vengeance were you after?”

“What difference does it make to you? Donovan will die—that’s all that matters to you, isn’t it?”

“And how do you benefit, Marcos?” I asked though I was beginning to figure it out on my own.

“She’s the product of a whore, a woman who not only fucked behind her husband’s back but dared to run off on me. Every bit of her—including her child—must be destroyed. I knew when I found you that one day you would be useful to me, that your own bitter pursuit would aid me in one way or another. And you have not disappointed me, Derek. Not until now, at least.”

All this time, it had never been for me. He’d said when he had found me, he’d seen strength in me, a strength that he admired, and for that he’d chosen to rescue me and give me a better life, to raise me as a son. But I had been nothing more than a tool, something he could groom and then use for whatever best served his purpose.

“Now, I was not finished with her, Derek. Give her back, and if you are still so inclined, you may have her when I’m done. But you have been lax with her, and if I have to punish her for your shortcomings, then so be it.”

He reached out to grab Scarlett, and I let out a growl that didn’t sound human even to me. He eyed me warily, but seemed to retreat, dropping his hand to his side. But still reeling in shock, I must have been off my game because I didn’t respond fast enough when he raised the whip and started to bring it down, aiming at Scarlett’s exposed flesh.

I spun around just in time to take the blow. It should have stung, but I didn’t feel it. When he’d raised the whip to hit her, suddenly I was angrier than I’d ever been in my life—and I’d spent a lot of time angry.

I pushed her down on the bed and spun around to face him. “You will let her go, Marcos. I don’t give a fuck what you had planned, you will find a way to undo it.” He wasn’t going to. I knew it before the words were out, but I had to give him the chance. Whatever his reasons, he’d rescued me from hell. He might have helped turn me into a bigger monster than the ones I’d known, but I’d let him. I owed him this, even if I knew there was no way in hell he was going to take it.

“You’re upset, I understand that, Derek. And I will forgive you for it. But you will give me back my merchandise. Like you, I’ve waited a long time for my revenge.”

Listening to him now, I realized how foolish I had been. I’d agreed to this plan, thinking that it would appease my soul, that it would somehow make up for what had been done to me. Both of us thinking we could use this girl, destroy her, to make up for wrongs that she never committed. We both deserved to die for what we’d done.

Unfortunately, today, only one of us would pay that debt.

“Let her go, Marcos,” I warned him one last time.

He raised the whip again, and I knew in that split second, no matter what I said or what I did, he would never relent. If I left with her now, he would hunt us down. He’d never stop, not until I was dead and she was in hell. I deserved it…Scarlett didn’t.

I lunged at him and reached up at the same time. I had his head between my hands, and without a moment’s hesitation, I jerked, hard and fast, and his neck snapped with a stomach-turning crack. Such a small sound for what it signified.

I released him, the man who had been a friend, almost a father, for more than a decade, and he fell to the ground. His lifeless eyes stared up at me and my breath lodged in my throat. He was dead.

But I’d had no choice. Or, I’d had a choice, and the decision had been clear. Protect Scarlett. It was all that had mattered at that moment, and I would not regret it.

It didn’t make up for what I’d done to her—I’d never be able to do that—but I would protect her.

I turned away from him to look at her. She was still on her side on the bed, right where she’d landed. She hadn’t moved an inch since I’d pushed her down there, and her face seemed frozen in an expression that worried me—terror, pain, stunned disbelief.

Even when I approached her, she didn’t move. Even her eyes remained fixed where they’d been, staring at Marcos’ dead body. Her father’s dead body. The conversation between him and I from just moments before replayed in my head and a tiny bit of guilt crept in. I’d killed her father right in front of her, not even minutes after she’d found out he was her father.

But in that way, I’d had no choice. If I hadn’t done what I did right then, there was no telling when, or even if, the opportunity would present itself again. It didn’t matter that she was his daughter. He didn’t care. He would have tortured her just the same, maybe more so.

“I’m sorry, Scar,” I said, the first apology I’d made my entire adult life feeling strange on my tongue.

My voice seemed to jar her into the moment and she looked up at me warily.

“Why did you do that?” she asked.

“He wouldn’t have stopped,” I explained, hoping she’d understand without me having to spell it out for her.

“But why? I’m just…a thing to you,” she said as fresh tears cascaded down her cheeks.

It wasn’t Marcos that had her so distraught, and that shouldn’t have surprised me. Every father figure she’d ever known had been a monster. The connection meant nothing to her. But what she was asking wasn’t any easier. I had no idea how to explain why I’d done what I did; why I’d been happy to view her as a thing no so long ago but now, she was the furthest thing from it. I had words for it because it was something I’d never experienced before.

So I did the only thing I could do—I ignored it. There was no sense in trying to explain something to her when I didn’t understand it myself.

“Lay down on your stomach,” I told her gently.

She looked up at me, confused, her eyes still filled with tears.

“We have to leave, and when we do, it will be a long time before we can stop. You’re going to be…the welts…” Why the hell was I suddenly having such a difficult time communicating? It irritated me. “Lay down,” I said, more harshly than I’d intended, but this time she scrambled to comply.

I retrieved the cold cream from the bathroom—the one that few slaves ever got, medicated as it was to numb the pain. And I tried not to look at the angry welts on her back when I returned. Why they bothered me so much, I didn’t know. I’d left marks on her skin, and handprints, and seeing them had turned me on. They still did when I thought about it. But the long, thin, bloody lashes across her back now, they made me angry. I wished I could revive Marcos just to kill him again for hurting her.

Ignoring my own hypocrisy, I sat down at the edge of the bed and rubbed the cream into her skin. She sucked in her breath and more tears tumbled down her when I started to rub, but the cream began to do its work quickly. She let out the breath she’d been holding and the tears began to subside. Her body began to relax beneath my fingers.

I lingered for a moment longer than I should have, massaging in small circles on her back. I wasn’t ready to stop touching her, and besides, I needed that minute to solidify the plan that had begun to take shape the moment I’d opened the door and found Marcos whipping her.

It wasn’t a good plan, at least not on the scale of anything that worked out for me, but it was the right thing to do. I couldn’t let her go back to the life she’d known before I’d interfered. There was too much risk that she would be taken again. It wasn’t like she had much of a life to go back to, even if I could offer her that.

Since I couldn’t though, the only option was to take her someplace she’d be safe. A new identity, far away from her previous life—I could give her that. I’d have to hope neither her absence nor Marcos’, was noticed until I returned. But assuming my luck held out, it wouldn’t be difficult to stage their deaths, making it look like his car had been rigged to explode by an enemy while he was transporting his most recent slave. It would work, but I had to move fast. The moment their absences were noticed, the plan was fucked.

Now all I had to do was get her out of the house without raising suspicions. There was only one way to do it—and she wasn’t going to like it one bit.

“I need you to do something you’re not going to want to do,” I told her.

She scoffed. OK, so making her do things she didn’t want to do wasn’t exactly new, but it was different now. I helped her to sit up as I tried to choose my words. She moved easily, meaning the cream had done its job.

“The only way to get you out of here is to take you right out the front door.” So far the plan didn’t sound too bad, right? “But you will have to be the perfect slave.” Yeah—that was the catch. “There is no other way you would have been allowed to leave this room.”

She nodded, but I could tell she didn’t have the slightest clue what it meant.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked again.

I still didn’t have a clear answer for her. “Because…because the other option isn’t an option anymore.”

Again she nodded, but it seemed to settle nothing in her mind. But it would have to wait. There wasn’t time.

“All right, we have to go,” I said and stood, moving to a section of the wall and pressing down on the wainscoting. A panel opened up in the wall and I reached inside. She was trying to look past me to see what was in there, but I blocked her view. It was just better if she didn’t.

As I approached her though, her eyes widened—not that I could blame her. I hadn’t gotten to preparing her for this part.

“There’s no other way, Pet,” I said, brushing across her cheek with my free hand, hoping it would somehow do something to calm her.

She didn’t look calm, but she did look resigned. So, I went to work, fastening the collar I’d retrieved around her throat and fastening it to a leash.

“Stand up,” I told her and she complied, though she kept her eyes on the other items I’d placed on the bed.

When she was standing in front of me, I picked them up and attached a small, metal clamp to each of her nipples. She squeaked in response, but she remained still. There was a long, thin chain that ran between the clamps, and one more that ran straight down to one final clamp. I knelt down in front of her and she gasped when I fastened it onto her clit.

Necessary or not, she looked so fucking hot. The last thing I wanted to do was walk her out through the house for every patron there to see. Mine!—a voice growled in my head, but I ignored it. She wasn’t mine, and if all things went as planned, she never would be.

So, instead of doing what I wanted to be doing to her, I blocked it out. “Kneel, Pet,” I instructed, and she went down on her knees, making it even more difficult to keep my thoughts in check. “You will remain on your knees. You will crawl, and keep your head down at all times.”

She looked panicked, ready to bolt.

“You can do this, Scar. You have to do this.”

It took her a moment, but she nodded. She mouthed the word ‘OK’ but no sound came out. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quite done.

“No matter what you see, and no matter what happens, you must behave. Eyes down, and no emotion. No lashing out.”

Now her whole body was trembling. This wasn’t going to work if she couldn’t rein it in. I reached down, running my fingers through her hair. It helped, but it wasn’t enough. I crouched down in front of her and leaned in. “You can do this. I will protect you. I won’t let anyone hurt you,” I whispered before I leaned in further and covered her lips with mine.

By the time I pulled away, she wasn’t trembling anymore. She was definitely calmer, and it was almost baffling to think that after all I’d done to her, she believed me. She trusted that I would protect her.

I stood back up and gathered the end of her leash in my hand. “Stay beside me or behind me. Never in front.” And then I started forward, not giving her mind a chance to work her back up into a nervous frenzy.

At the door, she hesitated just before crossing the threshold, nearly back-stepping into the room, but she got herself under control this time and followed me out. I locked the door behind me, comforted to know the only other key to the room was in the room with Marcos’ body.

The walk down the hall was quiet and she did well, keeping up despite the noises up ahead. But there was no show in the grand room this evening, which was a good thing. Seeing some of the things that Marcos arranged as entertainment—whippings, triple-hole assaults, and even bestiality if it appealed to the crowd—might send her over the edge.

Tonight though, there were only private groups scattered around the room. A slave on her knees, going down on her master; a pair of men going at another slave from both ends—all relatively mundane for this house.

She paused as we entered the room nevertheless, and I could see her taking in the various scenes, though she did well, remembering to keep her head down. I had to yank discreetly on her chain to get her moving, while the sick fuck I wished I’d attached the leash directly to the clamps instead of the collar. It made me jerk with arousal to think of tugging on those chains and watching her body with its unique response to pleasure and pain.

Once moving, it wasn’t long before we had to stop again.

“Good evening, Derek,” one of Marcos’ patrons greeted me and I shook his hand, keeping my body loose, feigning an ease I didn’t feel.

“Hello, Vincent. Are you enjoying yourself this evening?”

“I was until I saw this beauty,” He motioned to Scarlett and then leaned into stroke her back and along the curve of her ass. One more second, and I feared I wasn’t going to be able to stop myself from breaking the man’s hand. Fortunately, he had the sense to remove the offending hand before I had the chance.

“She really is something. I’d like to have her for a while,” he said, fully expecting me to hand her over.

It was going to seem strange when I didn’t, but Vincent wasn’t interested in just touching the merchandise. He had an anal fetish, and he preferred the slaves dry so he could make them bleed. And there was no fucking way I was letting him do that to her. If anyone got to fuck her tight, little ass hole, it was going to be me. And I had no interest in making her bleed. Scream—yes, in pleasure, not the kind of pain Vincent liked to subject the slaves too.

“I’m afraid Scarlett isn’t available this evening, but Marcos always has an abundance of slaves who would be happy to accommodate you.”

He looked displeased, irritated over being deprived of what he wanted, and his hand returned to her ass, skimming between her cheeks this time, no doubt seeking out the hole he’d been planning to use.

It was either time to leave or kill him. And I could tell by the way Scar’s body had stiffened, I had seconds to go out of there or else I might as well kill him. It would draw no less attention than the scene she was about to cause.

“Tomorrow night. I’ll let Marcos know you’ve reserved her,” I said and then yanked on her chain and walked away without giving Vincent a chance to reply.

She followed eagerly, but I could feel the tension in her and the tiny sniffling noises she made that meant she was trying desperately to hold back tears. Just one more minute—assuming we didn’t run into anyone else.

I actually breathed a sigh of relief when we reached the door to the yard. It was less conspicuous than going out the front door. It wasn’t uncommon for some of the patrons to take the slaves out in the yard to make them defecate on the lawn. Where that got fun, I had no idea, but then again, one might say my fetishes wandered outside the realm of normal, too.

Once outside, I was pleased to find there was no one else around. I led her around the yard to the garage, used my key to get in, and then hurried her over to my car. I opened the trunk and then helped her to her feet. She looked at the open trunk warily.

“No one can see me leaving with you. Once we’re past the guards, I’ll let you out.”

She nodded and even went climbing in, but the movement tugged on the chains between her clamps. She froze and squealed in response, making my cock jerk in my pants.

I leaned down to release the clamp on her clit and couldn’t help but watch the expression on her face as blood rushed back into the sensitive nub all at once. And I also couldn’t resist the urge to rub her, just for a minute, just until her hips started to writhe and a tiny moan escaped her lips.

I released her then and helped her to climb in the trunk, though I left the nipple clamps on her—because that was just the kind of twisted man I was. Besides, they looked so fucking sexy on her. What guy would have been quick to take them off?

I closed the trunk after one last look and then slid behind the wheel. I made it past the guards without a hitch and drove for a few miles just to be safe. When I pulled over on the side of the road and opened the trunk to let her out, I’d expected to find she’d taken the clamps off on her own.

She hadn’t.

I swallowed hard and helped her out. I took the clamps off then, but as I released one and then the other, I sucked her nipple into my mouth, feeling the arousal coursing through her body in response to both sensations.

As tempted as I was to linger, we were nowhere near out of the woods yet. I grabbed the spare shirt I kept in the trunk and handed it to her. She clasped it awkwardly but made no move to put it on. I’d kept her naked for so long, apparently, she didn’t quite believe I was telling her to cover up now. It really was a shame to cover up that body—and if we ended up getting pulled over, no doubt that body could get us out of any speeding ticket. Still, I didn’t relish the idea of sharing it—even the sight of her sexy curves—with anyone.

So, I took the shirt from her and held it out, nodding for her to slip her arms into the sleeves. She remained still while I fastened the buttons. I was already anxiously awaiting the moment I could rip the shirt off her.

But then it hit me. There was no moment. If I went through with my plan—which I had every intention of doing—the glimpse I’d gotten of her before I’d buttoned up the shirt was the last glimpse I was going to get. When we got where we were going, I’d be leaving her there. Alone. And I wasn’t going to see her, or her hot body, ever again.

Damn, I really didn’t care for the strange way the thought made my chest ache and my eyes sting. It was unfamiliar and unwelcome.

And I had a job to do. That’s what this was now. Not the job I was used to, but a job nonetheless. I was going to make sure she was safe. It was all that mattered. Somehow, at some point, making sure no one could ever hurt her again—the way both her father and I had—it became the most important thing in the world. All I had to do was get her to where we were going and leave her there. Just walk away. It was easy.

So why the hell did it feel like the hardest thing I’d ever done?