As it turned out, Dean’s plan wasn’t as messed up as she thought, considering how brilliantly it worked.
Kasper had managed to trace the email addresses and hack into them, finding out that while they didn’t respond to Mrs. Cortez’s message, they responded to Peter’s: long conversations that included shipments, requests, lists of other individual buyers and lists of all the auction dates that they needed to be ready for. It was all so organized, with the emails untraced to any particular physical address, leaving Kasper with more digging to do.
But there was a shipment request for the next day, to be delivered to the same area that Dean had found Peter and Paul in. He’d cleaned that area up before he’d staggered into Indigo’s bar, but Jack and Kasper wanted to re-check any evidence that would point to them, saying they would handle that end and foil whoever came out of the portal next. They would also be the ones handling the other individual buyers.
That was the only thing Indigo got before she was blindfolded, gagged and “imprisoned” all over again as they boarded a ferry, and all communication with the two shifters was cut off. It had been decided by everyone that earpieces shouldn’t be brought, at risk that they’d be found out. This was, after all, just a surveillance mission for now.
But they did bring one special phone that wouldn’t lose reception, which Dean kept safe and would only use if needed.
That was it.
To Indigo’s surprise, the ferry ride didn’t take long. Dean’s hands lifted her up personally from her spot sitting on the wooden deck, and she was carried over his shoulder again as if she weighed nothing. Her heart beat too fast and roared in her ears at each step he took out of the ferry and what seemed like solid ground, but a part of her knew it wasn’t just the journey.
Dean made her nervous—not his attitude itself, but his quiet comfort every time he handled her a little too roughly. She knew the roughness was all for show, but he seemed to feel bad, anyway, as evident every time he did subtle movements to assure her that he wasn’t going to harm her—a gentle pat on the back, a quick rub on the elbow. It was little things, but it was things that gave her a glimpse of the actual lion shifter beneath the arrogant façade he put up.
Oh, he was still arrogant, but he had a heart.
Whatever arrogant attitude he had, it was increased to the max as he interacted with the people in the area they were taken to, introducing himself and his role in this before he was ushered somewhere. Indigo was separated from him and kept in a cage, where her chains, blindfold, and gag were finally removed for her to get a glimpse of the place they were taken in.
It was a forest, one filled with pine trees and surrounded by sea. From a distance, she could see one of the piers in New York, shocking her into the realization that they were actually close by. That was the only thing she managed to see before her cage was taken deeper inside the trees and attached to a set of other cages that housed creatures she’d only seen in the marketplace before.
The cage beside her housed a vampire, one who didn’t know how to speak English and looked bored with everything. He was tall, thin and very pale, sporting dark, greasy hair that had seen better days. He sat in his corner and closed his eyes, hissing from time to time when humans passed them by and delivered a few more prisoners in. She took count of them all, noted the intervals of people coming and going. Then she just sat back and waited, knowing there was nothing else to do.
The hours passed, and she internalized all her worries as she tried getting the vampire to talk to her. It was almost impossible to communicate at first until she realized that while he didn’t know English, he did know something else.
Sign language.
She used that to her advantage, telling him to hang on and kill if he had to but to spare innocent humans. He agreed but lamented over how hungry he was because they fed him just one glass of blood a day. It was the equivalent of feeding a human a bag of chips a day—basically akin to teasing until the hunger just gnawed.
Indigo didn’t have much time to interact further as a couple of the human guards suddenly crowded in front of her and opened the cage. She’d bet Dean had told them something about her magic being effectively stifled for now, as evident by the fact that they didn’t take the metal bracelet acting as a “stifler” off her wrist. But they obviously didn’t want to take any chances, as they injected her with something that had her feeling relaxed. They guided her out of the cage and took her deeper into the forest, where she found a log cabin and guards posted outside. She was told to shower and dress up, and she did so, donning the outfit provided for her with a grimace.
The clothes covered as much as they revealed, as the garment was made of strings that resembled a bikini but sparkled even more brightly with gems. They gave her a crown to wear, and she pretended to protest at first before she eventually walked out of the cabin with her head high.
In response, she was practically dragged to another cabin—a larger one this time, housing so many hallways and rooms that boasted sliding doors and thin, Japanese-like windows. She supposed it was to make most transactions visible or nothing untoward happen inside, as evident from the human guards roaming every now and then.
It was a small ring, but it was a highly organized one, worrying Indigo if they had enough manpower to break it up. Before she could think about it further, she was taken into one of the rooms, which was dimly-lit and housed five men dressed in formal clothes.
One of the men was Dean.
His eyes were on her, skimming her from head to toe in that quiet manner of his that had her heart beating too fast again. His golden eyes were gone, replaced by ordinary brown from her spell, and his scars guaranteed his face was the farthest thing from handsome. But it didn’t matter, because what she saw in her mind was still Dean.
She saw concern flicker before it was gone, and a lecherous grin was on his mouth as he now eyed her smugly.
The Peter mask was on.
“Gentlemen, meet Indigo. She refuses to state her last name to me, but that doesn’t matter. I have a certain set of commands I want to show to you, so you can better see what she’s capable of. Indigo, come walk slowly and greet everyone nicely.”
Indigo did as instructed, pretending to be all tense about it before eventually submitting to the metal bracelet’s command. She walked closer, making a show of bowing and murmuring a good evening to everyone before she straightened her shoulders. She eyed them one by one, smiling pleasantly, then turned her smile expectantly towards Dean.
He smiled back, as if extremely satisfied. Then he gestured for her to come closer and pointed at a corner table, where arrays of food were found.
“Serve us, Indigo.”
She did as instructed, serving them and feeling her stomach grumble, indicating that she hadn’t eaten since they departed. But she behaved, sitting in front of them and watching them attentively as if it was the most enjoyable thing to do. Eventually, Dean ordered her to eat, too, and she settled for the leftover bread and rice available and washed it down with water. A few sips later, Dean was clapping his hands once and calling her attention.
“Great job, Indigo. Gentlemen, Indigo here also has the magic to seduce humans with song—enough to empty their pockets of their riches, as I’m sure our host has told you all already.” He proceeded to regale them with stories of how Indigo did the same to multiple high-class parties, leaving her very rich before he went ahead and stopped her stealing streak. He offered to show them how, already hailing a hand up.
One of the men, a middle-aged guy with graying hair and eyes that looked a little bit too greedy, held up a hand in interruption.
“I’m already rich, and I don’t need her to bring me money,” he bragged. He eyed her up and down deliberately. “I’d rather she seduce me.”
The audacity of the order made her want to slap him, but she stifled the urge. Dean was shaking his head.
“That would make it entirely too pleasurable, wouldn’t it? She hasn’t been sold yet, so I’m afraid you can’t sample the goods.”
“Fine,” the man grumbled. His eyes narrowed as they zoned in on Dean. “Then why don’t you order her to seduce you? Unless it’s all for show and serving food is all your hag can do.”
That threw them in a stump—and Dean knew it. He leaned back in his chair as if readying himself.
Then he said the words that made her want to slap him instead.
“Alright. Indigo, you heard the man. Come seduce me.”
She glared at him, an impulse. Then Indigo took a deep, inward breath, knowing he was just doing what needed to be done—and she needed to do her part.
Slowly, she walked towards him, ignoring the four other men who were staring eagerly and sitting back to enjoy the show. Those watchful eyes were what kept her moving, swaying her hips as she did so and dancing to an invisible beat that spoke of one intention.
She stopped in front of Dean, let her eyes gleam. She licked her bottom lip and leaned down.
“As you wish,” she whispered.
Then she made a show of sitting on his lap, to the men’s collective intake of breaths.
It was disgusting, to say the least—that this would the first thing in their minds when hags were obviously so much more than sex objects. But they were the most basic of men, and nothing in their wealth could have hidden that at all.
Angry, frustrated, Indigo continued her dance, tracing her hands all over Dean’s body before touching the scarred face in front of her. She made pleasant murmurs, bit her bottom lip again, and leaned forward to press her chest against his. She even made a show of lightly pressing her lips against his jaw, tracing the path with light skims of her tongue.
And then something happened that almost stopped her in her tracks, something that shocked her to her core and beyond.
His scent got to her, a mixture of pure, warm male and musk. The taste of his skin even got to her, lightly salty, just as warm as he felt.
And she began to enjoy it.
The thought should have stopped her from moving, but it didn’t. Instead, she moved now with vigor, letting instinct guide her until she was dancing again—on his lap, her butt touching his lower half. His hand went to her back, a firm touch that sent tingles up her spine. Then the tingles intensified, became hot spurts that shot straight down her core until she was throbbing in between her legs.
In response to it, she moaned. Then she ground harder against him, a frenzied movement that only sent fire all over her. Her ears roared, and she could only hear the dim cheers of the men now as they goaded her to do more—to strip and to tease Dean in front of them.
Belatedly, her mind realized what it was. In horror, she understood that the injection wasn’t just to subdue her magic.
It was to make sure she did things well today.