TERESA’S POV

They dragged me with them in the opposite direction, leading me down a series of rooms and finally stopping at the door down the hall.

“Esti!!!” Vander knocked on the door. Seconds later the door opened and an older blonde woman with bright red lipstick was standing in front of me.

“Is this her?” she asked, barely glancing at me.

“Yeah Lucian wants her to look very presentable tonight,” Vander replied.

“That will be a bit hard, seeing as you guys have been hitting her face,” she observed, using a hand hold my face as she checked it out.

“Well, Lucian believes you can work your magic,” Vander said to her with a smile.

She sighed and then looked down at me, “I suppose I can,” she replied in a bored tone.

Next thing I know, I was pushed into the room like an object, showered and forced into a short black dress, then sat in front of a dressing table.

“What do you people want from me?” I asked Estelle and her red lips curled in a thin smile.

“You should be grateful that Lucian is kind, he is going to sell you to the highest bidder tonight. If you continue to be foolish, you are going to end up in a far worse fate than you think you are in right now. So, if you value your miserable life, I suggest you shut the hell up and practice your smiles and hope to whatever God you serve that you end up with someone that is kind,” she whispered to me and I bit my lips shut, as tears rolled down my cheeks again.

She began to do my makeup as I willed myself not to cry anymore.

It was funny how I could not think of a fate worse than the one that I was facing right now.

Lucian or whatever his fucking name was, was going to sell my virginity to the highest bidder tonight, like I was a piece of cattle or something, there was absolutely nothing worse than that.

“Done,” she said as she finished, stepping back to observe her work.

I looked at the mirror to find a girl that I didn’t recognize. My long black hair had been curled neatly, and my face felt two shades lighter, with bright red lipstick on my mouth.

My eyes were still red from all the crying when I heard a loud knock on the door.

“Lucian is ready,” I heard Vander’s voice call out.

“Okay, give me a second,” Estelle shouted back.

“Look, if you want to get a good bidder tonight, I advise that you bite back those tears, there are a lot of sick fucks out there and the more you cry, the more you will attract them,” she advised me, her blue eyes boring into mine and I nodded at her silently.

“Good luck Teresa,” she said, leading me to the door. “You are going to need it.”

***

I stayed quiet with Lucian seated beside me as I was driven to an unknown place.

When the car stopped, Vander came to my side, gripping my arm tightly and leading me into a building that looked like a hotel.

“You are going to be on demand tonight,” he teased me cruelly, his breath hot against my ear.

I was led into what looked like a backstage of some sorts, with a large cage in the middle of the room.

“Get in the cage you dog,” Vander yelled, shoving me to the floor.

Tears brimmed my eyes again as I crawled into the cage, and it was locked from outside. The cage was covered with a dark cloth, leaving me alone inside in complete darkness.

What in the hell had I done to deserve this?

I felt the cage move, like it was being pushed, and then it stayed put.

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” I suddenly heard Lucian’s voice announce.

“The moment you have all been waiting for is here, the main prize for tonight has arrived,” he said, and I could hear loud shouts of excitement.

“Here in this cage is the virgin daughter of the man who betrayed us twenty years ago. I present to you all Teresa Ellis,” he yelled, and suddenly, the cloth was pulled off and bright lights shot into my eyes.

I could hear more screams of amusement as my eyes finally adjusted to the lighting.

I was set on a stage, literally a bird in a cage, with Lucian next to me, holding a microphone as he advertised me.

In front of me were over a hundred men, all dressed in suits, most of them yelling angrily, their eyes glinting in appreciation as they looked at me.

“She is the final bid for tonight and she is untouched,” Lucian continued, “a perfect prize for the man who offers the highest amount.”

“Her starting bid is 1000 dollars,” Lucian said, with a small smirk on his lips as I glared at him in hatred.

This bastard was actually going to sell me? Like I was some form of property?

“Do I hear 1500?” he asked as one of the mafia leaders in the room raised his bidding paddle.

“Okay, 1500, how about 2000?” Lucian asked and another man raised his paddle.

“Wow, we have 5000 dollars already from Mr Demetri,” Lucian announced and my stomach sank in fear.

This was actually happening, I was getting sold.

“Sorry guys, but I am buying her,” Demetri announced, a grin revealing his golden tooth. “That Ellis bitch is mine.”

“7000 dollars!!” Lucian shouted excitedly, another person had bid for me.

“The nun is mine!” the latest bidder shouted from the back. “My brother died because of what her father did,” the man shouted, his eyes glinting cruelly as he looked at me.

“Best believe that I will make her pay for her father’s mistake, IN. EVERY. SINGLE. WAY,” he yelled, and the other men yelled in support.

“7000 going, once,” Lucian announced, looking around the room.

“Ah fuck you,” Demetri shouted, raising his paddle. “But I am taking that bitch home with me tonight, you can have her after I am done, not that there will be any part of her left afterwards,” he said with a small smirk on his mouth. A smirk I so desperately wanted to wipe off.

“Okay now we have a surprising offer from Mr Demetri of twenty thousand dollars,” Lucian said, giving me a victorious glance.

Sick bastard, I thought as tears fell down my eyes uncontrollably.

“Twenty thousand going once?” Lucian asked, his voice sounding urgent like he needed someone to up the bid again.

“Going twice?”

“Teresa Ellis has been—” Lucian broke off in stunned silence as his eyes fell on a raised bidding paddle.

In front of him, a man in a black suit had raised his paddle and everyone else in the room went quiet.

“For the shocking price of a hundred thousand dollars, Teresa has been sold!!!” Lucian announced, not seeming as pleased as I would have expected.

I looked back to the man who had just bought me, wondering who he was, when the dark cloth went over my head again.

I was brought out of the cage and led out of the building where a black jeep was parked.

“Better behave yourself with your new owner,” Silco whispered and I braced myself before the car door opened.

The man in the black suit was seated inside and I entered the car, wondering whether I had ended up with someone worse like Estelle had warned.

“Who are you?” I asked him boldly, the worst he could do was to hit me right?

The man turned, surprising me by giving me an amused look. “I am a messenger and let’s just say that you made an impression on someone very powerful.”

Someone powerful? Who the could that be?

As the car drove, I found myself praying to a God that I had no longer served, that whoever it was, he wasn’t going to be as bad as Lucian.

Maybe if my new owner was kind, I could accept my fate somehow.

The car finally slowed down as we drove inside a gated compound.

“Get down,” the man instructed and I stepped out of the car immediately, taking in the scene in front of me.

The house was magnificent, it seemed like the kind of houses I would see in movies, from the perfectly tiled pavement to the dark blue building with black roofs overheating. But as stunning as it looked, I could not help but feel like it was not only my new home, but probably my new prison.

Armed men stood around the house. From the black gate to the large brown door I was led to.

“Welcome to your new home, Violet,” the man said with a smile as we entered the house.

Violet? Did he just call me Violet?

That wasn’t possible, because that was the name I had given Dante that night at the club. It wasn’t possible unless Dante was behind all this somehow.

“Who bought me?” I asked him immediately, my heart racing in panic. “Who is your boss?”

“If I didn’t know better, I would say that you are really excited to see me,” I suddenly heard a man call from behind.

I turned back to see the man that had haunted my dreams for the past month in the flesh - Stefano Dante standing in front of me with a relaxed smile on his face.

“Did you miss me, Violet?”