Chapter 3

Becca slipped the mint cigarette from her lips, stomped it out on the concrete, and turned to face me.

The predatory edge in her eyes vanished, replaced instantly by her usual bubbly warmth.

"Let's go," she chirped, grabbing my wrist.

She dragged me past the writhing dance floor toward an unmarked, heavy iron door in the back. A massive bouncer blocked the path.

Becca didn't flinch. She leaned in and rattled off a rapid string of numbers and letters.

The bouncer stepped aside. The heavy deadbolt clicked open.

As the door swung wide, the strobe lights caught a man walking down the dark corridor inside. The harsh slope of his brow. The slight asymmetry of his left eyelid.

Vance. My boss.

He disappeared around the corner before I could blink.

My stomach plummeted. Becca was a junior accountant. We spent our weekends watching Netflix and drinking cheap wine. How did she know the security codes to a place like this? And why hadn't she mentioned Carter calling?

I stopped walking. "Becca, I want to go home."

"You don't have a home anymore, Chloe."

She yanked me forward, stepping through the doorway and kicking the iron door shut behind us.

The deafening bass of the club was instantly muted.

We were standing in a stark, concrete dressing room. Two women with completely hollow eyes stood by a clothing rack. They shoved a hanger into my chest.

It was a black latex bodysuit. Barely three strips of material.

Becca unzipped her dress right in front of me. She strapped herself into a leather corset and thigh-high boots with practiced, chilling efficiency.

I backed up and grabbed the entry door's handle. I twisted it.

Nothing. Locked from the outside.

"Don't make this ugly, Chloe," Becca said. Her voice was entirely flat.

I spun around. She was staring at me like I was a piece of defective furniture.

"What is this?" my voice shook. "Becca, let me out."

"Put the suit on."

"No."

Becca snapped her fingers.

The shadows in the corner shifted. Two heavily muscled guards stepped into the harsh fluorescent light. They moved directly toward me.

"Put it on," Becca repeated, stepping up to my face. "Or they will rip your clothes off. And they won't be gentle about it."

Five minutes later, the two guards flanked me, dragging me down a dimly lit hallway.

The latex suit cut painfully into my skin. My bare thighs dragged against the leather of the VIP booth as they forced me down onto the sofa.

Dozens of wealthy, elderly men in tailored suits occupied the surrounding booths. They held crystal glasses of whiskey, casually turning to look at me.

Their eyes dragged over my exposed skin.

A spotlight snapped on.

Becca walked to the center of a circular stage. She tapped the microphone.

"Ladies and gentlemen," her voice purred through the hidden speakers, echoing across the cavernous room. "Welcome to the seventh anniversary of C&C Bio-Core Tech. Tonight's private auction begins now."

My pulse deafened me.

C&C.

Carter and Chloe?

My mind violently cataloged the last decade. Becca introduced me to Carter in college. Seven years ago.

They didn't just meet. They built this. Seven years of fake friendship. Five years of a fabricated relationship.

The floor split open.

A massive, reinforced glass tank rose from beneath the stage.

I gagged.

A woman floated suspended in the murky green water. She had beautiful blonde hair, but from the waist down, she was a mangled nightmare. Her legs had been amputated. In their place, a long, horrific appendage made of engineered scales and thick, pulsing nerve cords had been surgically fused to her spine.

Thick titanium chains pierced directly through her collarbones, anchoring her to the top of the cage.

She was a living, breathing experiment.

The crowd erupted into applause.

They were showing me this. They didn't care what I saw. Because people who saw this room never walked back out into the real world. I was already a dead woman walking.

"We call her the Bonsai Siren," Becca announced over the roaring bids.

The price climbed in millions. A corpulent Russian man in the front row raised his paddle.

"Sold," Becca smiled.

The Russian walked onto the stage. He didn't look at the woman’s face. He picked up a wireless remote from a silver tray. He pressed the heavy red button.

Electricity violently arced through the water.

The woman thrashed wildly, her silent screams producing frantic bubbles. The chains tore at the flesh of her collarbones. Deep red blood bloomed out, clouding the green liquid.

The men in the booths clapped harder.

I ducked my head behind the table. My fingers desperately scraped under my latex strap, blindly tapping the side button of my Apple Watch. I just needed one bar of Wi-Fi. One SOS signal.

My hands shook so violently I couldn't press the screen.

Even if the police came, they wouldn't stop this. The people in this room owned the police. They owned the city.

The tank lowered back into the floor. The stage cleared.

My terror hit a ceiling and completely shattered, leaving a freezing, unnatural calm in my veins.

Becca gestured to a man in black velvet gloves. He stepped forward carrying an electronic safe. He typed in a passcode. The heavy lid popped open.

He pulled out a silver tray and set it under the spotlight.

A single dark Violet Pearl rested on the velvet cushion.

The ventilation fans kicked on. A strange, hypnotic scent drifted through the room. It was sweet, musky, and uniquely intoxicating.

I stared at the screen above the stage, zooming in on the pearl.

My lungs seized.

It was just like the jewel Carter had been shoving deep inside of me for five years.