That had been the first night she’d felt the spray of blood on her face, a bullet-hole gaping through the head of the man who’d been about to undress her. She had frozen on the spot, her eyes going out the window to the silhouette of a man moving in the building opposite, and she had known it was him.
Lyla watched the shadowed corners as Fifteen in the present leaned down to kiss the side of her neck while tugging at her breasts openly in auction room. The corners were empty but that meant nothing. She knew better now.
He was watching. He was always watching.
She’d learned that the second time she’d been auctioned, and the two men who took her home for a week both found themselves strangled with a barbed wire on the first night while she’d used the bathroom. She'd come out to see him placing a black eternal rose on the countertop, along with a set of clothes she could change into, his mismatched eyes locking with hers before he'd left. The rose, the prettiest thing she had ever seen, all black and frozen in time, had been the first gift she remembered receiving, the clothes the softest fabric to touch her skin. She had taken them both with her.
It had happened again the third time in a sex club, and the fourth, and the fifth, and again and again until she and the rest of the organizers knew—anyone who bid on her died. Yet, she brought in big money so she was put on the stage again and again, and he was there every time to take them out.
It had taken her a while to understand it was most likely game for him. A man who cared wouldn’t have left her standing there naked, ready to be bought.
And yet, she stood there, worthless, discarded, unclaimed.
She shuddered as the black hole in her mind opened, beckoning her, calling her to fall into it and forget everything else, let everything about her existence be crushed out until nothing remained of herself.
The man’s tongue touched her neck, and revulsion settled in the pit of her stomach, her hatred of her body intensifying as the black hole got closer and she hurtled toward it. Fifteen wouldn’t care if she was catatonic, he wouldn’t care if she wasn’t there as long as her body was. But it had been years since someone had completely used her and she couldn’t understand how this middle-aged monster got so close.
Where was he?
“Sir, you have to clear the balance before you can sample.” The voice from the side, one of the auctioneers, cut through. The groping man straightened, giving her a moment of relief to collect herself.
Lyla took a step back, inhaling to control the spiral her thoughts were going toward, knowing she would lose herself if she went in, but it was a struggle to resist.
The man handed a wad of cash to the auctioneer, and Lyla surveyed the club again, trying to see if the devil was there.
He wasn’t.
Swallowing down the bitter disappointment, she tried to come up with a way she could get out of the night mostly intact.
“Let’s go, sweetheart.” Fifteen settled his arm around her waist and she looked at the wedding band on his finger, wondering if his wife knew he was out with the intention of fucking a girl half his age. But it was none of her business. They dug their graves, and she felt no remorse when they fell into it.
As they made their way outside, her heart began to pound.
Outside.
She loved the outside.
But she didn’t see it, not much. Growing up, her childhood and teenage years had been spent in special training houses. Some had been underground, some above, but they had always been confined within, her bed in the basement with the other kids. Now, she lived in a dormitory of other girls, in a complex that was large and heavily protected, but they weren’t allowed to go outside without reason and escort. That was one of the only reasons she looked forward to the auction, because if someone won her, she would get some respite for a moment outside, feel the wind and see the sky, if only for a brief moment.
The man led her out the backdoor of the club into the alley that opened into the parking lot.
“Stay here while I get my car,” Fifteen instructed her. “I don’t have to tell you what will happen if you try to run, do I?”
She shook her head. She knew what they did to those who ran. Her only other friend had run away when they’d been children, and she knew to this day they were hunting her. The Syndicate, the organization who owned all the slaves, did not let anyone escape. She had run one time too, and she'd been caught. And she had experienced first-hand what they did to those who ran.
Shoving the memory away, she stayed where she was. At her easy acquiescence, he smiled and left.
Standing alone at the edge of the alley behind the building, Lyla turned her neck up for the glimpse of the night sky, her heart heavy at seeing nothing but the dark. She knew the stars weren’t visible in the city some nights, she’d just hoped they would be. It had been too long since she had seen them, and too little in her short but hard life. But there was nothing tonight, no moon, no stars, just endless black littered by gray smoke and clouds.