Page 23 of The Kingpin’s Bride

The stairwell smelled like old cooking oil and cigarette smoke. My hands shook so hard I missed the keyhole twice before the lock finally turned. I shoved the door closed behind me, threw the deadbolt, and slid down to the floor with my back against the wood. My lungs burned. Somewhere under the panic I could feel the cold ghost line of Dario’s knife against my skin and the stranger’s quiet voice telling me to leave.

The apartment was small. One room that served as everything. Two mattresses on the floor with the sheets I kept clean even when everything else felt filthy. A narrow kitchenette with a single working burner. A bathroom the size of a closet where the shower never got properly hot. I had tried to make it less ugly. A cheap curtain over the window. A chipped mug with dried flowers I had found on the sidewalk. A stack of library books I no longer had time to read.

It was the best I could do with money I never actually held. Every dollar from the club went straight to Dario. Men he paid came by twice a week to check that I was here, obedient, too afraid to disappear. Running had never been a real option. Camilla was the leash, and my stepfather held it tightly.

I stayed on the floor until my breathing slowed. Then I forced myself up and stepped into the shower. The water never got hot. When I stepped out I didn’t look in the mirror. I pulled on an old white shirt, sat on the mattress, and stared at the locked door like it might open on its own.

I thought of the stranger. I’d finally met him.

Broader through the shoulders than Dario, but in a clean, controlled way. Dark hair. The kind of face that looked like it had been carved by something sharp and patient. Tattoos covering the backs of his hands and climbing his forearms, more ink visible at his throat when his collar shifted. He had walked into that room like he owned the air in it. No raised voice. No wasted movement. Just cold certainty and the quiet violence of the way he had turned Dario’s own knife against him. He was handsome in a way that felt dangerous. The kind of handsome that made my stomach drop and my pulse kick even while I was terrified. I did not understand why the memory of him made heat pool low in my body.

I lay back on the mattress and stared at the ceiling. My hand slid under the shirt, then lowered almost without my permission. I was wet. That fact alone sent a fresh wave of shame through me. I had touched myself before, late at night when the apartment was quiet and the need got too sharp to ignore. Always the same careful way. Fingers on my clit, slow circles, never anything more. I had protected the last untouched part of myself like it was the only proof I belonged to myself.

Tonight the usual touch was not enough.

I wanted pressure. I wanted fullness. I wanted something that matched the intensity of the man who had looked at me over Dario’s shoulder and told me to leave like it was an order I had been waiting for.

My fingers pressed harder against my clit. My hips lifted. The image of him would not leave. The tattoos. The cold eyes. The way he had held the knife without hesitation.

A broken sound escaped my throat. I was so close.

Then Dario’s voice cut through the haze, ugly and clear in my memory.

You’re going on the block.

A documented virgin.

That tight little virgin cunt.

My hand stilled.

My virginity was the only thing I had left that had not been taken or sold or used as leverage. It was the reason the auction would bring a higher price. It was the last scrap of myself that felt like my own. If I broke it now, alone on a mattress in the dark, I would be giving away the final piece on my own terms, and somehow that felt stupider than anything Dario had threatened.

I kept my fingers outside. I did not push inside. I worked my clit in tight, desperate circles and let the orgasm build until it crashed over me in a wave and I started gasping against the pillow. The stranger’s face was the only thing I saw while it happened.

Tall. Tattooed. Cold. Watching me like he had decided I belonged to him.

When it was over, the guilt arrived.

I curled onto my side and pressed my face into the sheet. Shame burned through me hot and thick. I had come thinking about a man whose name I did not even know while the man who owned my sister planned to sell me in three weeks.

I had protected the last physical boundary and felt filthy for the way my body had responded. Tears slipped out sideways and soaked into the fabric. I did not wipe them away.

Somewhere in the city the stranger existed. Somewhere Dario was breathing, holding Camilla, counting the days until the auction. And I was here, in a small apartment I could not escape, with the taste of my own orgasm and my own self-disgust thick on my tongue.

I closed my eyes and tried to pretend the guilt would be lighter in the morning.

I knew it would not, and yet I didn’t stop touching myself.

The guilt sat heavy in my chest, but the ache between my legs was heavier. I shoved the thin blanket down and spread my knees. My fingers were already slick. I circled my clit the way I always did when the nights got too long and the silence got too loud, but it wasn’t enough. Not after the way he had looked at me over Dario’s shoulder. Not after the quiet, absolute way he had said my name like he already owned the right to use it.

Rena.

I pushed two fingers inside myself and bit down on a moan. The stretch burned. I had never done that before. I had always stopped at the outside. Tonight I didn’t care. I fucked myself as deep as I dared with my own fingers and pretended they were his. Thick. Controlled. Ruthless.

“No hiding while I take you,” I whispered into the dark, mimicking the voice I imagined he would use. Deep. Cold. Absolute. “You’re going to take every drop. Say it.”

My hips jerked. My free hand came up and closed around the base of my throat where the collar usually sat. I squeezed until black spots danced at the edges of my vision.