Chapter 5 Sold Out
My heart is going at a thousand miles per minute right now.
I am pressed against the cold, damp wood of the storeroom door, my ear straining to catch the muffled chaos that’s still going on in the foyer.
"Chloe. Please stop struggling," I hear my dad say. But what follows is the sound of more struggling and this time a plea.
"I’m not going anywhere with you!" There is more thumping and then a grunt.
"Bitch!" I hear a man grumble.
"Thomas, if your daughter won’t calm down, you’re going to have to use this on her."
The noise reduces. "What...what is that?" Thomas asks.
"It’s an aphrodisiac. It’ll help calm her down."
Chloe’s muffled screams immediately increase, a frantic, rhythmic thumping of heels against the marble, and then my father’s voice comes again, sounding more desperate.
"Hold her arms, Lydia! Keep her still!" Thomas bellows.
There is a wet, choking sound, followed by the clink of glass. My stomach rolls. I can picture it perfectly: my father, the man who used to tuck me in, pinning his own daughter down to pour that chemical docility down her throat. He isn’t just selling her; he is prepping the merchandise.
Tears gather my eyes and my hands are exhaling uncontrollably. I’m not Chloe’s biggest fan right now but I know she doesn’t deserve this.
And what’s worse, if this is Chloe’s fate, what would become of me?
I jerk at the sound of the front door slamming. It’s a heavy thud that echoes through the floorboards and vibrates in my skull. Silence follows, but only for a heartbeat.
Then, the screaming starts again, but this time it is Lydia.
"You let him take her!" Her voice shatters the quiet, sharp as a razor. "Our Chloe! How could you let that monster walk out with her?"
"What choice did I have?" Thomas roars back. I can hear the sound of his footsteps circling the floors which means he’s pacing.
"Emily ruined us! She married that Wolfe bastard and left us with a ten million dollar hole in the floor. If Chloe didn’t go, we’d be sleeping in a tent by morning. Silas would’ve burned the factory with us inside it."
"It’s Emily’s fault," Lydia wails, the sound of a woman who has lost her favorite accessory. "That ungrateful, selfish girl. She’s tucked away in the dark while my baby is...God knows where."
I slide down the door until I am huddling on the floor, my knees pulled to my chest. My hand rests on my stomach. I feel a wave of pure, concentrated loathing so strong it makes the cold of the room seem distant. They aren’t even pretending anymore. To them, I am the villain for not being the sacrifice. They don’t care if I’m sold into slavery or abused or perhaps even died.
They just want me to sacrifice myself and make their problem go away.
***
The next three days are a slow descent into a gray, featureless fog. Hunger is a sharp, stabbing thing at first, a clawing in my gut that makes it hard to breathe. Then it becomes a dull, heavy ache. Thirst is worse. My tongue feels like a piece of dry leather, and every swallow is a struggle. I drift in and out of a shallow, feverish sleep, dreaming of Alistair’s cold, storm-gray eyes and the way his hand felt for that split second in the clerk’s office.
He said three days. I have to believe a man that arrogant doesn’t break his word.
On the morning of the third day, the bolt on the door finally screeches back. When the light hits me, it’s a painful feeling. It’s a blinding white wall that makes my eyes sting and water. I try to shield my face, but my arms feel like they are made of lead. I can barely even move.
"Get her up," a voice snaps. It’s Chloe.
She sounds different. Harder. I feel hands grabbing my shoulders, dragging me across the floor. I don’t have the strength to fight as a maid hauls me toward the living room. My legs are useless, my feet dragging across the carpet until I am dumped unceremoniously in front of the sofa.
The house is a wreck. The broken glass from Silas’s visit hasn’t been fully cleared, and the smell of stale cigarettes hangs in the air. Chloe is standing over me, wearing a silk slip dress and a look of pure, unbridled malice. Her eyes are sunken, her skin sallow, but the rage in her gaze is vibrant.
"You did this," Chloe says. She doesn’t wait for an answer. She swings her foot, the sharp point of her stiletto catching me in the ribs. I gasp, the air leaving my lungs in a painful rush. "You sent him to me. You told him to take me."
"Our father told him he could take you," I whisper, my voice a broken rasp.
Chloe snarls and leans down, her hand tangling in my hair. She jerks my head back so I have to look at her. "You think you’re so smart? You think you’re safe because you married a name? We had to pay Silas ten million to get me back. Ten million that we don’t have, Emily. You cost us everything."
She lets go of my hair only to deliver a stinging slap across my face. My head snaps to the side, and I feel a fresh tear of skin inside my cheek. Before I can recover, she shifts her weight and grinds the heel of her shoe into the back of my hand.
The pain is so intense that I feel like it could kill me. I let out a strangled cry, the bones in my hand protesting under the pressure. Chloe slams her foot down again and I scream even louder.
"Stop! Please stop!" I cry.
Just then, Lydia walks into the room and when she sees me, a small smile creeps up her face. She doesn’t stop her daughter.
In fact, when I manage to pick myself up from the cold floor, Lydia steps closer and delivers a backhanded blow that sends me sprawling toward the coffee table.
I cough and fall to the floor. Fresh blood fills my mouth again.
"Ten million," Lydia spits. "That was your dowry. That was our future. Now another ten million to recover your sister. That puts our debt at 20 million because of you. You’re a curse on this family, Emily. You always have been."
Thomas walks into the living room. He looks at Chloe, looks at Lydia and then looks at me. Chills run down my arm when I see a satisfied glint in his eyes. He’s...happy that I look like this. Happy that I’m suffering.
My stomach churns and I feel like throwing up. These people are supposed to be my family. Yet it’s obvious that their hatred for me runs deep.
I watch him as he picks up a heavy, leaded glass ashtray from the mantel. His eyes are red and glazed with a terrifying, mindless anger. He steps toward me, the ashtray raised high.
"I should have gotten rid of you years ago," he says.
"Dad, what’re you-"
He swings the ashtray down. I find a sudden, desperate surge of adrenaline and roll to the side. The glass shatters against the floor inches from my head, shards of it spraying across my skin. I try to crawl away, my fingers digging into the carpet, but Chloe is on me again. She grabs me by the hair, hauling me onto my knees.
"You’re not going anywhere," Chloe hisses. She looks down at my stomach, her eyes narrowing with a sickening intent. "You want to take Julian’s baby and marry some old ugly man? Let’s see how well it handles this."
She draws her foot back, her gaze locked on my belly. I squeeze my eyes shut, wrapping my arms around myself in a futile attempt to protect the life inside me. I wait for the impact. I wait for the end.
The sound that follows isn’t a kick. It’s a louder sound.
The front door doesn’t just open; it is obliterated. The heavy oak frame splinters as it is kicked off its hinges, hitting the hallway floor with a deafening crash. A gust of cold, rain-scented air rushes into the room, cutting through the stagnant smell of the house.
A line of men in black tactical gear floods the space. But I don’t look at them. I look at the man who walks through the wreckage of the doorway.
Alistair Wolfe looks like a vengeful god carved out of granite. He is wearing a dark overcoat over a black suit, his hair slightly damp from the rain. His face is a mask of absolute, lethal stillness. He looks around the room, his gaze resting on my father, then Lydia, and finally on Chloe, who is still holding a clump of my hair.
The temperature in the room seems to drop to freezing. Alistair’s eyes lock onto mine, and for a second, the coldness in them shatters. He sees the blood on my face, the way I’m shivering on the floor, the bruising on my arms.
"Let. Her. Go," Alistair says. He doesn’t shout. He doesn’t have to. The quietness of his voice is far more terrifying.
Chloe drops my hair as if it has turned into live electricity. She stumbles back, her face going white. Alistair is across the room in three long strides. He doesn’t even look at my father as his bodyguards move in, pinning Thomas and Lydia against the wall with a brutal efficiency.
Alistair drops to one knee beside me. He reaches out, his large, warm hand hovering near my face before he gently brushes a stray hair from my forehead. His touch is so light it’s almost a ghost of a sensation. He looks at my battered face, his jaw tightening until I hear the bone creak.
"I’m here, Emily," he says.
He stands up, unbuttoning his overcoat. He slips it off and wraps it around my shoulders. It’s heavy and smells of expensive wool and the cold outdoors, still holding the heat from his body. It’s the first time I’ve felt warm in days. He lifts me into his arms as if I weigh nothing, cradling me against his chest.
"Who the hell are you?" Chloe shrieks, her voice shaking and her eyes are red. She is backed into a corner, staring at the small army currently occupying the living room. "You can’t just burst in here! This is a private residence!"
Alistair turns his head slightly, looking at her with a disdain so profound it’s like he’s looking at a bug he’s about to crush.
"I’m Alistair Wolfe. Her husband," Alistair says. "And I’m the man who is going to ensure that by tomorrow morning, none of you have a roof over your heads or a cent to your names."
Chloe freezes. Her eyes dart to me the Alistair and then to her parents. I can see the wheels rolling in her head as she tries to make the connection about where she heard the name from. Then moment it clicks, Chloe’s mouth drops open. She looks at the rubble of the front door, then at the bodyguards, then back at Alistair.
"Are you..." she stammers, her voice barely a whisper. "Are you Alistair Wolfe, the CEO of Wolfe Global?"