My fiancé sold me to the Norling crime family to pay off a five-million-dollar gambling debt, telling me to please their Don. What he didn't know is that the Don of the Norling family is my father. On our third anniversary, Julius took me to a black market auction in Vegas.
"Close your eyes, baby," he whispered. "I promise you're gonna love this surprise." I thought he was going to bid on a gift for me. I did as he asked, closing my eyes and letting him lead me by the hand down a noisy hallway. But when I opened them, I was standing in front of a few rough-looking guys. "Julius?" I turned to ask him what was going on, and a sharp pain exploded in the back of my head. Then, darkness.
When I came to, I was stuffed in a cramped cage. I tried to scream, but only a hoarse whimper came out of my throat. They’d drugged me. The realization hit me like a ton of bricks. "And now, gentlemen, for our final item of the night—" A blinding spotlight hit me.
The auctioneer tapped the bars of my cage with a cane. "Look at this face. So pure, so innocent. And those amber eyes." He lowered his voice, his tone sick with excitement. "And most importantly, she looks just like his wife." An excited murmur rippled through the crowd. Whose wife? "The bidding starts at five hundred thousand dollars!" "Seven hundred!" "One million!" In the end, I was sold for two million. The cage door swung open. They dragged me out by my hair and threw me into the back of a car. I was still too weak to fight back. My mind raced with the horrors that awaited me. Would they harvest my organs? Sell me to a brothel? Then the car pulled into a lavish estate. The design of the main gate was painfully familiar. My eyes went wide. How could it be here? One of the goons threw me over his shoulder, carried me down to a basement, and dumped me on the floor. But I barely felt the pain. All I could see was the man who walked in after them. It was Julius. He just stood there, soaking in the sight of me, this broken thing on the floor. He looked like a completely different person from the gentle, caring man I thought I knew. "Julius—" I forced the word out. "Why?" I didn't understand. We’d been together for three years. Our relationship was solid. He’d told me it was love at first sight when he saw me in the library, and he pursued me for months until his sincerity won me over. I’d just met his parents last week. "Oh, baby." He crouched down and tilted my chin up with his finger. "Because I'm in debt. Five million dollars." His hand moved to my cheek. "You know what they do to guys who don't pay? They'll dump me in the river. You love me too much to let that happen, right?" "You saw for yourself, you only went for two million. That's not nearly enough. But if you can keep the big man happy in a little bit, my entire debt gets wiped clean." I stared at the face I once loved. I wanted to slap it, hard. But I couldn't even lift my hand. All I could do was glare at him in silence. Two older people stepped out from behind him. His parents. The warm, kind couple I’d met last week was gone. Julius’s mother ripped the pearl necklace from my neck and the diamond studs from my ears. She grinned greedily. "This should be worth a little something." The tearing pain in my earlobe sent a cold sweat down my body. "Don't make this harder than it has to be," his father sneered. "It's an honor to please the Don. Once he's satisfied, you're free." "That's right," Julius nodded, faking concern. "I won't think any less of you, Scarlett. When the Don's tired of you, we'll still get married. We'll pretend this never happened." His words made me want to throw up. I forced the corners of my mouth into a cold smile. "In your dreams," I spat. "Go to hell."Previous Chapter