Chapter Two

TWO

Mikhail Romanov 

“What are we doing here?” I asked Maxim as we walked into the main building. I had had a long day at a conference for CEOs in the tech industry and I still had things scheduled for the night. I hated to pass my responsibilities over from one day to a new one. 

“I'm not sure yet. Killian invited me,” Maxim responded. 

“Fucking Killian,” I muttered. Killian was an acquaintance of my brother's. My brother was sufficiently notorious without Killian. With Killian, he was a pain in the ass. 

We headed into the building and Maxim led the way to what looked like a hall. There was a cheering crowd there, and I recognized some of the people that were sitting around the neatly set tables. 

“We're a little late,” Maxim sighed. Killian appeared in front of us out of nowhere. 

“Look who finally decided to show up,” he teased Maxim with a grin. I glanced at my watch and looked around impatiently. 

“Hey man,” Killian looked at me. “I saved you a seat in front.”

I nodded curtly and followed after him and Maxim. We sat around a table and a waiter walked in our direction. I took a glass of champagne and finally looked at the stage. 

It was an auction. A human auction. I leaned back in my seat, watching what was going on with interest. I had mentioned wanting to go to one of these to Maxim. That was most definitely the reason I was here. 

I glanced at him and chuckled. He hated to admit that he loved me, but I knew he did. He did not hide it. Everything he did showed it. 

I looked at the stage again, eyeing the young girl on the stage. She had to be about eighteen or nineteen. 

They bargained on her price. Despite the strong front she put, she was terrified. I looked around and found the man that offered two hundred thousand dollars for her. No one else wanted to pay that. 

“Sold.” The guy on the stage announced. 

I watched with a little boredom as they sold every person on the stage. I had expected that the slaves would put up a fight, create a scene o do something even remotely entertaining. 

“This is boring,” I told Maxim. He nodded in agreement. “Let's see it to the end and forget about it,” he said.

I agreed. I looked at my phone. I could spare thirty minutes more. 

“This is Spice,” the guy on the stage introduced and I looked up from my phone. It was a weird name. Every other slave had gotten a fairly good names. 

“She's a little bit of a trouble maker, as you can see,” he chuckled. “You can have a lot of fun taming her. We'll start at fifty thousand for her price.”

I casually looked at the slave in question, studying her. 

My mind jolted as I caught sight of her face. Her dark hair, her soft features. Her beautiful but strained body, the pain and exhaustion on her face. 

Spice? Her name was not Spice. It was Marlowe. Marlowe Sage Kunetsov. I could never forget. 

What the fuck was she doing here? 

I inhaled slowly to call my racing heart. I was not supposed to be reacting this way. She was not supposed to be drawing this kind of reaction from me. At least, not anymore. 

She strongly reminded me of a point in my life where I had wanted to be happy. I hated that, and a part of me hated her. But I could not find it in my stony heart to leave her here. 

“Three hundred thousand,” I raised the small placard that Killian had handed to me when I sat down. 

Maxim glanced back at me with surprise. He laughed with disbelief and took a sip of his champagne. 

“You kinky motherfucker,” he muttered. 

I said nothing. The hall was silent. The guy on the stage looked stunned. He did not debate my price. 

“Sold.”

— — —

“She's quite a handful,” Killian said to me as he followed Maxim and I out of the building. 

I paused and looked at him. “What do you mean?” I asked. 

“She's rebellious. She tried to run yesterday. That's why she's in bad shape. There are so many other women you could have gone for,” he chuckled. 

Fury billowed in my chest and spread to every part of my body. I clenched my hands in my pockets. 

“You did that to her?” I asked. My voice was surprisingly calm. 

“Well yes. Punishment for her defiance and a deterrent to the others,” he glanced at Maxim who was talking to some other guy. I kept my eyes on him. 

“I can still make some arrangements and have a better woman delivered to you, if you'd like that,” he looked at me. 

I tilted my head to the side, wondering what the consequences would be if I shoved a knife through his teeth and through the back of his head. It wouldn't be anything that would affect me. Just the diplomacy I had with the other people here. 

He shifted under my stare, shoving his hands in his pockets, possibly to hide his discomfort. 

I walked away, heading for the car Maxim and I had come in. 

Marlowe had already been sent to my mansion. She was injured and sick, and I was busy. She would not be seeing me for a while, and I would prefer to keep her in the dark about who had bought her. 

“Considering the fact that you wanted to leave, I didn't think you'd buy a slave,” Maxim chuckled as he climbed into the vehicle and buckled himself in. 

“Well, I have a knack for spontaneity,” I murmured as I ignited the engine. 

“Sure. Can't wait to see how this goes,” he chuckled and pulled out his phone. “Do you mind stopping at the pizza place? I'm starving.”

“I do. You already wasted my time here.”

“You're gonna stop anyway.”

The cocky piece of shit was right. I could not deny him even the littlest thing. That was okay though. He was my brother after all. 

As I sped down the street, I could not help but wonder how Marlowe Kunetsov, daughter of the late Kunetsov gang leader had ended up a slave to a cockwad like Killian; and what I was going to do with her. 

I chuckled to myself as a series of idea rolled through my head. Maybe buying her out of slavery had not been a good idea, because she was going to go through so much worse at my hands.