Amelia's POVMy eyes widened as Cassius appeared in front of me. He looked like a prince. Dressed in a black suit with his dark hair gelled to the back and his eyes blazing, he was handsome. It was obvious that all of the women that looked at me as he stretched his hand out to me wanted to be in my place and I didn't blame them. If I was not a first-hand victim of Cassius' brutality, I would probably behave the same way. I would probably be standing amongst those girls that were giving me jealous looks and hoping that Cassius would glance at me too. I would probably be somewhere imagining what it would be like to have and hold his attention. Like them, I would wonder who was the lucky girl that got to call him hers and who would get his love and promises of a happily ever after. But I knew that beneath that devastatingly handsome face was a monster. I knew beneath that earnest smile that he gave me and the way his eyes looked at me like he had not seen someone more beautiful wa
Chapter 45Amelia's POVDamien's Beta was standing right in front of me. In the flesh.I remembered how he had looked at me with scrutiny all of the times that our eyes had met during the course of his short stay at the Mansion before he had left earlier than Damien and Eric. He didn't look at me any differently today like he was studying me to give a report. He looked at me like he was a soldier that had been given the assignment to watch me and get back to the higher-ups. "You were saying something?" Elena asked me but I didn't answer, still stuck on the fact that Nathan was here. And if Nathan was here, did that mean what I thought it meant?Looking around the hall, I tried to see if Damien was truly there. Would he be wearing his hair in a bun or down? Would he be wearing a dark-colored or light-colored suit to match those beautiful blue jade eyes? If he was here, why had he not shown himself yet?And why had I not seen him? Was he trying to be careful not to approach me f
Amelia's POVYou know that one moment when you're sure that things are about to get worse but because you are stuck on something, you don't think it's possible to leave until you get what you're here for? That was how I felt standing in front of Cassius' door as I waited to hear more about the bidding market. The bidding market was something that was never openly spoken about but people who knew about it knew what it was for and who it catered to. To the rich and powerful. Mostly Vampires but sometimes werewolves.The bidding market was a place where people that nobody would care to look for or had any loved ones were sold off to the highest bidder like merchandise. Some of the maids in this mansion had been bought through that avenue and it seemed as though these people were discussing the market because something was about to happen. Were they trying to reopen the bidding market? And why? Why would they want to after all of the trouble that I heard was undergone to shut down
Amelia's POVAs I sat on my bed and looked at the long hand of the clock as it hit six in the morning, I realized that I had been plagued by nightmares. I had gotten up by two in the morning after the last one and I had not slept a wink. I could not get over what Nathan had told me last night in that office. That Damien, the same Damien that I knew was the mastermind behind the reopening of the bidding market. He knew what the bidding market was for, didn't he? Of course, he did. It was a shop for slavers and a hellhole for slaves. So why was he being a part of it?What had been going through his mind when he decided to open it? How was he even able to open it again?My mind flashed back to the promise that he had made to me on the phone when we spoke and I shivered.Because Nathan had more or less implied the actual reason why Damien was going ahead to not stop the bidding market from being officially reopened. 'Just know that I'm coming back for you, Amelia. No matter what' He
Amelia's POV Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. That was the only sound I could hear when I opened my eyes and found that a cloth had been placed on my neck, applying pressure against the puncture points where Cassius had sunk his fangs into me. I must have passed out in his arms from losing too much blood to his lack of self-control. Every day I wondered what was going to happen to me the day Cassius simply did not stop, instead going ahead to take every last blood from my body. My vision cleared up, and I saw him crouched in front of me, giving me a look that was between disappointment and annoyance. "You've grown weaker, Amelia. Before you used to be able to keep standing by the time I was done with you and yet now, it is a hassle to even enjoy a blood meal from you without supporting you with my hands." He complained and if I wasn't so weak, I might have frowned at him, damning the consequences of my actions because why was he still upset about the fact that I was unable to sta
Amelia's POV I was sure that if Damien was looking at me when I asked that question then he would have raised his eyebrows in surprise at my harsh tone. Because that was what Elena was doing right now as she looked at me. Perhaps it was because Damien was not physically here that I had the courage to say those words to him but it didn't matter whether it was courage, annoyance, or deep sorrow at the reality that Damien was choosing that had pushed me to the wall. The truth remained that when I had thought the bidding market was all Cassius's idea, it had been the idea of the one man that I believed could not have been capable of suggesting such, considering how he did not treat slaves like property or abuse them the way Cassius did. What was worse was that the idea had come to his mind because of me. That he believed he was doing this because he had no other choice. That he could see no other way out to save me. It made me complicit in the bidding market plan, whether I like
Damien's POVYou'd never realize how vulnerable you are until you are swept off your feet and feel like your world is crashing down on you. That was how I felt after that phone call. After those words that my mate had thrown at me in the heat of our argument about the bidding market. 'If that is the only way to save me, then I'd gladly fuck Cassius instead.' She had said and pain like I had never felt before, pain that felt like I had been stabbed in the heart hit me when she said those words so calmly like she had thought them through. Like she was indeed ready to go to such lengths to prove to me that I was in the wrong for wanting to save her through the bidding market. The growl that escaped my chest was the furthest thing from humane and I threw my phone at the door, just as Nathan came in and caught the phone as it was heading for his face. Rage. Absolute and vengeful rage was what I was feeling right now. Like a volcano about to erupt. My thoughts were clouded with rage a
Amelia's POVIt had been more than a week since that dreadful call with Damien that had ended abruptly when Elena had probably saved me from more word vomit but we would never even know what Damien's response was now or if he even wanted to still rescue me after what I had told him. But everywhere had seemed quiet after that call and I assumed that the bidding market plans had been stalled since even Cassius had not said anything about it and I knew it because I had been eavesdropping as much as I could, whenever I could. As I stared at my reflection this morning, I realized that I was long overdue for a haircut, my thick black hair already tangling at the tips as the strands stopped at my lower back. My large emerald green eyes still had eye bags but they were not as dark as they usually would look like because I had not been having nightmares for the last couple of days, a small mercy I believed that I cherished because I had no idea when it was going to return with a vengeance.