Page 22 of Souls and Sorrows

His blue eyes slide slowly across the room toward Ermes, and he shifts his weight between his legs. “Can’t do that, little lady. Sorry.”

My nostrils flare, and I curl my hands into fists at my sides. “Why?”

Ermes drops his hand to the side, pulling a sheet of paper from the bench. “Didn’t you read the fine print before you signed this contract? Not every auction night at Anteros is for a single interaction. Some of them are a little more… permanent.”

He grins, and the nausea in my stomach leaps, desperate to escape me.

“Which do you think tonight was?”

Fuck.Have I sold myself indefinitely to Vitus?

A sharp pain slices through my chest, like a knife cutting directly through to my heart beneath the protective bone. I don’t blink, don’t breathe, don’t move.

“Don’t move, my beautiful butterfly. I’m helping you. You’ll be useless to the men who want you, and then they’ll never be able to hurt you.”

Panic swells inside my body like a boat that’s sprung a leak and is fast on the verge of capsizing.

Clearly, Mamma was a liar.

Men don’t stop wanting what they want even if it’s a little dirtied up. They’ll take pride in making it worse.

The door opens again, and my spine goes rigid. Mikey hooks a finger in the prong collar, causing the spikes on the opposite side to sink into my skin, almost breaking the surface. I make a strangled noise, but he ignores it, pulling me over to where Ermes and the girls sit.

Gritting my teeth, I glare at the thinning patch of dark hair on top of the Mafia boss’s head. “My father won’t allow this—”

Ermes’s hand whips out, catching the leash in his fist, and then he’s yanking me down so we’re eye-level. I sputter, my fingers immediately clawing at the collar as a spike pierces my skin; I feel a bead of blood trickle down slowly, and Ermes just tugs harder.

“Your father is nothing to me. Your last name might still be associated with the grandeur that once was, but aside from residual authority and a little operation out in bumfuck, Maine, youarenothing. Do not think I’ll hesitate to end you just because you came here, asking for my help. I know your betrayals,gattina, and I will use them against you.”

“Is that any way to speak to someone apparently worth as much as Paul Cézanne’sThe Card Players?”

A silky, shadowy form stops in the dressing room doorway, not coming any closer. Just props a forearm up on the frame, leaning so his face is obscured.

But that voice…

Ermes relinquishes his hold on me. Barely. “A collector. That explains your bid.”

“My sister is a painter. I know value when I see it.”

Heat fans the edges of my face.Is he talking about me?

Did…heplace the winning bid?

Tension coils tight in my body, spiraling up through my chest and scattering my breaths.

“Yes, well, that might be the case, but I’m afraid there are still certain protocols in place,” Mikey P. interjects, taking a step in the stranger’s direction. “Unfortunately, bids are only open to members. As we have no way of verifying your account information or—”

A white envelope drops to the floor in front of the man’s feet. He bends down, shaking his arms so the sleeves of his suit jacket rise up, revealing muscular forearms corded with thick veins. With a flick of his wrist, he sends the envelope skidding across the floor. Ermes traps it with the tip of a shoe, not removing his gaze from the other man.

“This can’t be all the money.”

The stranger stands back up. “Obviously. But it should prove I’m good for it. Now, give me my prize.”

That voice…

Like deep silk that I feel between my legs as it drifts toward me, warming the coldest parts of my body.

He takes a step closer, and the girls at Ermes’s side slink away, as if pushed back by some sort of force field. My bones tingle with anticipation as the man from the club last week exits the shadows, his face a careful mask of impassivity.

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