The Seller: A Dark Romance

by Renard, Loki

  Athens is a hive of activity, and as much security as he has at this place, there’s no way he can stop people coming in if they really want to. My stomach twists with nerves as we start to descend toward the flat roof, marked with a helicopter symbol.

  “We can’t stay here.”

  He doesn’t look over at me. He’s concentrating on landing. He shouldn’t be. He should be sending this thing rocketing into the sky and getting us as far away from major cities as possible. The middle of the Sahara would be preferable to Athens.

  There’s nothing I can do as we descend toward the rooftop - not without potentially killing us both, but the moment we touch down and the rotor blades have slowed enough for me to be heard, I reach out and grab his arm.

  “We can’t be here.”

  “Why not?” He frowns at me.

  “It’s not safe.”

  “How would you know what is or isn’t safe?”

  “I just know.”

  “That’s not going to be enough to make me leave my home.”

  “Anywhere else,” I tell him. “We could go literally anywhere else.”

  “What’s going on in Athens that has you so worried?”

  I close my mouth. I can’t tell him. He’s not my confidante. He’s my captor. The one I fucked through the bars of the cage he kept me in while trying to break me. I can’t tell him what’s worrying me. I can’t tell him anything.

  He gets out of the helicopter, walks around, and takes me by the hand. “Out,” he orders.

  I step out, looking around and feeling my stomach churn. Athens is where this all started. It’s where I was taken from the bar by the skeezy guy who didn’t even really bother to hide that he was spiking my drink.

  I saw the powder go in. I basically had to crane my head the other way while he stirred it with a straw, and then damn near hold my nose when I drank it because whatever he used made the whole thing taste like the inside of a tin can.

  Waking up in Stavros’ basement was scary, but finding myself back here in fucking Athens of all places is terrifying. He wasn’t supposed to do this. He was supposed to fuck me a few times and hand me off to a buyer. Why can’t he just be the scumbag seller of flesh I know he is?

  I have to accelerate things somehow. I have to get him to think I’m ready to sell.

  “You’re quiet,” Stavros notes as he leads me down inside his beautiful mansion. I’m not one to be impressed by marble and chandeliers. I preferred the basement, if I am to be completely honest. Not that he cares.

  “I wasn’t spoken to,” I say softly. This is how good, well broken, submissive girls act, I think. I hope.

  He stops and turns my chin up toward him. “What is going on with you, Siri?”

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “Sir?” He smirks at me.

  “Stavros?”

  “No,” he says. “I like sir.”

  He keeps leading me down the winding stairs, until he reaches a hall with a row of doors either side. I am taken into the third one on the left. It doesn’t matter. This is one house I do not intend on escaping from.

  The room is well appointed, but overly designed. I can tell a professional came in here and made this space look “homely”, but all they managed to do was clutter it with things that were too new and too fancy. It almost feels as though the whole place were wrapped in plastic which was only peeled off moments before I arrived.

  There’s a window looking out over the city. A big beautiful glass pane which lets light stream in. I recoil from it. Athens is cursed, as far as I’m concerned. This city has harbored liars and murderers for thousands of years. I used to think the history was beautiful. Now it just seems oppressive, and the blood I once took so much pride in seems tainted.

  “Siri.”

  It takes me a moment to respond.

  “Oh. Um. Yes?”

  He’s looking at me again in that way he has, with those keen eyes which see so much more than they should. Stavros is nothing like what I expected. I thought he’d be brutal with me, but I was willing to pay the price of my flesh to escape this world. If I had to sacrifice some sex to get out of here, that was okay.

  Now, I am more vulnerable than ever, and I think it might be showing, no matter how much I try to hide it.

  “I know better than to ask you what is going on,” he says. “But, you can tell me.”

  I am pulling closer to him, though I don’t mean to. He’s a bad man. I can’t start to think of him as some kind of hero. I chose him because I knew he was efficient and I knew he’d sell me to the right buyer.

  “I can tell you? And then what?” A dark smirk curls my lips. He can’t help me. This was all set in motion long before he met me. He’s a pawn in this game as much as I am.

  “And then I know,” he says.

  “And what would you do if you knew? You lock me away and you fuck me in cages. You punish me with your belt. Why would I tell you anything? Just fucking sell me already and get your money.”

  His fingers tighten on my chin. “I’ll sell you when I decide to,” he says. “You’re not in control, Siri. I don’t know why you can’t seem to understand that, let alone accept it.”

  I was in control once. I might not be anymore, but that’s a temporary issue. I try to relax. I can’t keep making him think there’s something going on. I have to redirect all this energy to something that might make sense to him.

  “I hate you,” I tell him, even though it’s not really true. “I hate you and I can’t wait to be away from you. That’s why I want you to sell me.”

  I expect him to get angry, to snarl and maybe even hit me. But he doesn’t. He just smiles down at me, so perfectly collected and calm.

  “You’re an awful liar, Siri,” he says, dropping a kiss on my lips. “Settle in. I’ll come for you later.”

  Chapter 4

  Stavros

  She’s scared.

  I know she’s scared, because I’m suddenly realizing that I’ve actually not seen her afraid before. Not when she woke up and found herself my captive, not when I whipped her ass, not when she was caged.

  Something about this city terrifies her, and I know she’s not going to tell me what it is. If there’s one thing Siri can do, it’s keep a secret. I could beat it out of her, but I admire the trait in anyone, though especially in a woman. She can keep her secret, I’ll find it my own way.

  Now I’m in Athens, everyone in my organization is on high alert. It doesn’t look all that much different than regular activity, but it means that I know when a sparrow shits on the Acropolis. Since landing, it’s become apparent that I am not the only businessman with some concerns around the death toll of late.

  “There’s increased guard around all the usual suspects,” Markos, my right hand man, tells me. “We’re even seeing increased policing. Something is coming.”

  “What are the streets saying?”

  “There’s chatter, but nothing specific and most of it is contradictory,” he says. “Haven’t seen anything like this in years, not since the big families were at war.”

  “Is there anything from them?”

  “Not really.”

  “Okay. Let me know if you find anything out.”

  It’s an unsatisfying set of answers. Usually, I’m the one who knows everything while others try to guess what’s going on. Right now, I have the very uncomfortable feeling that I’m the one in the dark.

  I can’t shake the feeling it has something to do with Siri, but how could a nineteen year old American girl who took a drink from the wrong guy in a bar have anything to do with half of Athens being on high alert?

  I go to my office to think, and to make some calls. The first one is to an American contact, a private investigator with links to US databases.

  “Liam?”

  “Hi, Stavros, hows it going?” He has a laid back Californian drawl which makes everything, even dire emergencies, sound like we’re planning a beach party.

  “I need you to look into so
meone for me. I’m sending you ID.”

  “Sure, dude. You missing a girl?”

  “No. Just not sure that one I’ve got is who she says she is. How long will it take to run?”

  “I can do it right now, man, I’m in front of my computer. Send it through.”

  I email a copy of the documents Siri had on her when we picked her up. While I’m waiting for results, Liam passes the time by humming his own version of hold music, tuneless dirge of a song which is only interrupted when he gets a hit.

  “Whoa. That’s weird.”

  “What is it? Is she a cop?”

  “No dude, she’s not a cop. She’s a nobody.”

  “You mean she’s not on your databases.”

  “I mean that ID you sent has to be a fake.”

  “I have a phone,” I say. “It has her mother’s contact details. She says her mother’s dead, but…”

  “Have you called the number?”

  “And have the call traced? No. I turned the phone off.”

  “Turn it back on and give me the number.”

  It takes another minute or so to do that. All the while, I have an eerie, prickly feeling running up and down my spine. I’ve had girls who had fake IDs before. Runaways usually don’t have proper documentation. But runaways don’t present the way Siri does. And they don’t panic because they realize they’re flying into Athens. The girls usually like coming here. I promise them a shopping trip and they realize that there are real world perks and even glamor when it comes to being owned in my tier of existence.

  I read the number to him and wait for him to do his magic with it.

  “Okay, well, dude, this is her mom’s number, if her mom is a fast food restaurant in Iowa.”

  “Why would she have a fake contact number for her mother?”

  “Same reason she had a fake ID, I’m guessing. She doesn’t want anyone to know who she is. Get me some DNA and I’ll run it.”

  “How long will that take?”

  “Depends how soon you get it to me. Maybe tomorrow, if you can get it sequenced locally and have the results sent to me.”

  I thank him and hang up, my mind racing. I fucking knew there was something going on with Siri from the beginning. I should have followed my instincts from the start instead of wasting days sitting around and letting my men die in the process.

  Taking a deep breath, I resist the urge to go storming into Siri’s room and demanding to know who she is. I already know she won’t tell me, and at this point in the game, I need to start playing my own hand a little closer to my chest.

  * * *

  I expected to find Siri at the window when I entered her room. It’s natural for the girls to want to look out and see the city. But she has the curtains drawn, and she’s sitting as far back from the window as humanly possible. The lights are off and the room is almost as dark as the basement I held her in. She’s such a strange little thing, a mystery I can’t wait to solve.

  “Siri? Are you feeling alright?”

  “I’m fine,” she says from her seat on the bed.

  We both know she’s not fine, just like we both know that I’m not really inquiring after her health. She has the curtains drawn so tightly that not even a little of the light can seep through. It’s as if she wants to block the city out completely. She’s hiding from something out there in the streets beyond.

  As much as she tries to keep her secret, it keeps leaking out of her with every action she takes. Every look. Every breath tells me something more.

  “Come here,” I say, pointing to the floor in front of my feet. “I want your mouth on my cock.”

  Even in the shadows of the room, I can see her arrogance - as well as her interest. She hates the way she responds to me, but from the moment we locked eyes on that very first day, there has been a connection I can’t deny.

  She complies quickly, sliding from the bed onto the spot on the floor where I indicated she should go. Her obedience surprises me. I was ready to take hold of her by the hair and pull her into position, but that’s not necessary.

  “Stay there,” I say, striding over to the window to throw back the curtains. I want to see this. All of this. Too much of our lust has been shared in the dark. It’s time to see it in the light.

  She recoils from the sun’s rays, hunching down on herself as if the light could hurt her.

  “What are you scared of?”

  “You.” She whispers the lie she knows I won’t believe. She’s never been scared of me. Not for a single second. And that makes me wonder who she could possibly be afraid of, if not me. I am a man capable of destroying her sense of self, of turning her into a lust driven toy, and then selling to someone who will own her completely. What kind of greater monster lurks in Athens?

  I walk back to her, slide my hand under her chin and tip her head up to meet my eyes.

  “Tell me, Siri.”

  She doesn’t shake her head. She doesn’t even acknowledge that she heard me. She just stares up at me with desperation, I recognize and reasons I don’t.

  “You don’t want to tell me? Why not?” I keep my voice soft and calm. There is a chance, a small chance, that I can take advantage of her fear now and perhaps become something of an ally. If she trusts me to protect her from whatever is out there, I might finally discover her secret.

  I get nothing from her. She’s like a statue. A pretty statue kneeling at my feet.

  “Take the dress off. You belong naked.”

  She obeys me nearly immediately. Every time I expect her to hesitate, she doesn’t. Every time I want her to tell me the truth, she refuses to. I do not understand her at all, but I can’t get our night together out of my mind. Being inside her was like coming home. It was the kind of sex I didn’t believe in before I had it. I’m still trying to come to terms with it. I’m almost afraid to fuck her again, in case it isn’t the same.

  Her body comes into view, soft breasts, pink tipped with her delicious little nipples. Her skin is like cream, and the expanse of it, along with the soft golden and brown fall of her hair serves to highlight those bright blue eyes which stare into my soul.

  “There’s something about you, Siri,” I tell her gently. “I wish I knew what it was.”

  As I speak, I lower the fly of my pants and let my cock spring free. Those pretty eyes lock on it with what seems to me to be real desire. She portrays innocence, but it’s an act. There’s nothing innocent about those eyes, now looking up at me from the floor. There’s no reluctance in her. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she wants to suck my dick just as badly as I want to have her mouth wrapped around it.

  Siri

  He’s an asshole. A beast. A monster. But he’s also my ticket out of Athens, and if a well trained fuck toy is what he’s looking to sell, then I’ll blow his mind, as well as his cock.

  I extend my tongue and let it run under the head of his dick. Down lower, I find his balls. He shaves them, so they’re smooth to the touch as I let the tip of my hot, wet tongue run over them too. I am not going to give him the satisfaction of appearing reluctant, because I am not. This act is one of control, but I’m not the one who is going to give it up. He is.

  He lets out a throaty male groan, an intimate sound which makes goosebumps appear instantly on my skin. I shouldn’t enjoy this so much. This should be humiliating. He’s using me. He’s taking my mouth for his pleasure and he’s not worrying about mine.

  I need the distraction. I need the connection. We are not on cuddling terms, so cock sucking will do. I know I’m fucked up and twisted, but does he know that his thick, hard cock might as well be a pacifier at this point? Something to occupy my mouth and mind as I run from the shadows looming in my mind.

  I almost wish I could warn him about what’s coming, but that would derail my entire plan. This only works if he stays in the dark. He can’t know who I am, or why I need to be sent away. All he can know is that my mouth is hot and wet and willing and I am a commodity ripe for trading.

  So
I suck him.

  I suck him with my heart and my soul. I let him push his dick all the way to the back of my mouth and find the opening of my throat. I give myself to him completely. I fall into the kind of submission that is mindless instinct, my lips wrapping tightly around his hard flesh, pretending this means something. God, I wish this meant something, but it can’t. There are too many motives between us, too many lies. He sells women and I… I might be even worse.

  “Fuck. Siri. Yes. Touch yourself,” he commands. “Put your fingers between your legs and touch yourself. Fuck yourself like you want me to fuck you.”

  My hand was already between my legs, but now that he commands it, my fingers start to follow his will. I trace the seam of my lips and find the bud of my clit. It’s already wet, because like it or not, Stavros turns me the fuck on. He’s everything I should hate, and everything I need.

  At his urging, I push two fingers into my pussy. I never used to masturbate this way. I used to just rub my clit until I came. It felt good, but never this good. It never felt complete, though it was fine until I learned what it’s really like to be connected to another person. Stavros and I share something more than the bond of our circumstances. I know we do. It’s been a matter of days and already when I think of him, I feel more good feelings than I do when I think about my entire family.

  That’s really a testament to how fucked up I am. I’ve never known real love, not ever. My relationships to others have always been relationships of convenience, or commerce. The notion of being sold isn’t as abhorrent to me as it would be to most people. I’ve always known I was a commodity. It was made obvious to me in a variety of ways my entire life. Stavros isn’t the first man to mold me and put a value on me. He’s just the first one to do it so bluntly.

  My fingers are deep inside me, and I can feel myself clenching around them. My body knows this isn’t his dick. It wants it to be. The first and last time he took me, it was like being changed from the inside out. Every time he thrust inside me, he made my body respond anew. When we’re connected, we form some kind of circuit, some close fucking… I don’t even know. My brain is scrambling to understand what this is.