Crimson Obsession

PROLOGUE.

“Get on your knees, Zayka," Nikolai said quietly, his legs spread apart in his seat. Butterflies fluttered through my stomach.

I still didn't know what that word ‘Zayka’ meant. I was scared and at the same time, I was stunned by how sensual he looked just sitting comfortably in the loveseat.

I slowly got on my knees in front of him. I wanted to worship him, do everything he wanted. He took a fistful of my hair, twisting the strands round his knuckles, his grip firm.

“Take care of this," he whispered. His eyes moved to the bulge in his pants. I had no choice but to oblige. He was my owner after all.

IMOGEN MAY AVERY.

I kept my eyes closed in the darkness. I could feel the presence of other girls around me and the air was thick with the fear we were all feeling.

It was hard to breathe. I could hear the faint jazz music playing from somewhere outside the room we were in.

It took all of my strength to keep from crying. I could not so much as let a tear leave my eye, no matter how much I wanted or needed to cry.

“What's taking them so long? Let's get this over with,” someone said quietly from behind me. I stiffened at her words.

If I could delay this forever, I would.

This was not my first auction. I have been to auctions right from when I turned twelve. That was the age they thought all girls were mature enough to be sold.

I attempted to bury my face in my hands and pray to a God I was not sure existed. I wanted to pray that no one would buy me during this auction the way I had not been bought in all these years.

I was stopped halfway. Someone shoved the door open. Light flooded in, blinding me momentarily.

My heart dropped to the very base of my stomach and my stomach lurched. I wanted to throw up so bad, but I would just end up retching, because I did not have any food in my stomach.

It would also cause chaos among the girls and that would earn me a whipping. I fought the acidic bile back.

“It's time, girls. You know what you're here for. Either you get sold or I make your life hell,” Mistress announced. That was her name… or what we knew her as.

My eyes adjusted to the light and I looked at her. Her eyes were already fixed on me. I gulped, getting the message.

She had made my life worse than hell because, by some sort of luck, I had not been sold. Sometimes, I wondered if being sold to one of the weird, ugly, mean-looking men out there would be better than days of starvation and hard work that I had to endure.

The fear of the unknown made me hope for the hell I knew.

“Move girls. On your feet,” Mistress called, clapping her hands. We scrambled to our feet and my world spun around me for a second. My stomach growled and tears flooded my eyes. I was hungry. Starving.

Someone from behind me shoved me forward and I started to walk. The small placard that was hung around my neck was a weight.

I looked at it and reminded myself of my number. Forty-nine. There were fifty of us. Maybe all the men interested in slaves would buy all the ones they wanted and I'd be left behind.

I took a deep breath to keep my composure and evenly distribute the little strength I had throughout my body. We filed out into the hallway, and we were directed to a wide room by guards. The back of the stage.

There were chairs and tables and different types of lights strewn across the floor. I looked forward and saw a curtain.

The jazz music was closer now, and it was accompanied by the sound of chatter and cutleries hitting ceramic dishes. The auction was already ongoing.

The males were lined up beside us. They were fewer than the females. I looked at each of them carefully, wondering what they were feeling and if it hurt their egos to be in such a weak position.

I was surprised when I found one of them already looking at me. His eyebrows were drawn together and he looked concerned.

“Are you okay?” He mouthed.

I swallowed and looked forward to see if Mistress was around before looking back at him. The males and females were not to be seen communicating with each other in any way.

I nodded slowly, and he gave me a small smile before looking away. I looked away, still taken aback.

Seeing concern or any other form of emotion, aside from sadness, from the other slaves was so rare. We were all suffering. There was no time to care for another person.

I looked back at him, trying to memorize his features. It was silly, but I hoped I'd see him again.

“Ladies and gentlemen, here comes our second batch of goods for tonight,” someone announced at the other side of the curtain. My stomach lurched again. “These are the Diamonds…”

Diamonds. I did not feel like a diamond.

“Alright girls! Chins up, smiles on, and your asses better be out there. I don't want any of you returning here tonight!” Mistress yelled, appearing out of nowhere.

The curtain was pulled back, and for the second time that night, I was almost blinded. I blinked rapidly so that my eyes could get adjusted to the spotlight that was pointed at us.

I could not screw this up. I could not trip or make any mistakes. That would be the worst possible thing that would happen to me.

We arranged ourselves on the stage according to our numbers and my heart beat so hard in my chest that it was excruciating. It was torture to keep my chin up.

It was hell to keep a smile on my face. But I managed to. I checked my mind out of the situation, refusing to watch how other girls like me were being sold.

I did not want to look at anyone. I did not want to look at the monsters that were buying human beings like them. I struggled to breathe.

If I made a single mistake, if a piece of me fell out of place, I was going to crash. I had to hold myself together.

And I was doing a good job until the girl at my left-hand side stepped forward. She was number forty-eight.

My smile wavered, and my neck started to hurt from keeping my chin so high up. A sinking feeling gripped me so hard that I could not breathe. I knew it.

Deep in my bones, I knew it was over. I was going to be sold. From the corner of my eye, I watched forty-eight walk off to the side of the stage where the purchased people stood.

Everything else was a blur. The way I stepped forward after my number was called, the way I stood stiff with the fake smile on my face, the way I nearly died of suffocation, the way I watched the eyes of both men and women assault me.

“Two hundred thousand?” A man from the crowd called and my heart sank.

“Two hundred and fifty,” another called.

“Two hundred and seventy,” a woman's voice reached my ears and tears welled up in my eyes.

Please. Please God, please. I cried in my head.

“Five hundred thousand,” a uniquely accented male voice called from the crowd and I completely stopped breathing.

“Going at five hundred thousand,” the announcer said with a big grin...turning to whisper something to the man beside him.

“Gone. Mr. Zhivago is the highest bidder. Congratulations on your buy,” the announcer smiled and waved me off to the side.

I looked into the crowd, hoping to see who it was I had been sold to, so I could prepare my mind.

It was unreal. There was no way. There was no way this was actually happening to me…

A wave of dizziness, coupled with extreme fatigue, hunger and the sudden lack of air hit me and my knees gave out under me. I fell into darkness.

NIKOLAI ANDREI ZHIVAGO.

I stared at my wristwatch, wondering if this impromptu meeting that Levi had set up with a client was going to mess with my schedule.

Levi glanced at me. I immediately relaxed in the car seat because I knew he was going to tease me for being so tense. I hated it when he called me uptight or tense.

“You need to calm down,” Levi said…looking at the GPS locator as it announced that we were five minutes from our destination.

Five whole minutes. We had spent twenty minutes of what was supposed to be my free time on this detour.

“This better be worth it, Levi.” I muttered.

“You know it's going to be worth it,” he said, looking into the street. It was sort of a rural area. One where druggies and hipsters would be common.

Levi looked taken aback and by the way he slowed the car, glanced at his phone and back at the GPS locator, he was wondering if we were close.

“What on earth does Russo want us here for?” Levi questioned, grabbing his gun and tucking it in his waistband.

He drove forward slowly on the deserted, dirty street and the locator announced our arrival at our destination as we drove past what seemed to be a warehouse. My eyebrows rose as Levi slowed the car to a stop.

There were men in suits in front of the gate, and from the looks of it, they were armed. I looked at him. He was already dialing Russo's number.

I leaned back in my seat, loosening the tie around my neck. I glanced at my watch. I sighed and decided to completely take the tie off.

“Russo, we're here,” Levi said into the phone that was on speaker.

There was jazz music playing in the background at the other end. It was accompanied by chatter.

“Ah, you're a little late. Come on in,” Russo said.

“This better not be some expensive joke. Nikolai is not excited to be here,” Levi said, and I gave him a sharp look. He shrugged, and I huffed out a breath... pushing my door open.

He climbed out too and slammed the door shut, locking it with the remote. We headed towards the gate. The men looked us over.

“Zhivago,” Levi said…handing the car keys over to one of them. They nodded, pushing the gate open.

We followed the trail of a red carpet to the door of the large storage building. Levi went in first, as he always did.

I walked in after him. There was a wide and empty, but well-lit space. The jazz music I had heard on the phone was close now.

Someone was speaking into a microphone but what the person was saying was muffled.

A man in a suit walked up to us. “If you would follow me, sirs,” he said with a polite smile.

I sighed again as he led us to the only door at the other end of the room.

“You need to calm down,” Levi said, hiding his smile.

He was always amused by the discomfort I felt when my time was being wasted.

“You need to shut your mouth,” I told him.

“Yes boss,” He was full-on grinning now.

“Don't call me that,” I cringed. He knew how much I hated that too.

“Daddy is fine then?” he teased, and I glared at him.

If I said more, he would find more to bother me. Such has been the norm between us for years as best friends.

“You're a disgusting bastard,” I muttered under my breath.

The man opened the door and pointed us in. “Have a good time, sirs,” he said, and I nodded, hoping that whatever this was would be alright, at least.

The jazz music flooded my ears as we walked further into the room. A man walked up to Levi and asked him our names so he could direct us to our tables. Levi told him, and he directed us to a table at the center of multiple other tables.

I took a seat, looking around. There was a stage, but that was not where the music was coming from. The jazz band was on the other side of the room. Their music was not loud enough to drown out what the man on the stage was saying.

It was subtle and right in the background. The perfect combination. I looked around and found some familiar faces. This was a gathering of elite people. Not just elite people, but the most twisted of elite people.

I looked at Levi, wanting to tell him about my observations. I was cut off by the man on the stage speaking excitedly.

“Ladies and gentlemen, here comes our second batch of goods for tonight,” he said. The excitement in his voice was maniacal. I immediately knew it was not good.

It clicked with me. Russo told me he had ventured into a new business. I should have known that it had something to do with trafficking. I chuckled.

“These are the Diamonds…” the man said with a wide grin.

A side of the black curtains behind him was pulled back, and several women walked out in a line, arranging themselves on the stage according to the number on the placards around their necks.

My eyebrows rose, and I ran my fingers across my lips to stop myself from smiling. Russo had outdone himself with his evil. It was almost insane, the fact that he could pull it off, that is. Trafficking and slavery were not new to me.

I almost laughed at the way they posed themselves. Their chins were up like they were above us.

The smiles on their faces were almost happy, like they owned the world. They didn't even own themselves. They had nothing.

It was fun to watch each of them get sold. Any other day, watching the women get sold would have annoyed me.

Everyone was supposed to have their freedom and human right, or whatever that shit was. But the way they posed themselves as superior made them absolutely deserving of the horrors they would face with whoever their masters would be.

Or at least, that was my thought process until there were three of them left. 48, 49 and 50.

My eyes were fixed on 49. The fear in her eyes. The way she barely breathed. The way she kept her eyes forward despite the fact that everyone beside her was getting sold.

My smile dimmed as I studied her. She looked like she was somewhere between malnourished and starving. I wanted to fix that. I wanted to… feed her. I wanted to fix her. I pitied her. I wanted to make her mine.

“Five hundred thousand.” I announced how much I was going to buy her, disgusted by the other people who wanted to buy her for less, to even buy her at all. She was mine.

In all truth, I could not really understand why I wanted her. Maybe I wanted a souvenir from this party…or auction.

Maybe I wanted a toy. Maybe I wanted to know what it was like to have a human of my own. One I could twist to my liking. The thought excited me.

“Mr. Zhivago is the highest bidder. Congratulations on your buy,” the announcer's words filtered into my ears.

I looked at Levi. He was looking at me with a smile. He shook his head and I could tell what he was thinking. ‘You sick bastard.’

He was right. I was sick.