Chapter 10 The Auction
The car smells like leather and cold air and him.
It smells like the expensive cologne that masks the scent of violence and I sit there with my hands clenched in my lap and I try to breathe. I try to force air into lungs that feel too tight and too small like I’m breathing through a straw.
He is driving. There is no driver tonight. Just him.
He handles the car with one hand on the wheel and I stare at that hand. I stare at the ring.
The silver crest glints in the passing streetlights. Flash. Dark. Flash. Dark. It’s a strobe light of my nightmare and I can’t look away.
We are leaving the rich district. We are leaving the hills where the villas sit like crowns on the mountaintops. We are heading down. Down toward the coast. Toward the docks. Toward the dark water where bodies disappear and never come back up.
"You're quiet," he says.
His voice fills the car. It wraps around me like smoke.
"I'm praying," I say, and I don't know why I said that because I don't believe in God anymore. Not since Mama died.
"Save your prayers," he says and he doesn't look at me. "You won't need them tonight. Tonight isn't about faith. It’s about business."
Business.
Killing me is business. Getting rid of a problem is business.
I shift my leg just a fraction of an inch. I can feel the knife in my boot. It digs into my calf and the pain is grounding. It reminds me I am still here. I am still alive.
If he stops the car in a deserted place I will use it. I will jam it into his neck before he can pull his gun. I will die fighting.
But he doesn't stop.
He drives past the empty warehouses and the rusted shipping containers. He drives toward a building at the end of the pier where yellow light spills out of high windows.
There are cars parked outside. Black SUVs. Sedans with tinted windows. Men standing in clusters smoking cigarettes that glow like fireflies in the dark.
He kills the engine.
"Get out," he says.
I open the door and the smell of the ocean hits me. Salt and rotting fish and gasoline. I step out and the wind whips my hair across my face. My legs feel like water but I force them to hold me up. I lock my knees. I lift my chin.
He walks around the car and stands next to me. He is huge in the long coat. He blocks the wind. He blocks the light.
"Stay close," he says. "Don't speak. Don't look anyone in the eye unless I tell you to. You are here to be seen. Not heard."
"Am I being sold?" I ask, and my voice is barely a whisper.
He looks down at me. His face is hard. Unreadable.
"You were already sold, Lilith. Tonight is just the receipt."
He puts his hand on the small of my back and guides me toward the door. His touch burns through my coat. It feels like a brand.
The men outside stop talking as we pass. They straighten up. They toss their cigarettes. They look at Dante with fear and they look at me with hunger.
I feel their eyes sliding over me like oily hands. I want towash their gazes off me. I want to scream.
We walk inside.
The warehouse is massive and hollow. The air is thick with smoke and the murmur of voices.
In the center of the room there is a table. Three men are sitting there. They look like vultures. Expensive suits. Gold watches. Eyes that have seen too much death to care about one more girl.
Dante walks to the table and the room goes quiet. The silence ripples out from us like a wave until the only sound is the click of his boots on the concrete floor.
"Caravelli," one of the men says. He is older. Grey hair. A scar running through his eyebrow. "We didn't think you would come."
"I always come when my property is questioned," Dante says.
He pulls out a chair. Not for himself. For me. "Sit," he commands.
I sit. I fold my hands in my lap. I stare at the table. I stare at the grain of the wood and I try to disappear. Dante doesn't sit. He stands behind me. He puts his hands on the back of my chair. It feels like he is boxing me in. Trapping me.
"So this is her," the grey-haired man says. He leans forward. He smells like stale tobacco. "Marco Rosetti’s girl."
"Lilith," Dante says.
"Rosetti owed us money too," another man says. He is younger. Sharper. He looks at me like I am a piece of meat he is deciding whether to buy. "A lot of money. If you acquired his assets then you acquired his debts."
"I acquired his daughter," Dante says and his voice is ice. "The debts died with his reputation."
"That’s not how it works," the younger man snaps. "We have a claim. We have rights. And we are not the only ones."
He looks at the grey-haired man. They share a look. A secret.
"There is another buyer," the grey-haired man says slowly. "Someone from the South. He says Rosetti promised him the girl first."
My heart stops.
Another buyer?
I look up. I look at the grey-haired man. "Who?" I ask.
Dante’s fingers tighten on the back of the chair. "Quiet."
"Who is asking for me?" I say again, and my voice rises. "My father only dealt with you."
"Your father dealt with devils you don't even know exist," the younger man says. He smiles. "And the man in Naples... he is very eager to collect. He says he has a specific use for you."
Naples. Who is in Naples? Why would anyone there want me?
"He has no claim," Dante says. His voice is low but it carries across the room like thunder. "The girl is mine. The debt is settled. If anyone from the South has a problem with that they can come to me."
"He will come," the grey-haired man says. "And he won't come with a checkbook. He will come with an army."
"Let him come," Dante says.
He moves his hand. He rests it on my shoulder.
My breath hitches. His fingers are heavy. His thumb brushes against the collar of my coat. It’s possessive. It’s a warning.
To them. Not to me.
"She is not an asset for liquidation," Dante says. "She is part of my household. She is under my roof. That makes her mine."
Mine.
The word echoes in the vast space.
"You are risking a war," the grey-haired man says. "For what? A girl who is worth less than the suit you are wearing?"
"For principle," Dante says.
He leans down. His face is next to my ear. I can feel the heat of his breath. "Stand up."
I stand up. My legs are shaking.
Dante looks at the men. He looks at them with that flat dead stare that makes people look away.
"Tell the South to stay where they belong," he says. "Tell them if they touch her... if they even look at her... I will remind them why no one crosses the Caravelli line."
He takes my arm. "We’re done here."
He turns me around and marches me toward the door.
"He won't stop, Dante!" the grey-haired man yells after us. "He wants her! He says she is the key!"
Key to what? I try to look back. I try to ask.
"What does he mean?" I gasp as Dante shoves me toward the exit. "Who is he? Why am I a key?"
"Shut up," Dante says.
He doesn't stop. He doesn't look back. He walks me out of the warehouse and into the cold night air. He shoves me toward the car.
"Get in."
I scramble into the passenger seat. He gets in the driver’s side and starts the engine. He peels out of the lot, tires screeching on the asphalt.
He drives fast. Too fast. The city blurs past us in streaks of light. I am shaking. I am shaking so hard my teeth are chattering.
"Who was that?" I ask and my voice is jagged. "Who is the man in the South? Why did they say I was a key?"
"It doesn't concern you."
"It concerns me if people are coming to kill me!"
"They aren't coming to kill you," he says. He grips the steering wheel so hard his knuckles are white. "If they wanted you dead you would be dead. They want something else."
"What? What do they want?"
"Enough," he snaps. "You ask too many questions for a girl who is supposed to be invisible."
"I can't be invisible when people are auctioning me off in a warehouse!"
He slams his hand on the steering wheel. "You were not auctioned. You were claimed. There is a difference."
"Claimed by who? By you? Or by this other man?"
"By me," he roars. "Only me. Do you understand?"
He slows the car down. We are climbing the hill back to the villa. Back to the cage.
I look at him. I look at the profile of his face in the dark. He looks angry. But underneath the anger he looks... worried.
He is terrified. The King of Castello Nero is terrified of the man in the South.
I touch the window glass. It’s cold against my fingers.
"Why?" I whisper. "Why are you protecting me? You hate my father. You hate my family. Why start a war for me?"
He doesn't answer. He just stares at the road.
He stops the car at the front entrance. He turns to look at me. His eyes are dark shadows in the gloom.
"Because," he says, and his voice is so low I almost miss it. "Because you are the only thing in this world that my enemy wants more than my blood."
He unlocks the door.
"Go inside, Lilith. And pray that I am enough of a monster to keep you."