I offer her a slow nod, in which she returns, and then I look away.
Emilio takes a seat on the sofa directly across from me; his cold dark gaze never falters; he rests his back comfortably against the sofa, props his right leg on his left knee at the ankle, revealing black dress socks between the hem of his pants and the shiny black of his dress shoes. His fingers interlock casually over his stomach.
I turn to the fake Francesca as she’s making her way around the desk.
“I prefer to do business only with you,” I tell her.
“We’re sure you do,” Emilio says icily, and with an expression to match, “but the Madam isn’t going to be left alone in a room with you, Mr. Augustin.” He gestures a hand, palm up, at the fake Francesca. “There she is—take it or leave it.”
I lick the dryness from my lips slowly; I may have to change things up a bit, reveal parts of Mr. Augustin in front of these people that I’ve been reserving for Francesca, just to get my time alone with her.
The fake Francesca takes a seat in the leather rolling chair behind the desk.
“I can assure you,” she says, “that my brother will not interfere in our business transaction.” She looks over at Emilio and adds without taking her eyes off him, “If he does, I’ll deal with him personally.” She smiles at me and says, “He does have a tendency to be a bastard; hasn’t learned yet when it’s best not to be himself.”
Wow, you’re really treading dangerous waters playing your role, Whoever You Are—Emilio seethes beneath the surface; his eyes wide, his hard-pressed mouth tightening, his interlocked fingers practically turning purple on his lap. And I can’t tell if the fake Francesca is enjoying the opportunity to ruffle Emilio’s feathers, or if she’s worried about what he might do to her later to get her back, because she seems to be playing her role as flawlessly now as any one of us.
I smile faintly at Emilio, just for good measure, and of course he wants to kill me for it.
“Bianca,” the fake Francesca says to the left-handed servant girl, “be a good girl and offer our guests a drink.”
Bianca bows her head and then steps away from the other servant, moving toward the bar on the far side of the room to do as she was told.
Miz Ghita finally sits down on the loveseat to join the rest of us.
“So, Mr. Augustin,” the fake Francesca begins, “why don’t we start with the particulars of the kind of girl you’re looking to purchase? I must say, we were all a bit surprised that you saw nothing you liked in the showing.” She glances briefly at Izabel and Nora. “We’re just having a difficult time understanding your preferences.” Someone like Francesca Moretti would never say ‘we’ when referring to her business or her guests; she would never have to scold her brother in front of guests because her brother would never give her reason to; the real Francesca Moretti would not only insist she deal with me privately, but she’d demand it, because she wouldn’t fear me. And Emilio would never look at the real Francesca the way he has looked at the fake one twice tonight, as if he were imagining his hands around her throat—it’s kind of disappointing that this feared family is so utterly fucking stupid when it comes to trying to hide the identity of their leader. I couldn’t be one hundred percent sure before, but now I know exactly who the real Francesca is.
“Actually,” Emilio cuts in, pointing upward, “before we go any further, I think Mr. Augustin should prove he is who he says he is.” He looks right at me, challenging me.
“I thought that had already been established,” I say, giving all of my attention to the fake Francesca just to spite Emilio more. “You’ve done your background check on my name, my business; you’ve made your phone calls; looked into my earnings and tax information I know for the past ten years at least—what more is there to prove?”
“Anyone with the means,” Emilio says, “can make up an identity as secure as yours appears to be—but that doesn’t mean shit.”
Funny how the most irritating one of the Moretti bunch also seems to be the smartest. Except for the real Francesca, who I believe will be the one of them all who’ll inevitably make my role a lot harder to play.
“You could be a police officer,” Emilio accuses. He pauses and adds, “Or an undercover agent from any number of organizations searching for a missing person who your client believes we’re in possession of—that is why you’re looking for a particular girl, is it not?”
You’re really onto something, Emilio, and I give you credit for being too close to the truth for your own good, but I’m sorry it’s not gonna work out for you tonight.
I smile and reach for a glass of whiskey from the tray offered by the servant girl. She offers Izabel the same.
“No thank you,” Izabel declines.
The servant moves across the short space toward Miz Ghita and the nameless decoy on the loveseat, offering them a drink; only the nameless decoy takes a glass; she brings it to her painted lips and watches me over the rim as she takes a small sip.
“That’s an interesting observation, Mr. Moretti,” I say casually, take a sip and then add, “but if you really did your research on me—and I’m sure that you did—then you’d know about my brush with American law ten years ago when I was among five other buyers busted in a sex-slave raid in Los Angeles.” I set the glass on the table beside me.
“Busted,” Emilio points out, “but later released from prison—undercover agents always get busted with the real criminals and then are later released.” He thinks he has me.
The servant girl goes over to Emilio next; he looks up at her, nods, and takes a glass from the tray, and then she moves toward the fake Francesca sitting behind the desk.
“Yes,” I say with another confident smile, “but I was busted with my cock inside one of the girls on sale that night—come on now, Emilio, you and I both know that if I was undercover, and I wasn’t one of the criminals, I never would’ve gone as far in the role as to actually fuck the merchandise. Cops, agents, they’ll go as far as harming themselves undercover; snorting shit up their noses, pumping their veins full of drugs, even takin’ a beating, but they won’t hurt or violate anyone innocent.”
Emilio bites down on the inside of his mouth.
I smile a little more—I like fucking with this guy; have to admit he’s put a little sunshine in my bad mood as of late.
“Well let’s just see you prove it,” Emilio states, drinks back all the whiskey from his glass and then slams it down on the table beside him.
Raising his back from the sofa, he leans forward and props his elbows on the top of his legs, interlocking his fingers between them. He looks at Nora first, but then his dark eyes fall on Izabel, and I don’t like what he’s thinking—don’t need to be able to read minds to get a general idea of what’s going on inside his head.
He turns his attention to the second servant girl who has been standing in the room quietly, waiting to be given any number of orders.
“Come here, girl,” Emilio tells her with the gesture of his fingers, curling them toward him.
The girl walks over to Emilio without hesitation.
“Emilio, I do not think that is—” Miz Ghita says but is cut off; Emilio’s hand shoots up, quieting her.
“Not now, Mother,” he snaps, but never takes his hooded eyes off me. “If the rest of you were doing your job, I wouldn’t have to do it for you.” He looks up at the girl. “Take off your dress.”
The girl takes off her dress and stands naked before him; creamy light brown skin; soft, supple, with a slender waist and curvy hips; dark hair tumbles down the center of her back.
“Your turn,” he says to me and his eyes fall on Izabel.
I don’t like where this is going.
“Naomi is off limits,” I tell Emilio. “I don’t care what you’re trying to prove, but it won’t be with her.” Without looking at Nora I tell her, “Aya, stand and take off your dress.”
Nora stands without hesitation and removes her dress.
Miz Ghita and the
fake Francesca make a strange breathy noise that sounds like a suppressed gasp when Nora’s heavily scarred back is revealed—the nameless decoy remains undisturbed. Streaks of raw skin, pink and gray and ropy, crisscross her back in a pattern of chaos and brutality, from the top of her shoulders to the top of her ass. Some scars—put there by Fredrik Gustavsson—are still fresh, not yet smooth but are rigid and scabbed with areas red, inflamed. And just like Nora’s missing pinky finger, this too will work to my advantage, otherwise I never would’ve agreed to bring Nora on this mission. She’s too physically damaged to be considered suitable property; especially the kind of property a master would take with him to social gatherings.
Seems even Emilio is taken aback by Nora’s appearance; he gawks at her, even looks a bit aghast. And Bianca, the left-handed servant girl, can’t help but look right at Nora, though thankfully for her I’m the only one in the room who seems to notice her disobedience.
The Moretti family may have both feet planted firmly in the sex slave trade, but they, like many high-class sellers—even the masters—would never beat a girl as severely as Nora clearly has been beaten. Her scars are vibrant evidence of torture, and torture is not the same thing as punishment. A master can’t sell a girl who looks like Nora—except to a sick bastard like Niklas Augustin. And this is where I will undoubtedly gain the interest of the real Francesca and finally get her alone. Because the notorious Madam Francesca Moretti, I believe, is just like Niklas Augustin. At least I fucking hope so, because what I’m about to do next will either secure my private meeting, or get me tossed out of this place on my ass.
After a long moment with no one saying anything, I look to Emilio and say casually, “You were saying, Mr. Moretti?” I cock my head gently to one side.
He pauses, looks at Nora’s back, then looks at me again.
“Some of those wounds are new,” he points out the obvious.
I nod.
Emilio’s eyes dart from one person to the next.
“Oh, don’t tell me,” I say, “you’ve never had to beat one of your girls almost to the brink of death, Mr. Moretti.” My gaze is calm and collected, sadistic.
Emilio rests his back against the sofa again, straightens his suit jacket, props his right ankle atop the left knee.
“I haven’t personally, no,” he answers. “I like my girls…unblemished, Mr. Augustin.”
Maybe you do, Emilio, but your big bad murderous sister, I think takes pleasure in beating girls to the edges of their lives.
Miz Ghita stands from the leather loveseat.
“Mr. Augustin,” she says, rounding her chin, “I’ve already had a discussion with you about how—”
“Yes, I remember,” I cut in without looking at her, “you told me Madam Francesca won’t do business with someone who disfigures a piece she has spent far too much money, time and resources molding to perfection—your warning remains perfectly clear in my memory.” Finally I look right at Miz Ghita, and add with uncompromising eyes, “But I’m not looking to buy a piece, as I’ve told you; I’m in the market to buy a cyprian.”
“Well just the same—“
“No,” I interrupt again, displaying for the real Francesca the one of us—me or her mother—who’s in control here. “I’m confident that Madam Francesca will do business with me, no matter what I intend to do with my property after I’ve paid for it.” My gaze roves about the room, drinking in almost every set of eyes. I reach into my suit jacket pocket and pull out a pack of cigarettes, pop one between my lips and light it. And while Miz Ghita stares at me, appalled by my rude, disgusting gesture, I continue with the upper-hand, puffing happily on my cigarette. “But spare me the self-righteous spiel about how the Madam cares about the safety and health of her cyprians, or the pieces she sells in her showings—I’m not here to report her to some fucking underground Health Board, or write her establishment up on code violations. I don’t give a shit about the way Madam Francesca chooses to treat her slaves—I don’t give two fucks if she kills them, slowly, or if she feeds the leftovers to her dogs. I’m here, as I’ve said before, to do business with the Madam, and only the Madam.”
Silence falls over the room like a stifling blanket.
I take a long drag from my cigarette and then drop it in my whiskey glass.
Niklas
“Now,” I say to a snarling Emilio, “I’d like to get this business meeting underway, unless…you have anything else you’d like to add to further waste my and Madam Francesca’s time?” I motion my hand toward Nora and the other naked servant girl. “Shall we move this along?”
Without moving his head, Emilio looks to the fake Francesca. She nods at him, and then he turns back to me. Seconds later, he’s breaking apart the button on his dress pants.
Ah, OK so he wants to play dirty—literally. Too bad for Nora.
“I take it,” Emilio says, provoking me, sliding down his zipper, “you’re not the modest type.”
His cock is in his hand, I can tell without having to look directly at it.
I start to break apart the button on my dress pants, go as far as fitting my fingers around it, but then I stop. I look around the room at each and every person slowly, and then find Emilio’s eyes again.
“No,” I answer, “I’m not the modest type—but I have to warn you”—I look at his cock inquisitively, purse my mouth on one side and raise a brow, then look back up at his darkening expression—“you might regret it afterward.”
His face tightens and his Adam’s apple bounces in his throat.
I leave my cock in my pants and say, “But you’re not the one in this room I need to prove myself to. When I have Francesca Moretti’s full attention, when she and I are standing face to face, only then, and only for her will I play these fucking games to prove I am who I say I am.”
Emilio and Miz Ghita simultaneously look over at the fake Francesca sitting behind the desk—the nameless decoy still doesn’t take her eyes off me. The fake Francesca’s dainty shoulders rise and fall with a heavy breath. She stands from the chair and walks around the desk toward me. I remain seated as she approaches—a sign of disrespect that doesn’t go unnoticed.
“Aren’t you going to stand, Mr. Augustin,” Miz Ghita says from the loveseat, “so you can be face to face with the Madam?”
I smile darkly. “I will when the real Madam is the one standing in front of me.”
Three pairs of eyes—Emilio, Miz Ghita and the fake Francesca—bounce to and from one another in a nervous, stunned motion.
The fake Francesca tries to regain control of the moment; she tosses her head back elegantly and says with light laughter, “What an absurd accusation. You come here to my home, drink my whiskey, take up space in one of my showings by not bidding on anything, and I still agree to meet with you afterward, and now you call me an imposter?” She snarls and twirls her hand in front of her at the wrist. “I think your time is up here, Mr. Augustin. Mother, show him and his…companions to the door.”
She starts to walk away, but stops when I say, “I’ll only leave if the real Francesca tells me to.”
Emilio stands up, tucks himself back inside his pants, and moves toward me.
“It’s time you leave,” he insists, looking me in the eyes, unblinking, daring me to piss him off, which I hope I fucking do.
“Madam Francesca,” I call out, “if you want me to leave, all you have to do is say so and I’ll go quietly.”
Miz Ghita comes toward me now; her long black dress swishing about her hurried legs.
“You have worn out your welcome, Mr. Augustin,” she says with acid in her voice. Then she points at the fake Francesca standing beside Emilio. “You’ve disrespected the Madam, and that will not be tolerated.”
“Oh, but I haven’t disrespected the Madam,” I correct her smugly. “In fact, I’ve hardly said a single word to her since I stepped into this mansion.” I walk slowly away and begin to pace the floor, moving around Nora’s naked body, my hands clasped behind me, resting
on my backside. “There is only one person in this room who can be the real Francesca Moretti, and although I have to say you did a decent job concealing her identity with all of the lookalikes running around”—I stop pacing and motion to the fake Francesca, afterwards the nameless decoy—“but the truth is that Francesca Moretti is far too beautiful to resemble any of them.” Both of the decoys’ mouths tighten; their faces rife with insult, staring me down, but saying nothing.
“Then tell us,” Miz Ghita challenges, “since you think you’re so smart, who in this room are you implying?”
Both sides of my mouth turn up slightly; I bring my hands around from my backside and fold them down in front of me.
My eyes slowly sweep the room, and at last fall on the left-handed servant girl they call Bianca.
“She is the real Francesca Moretti,” I announce, locking eyes with the so-called favorite slave—she does the same to me, further proving that I’m right. “She has been with either you, Miz Ghita, or the fake Francesca since I arrived; she was the first and only servant girl to approach me in the great hall to serve me wine; she has been in earshot of just about every conversation I’ve had, allowing her to study me; and when she served Emilio a glass of whiskey just moments ago he actually looked her in the eyes and nodded as if to thank her—he wouldn’t have spared the effort if she were a mere slave girl.” Emilio, realizing his error, inhales deeply and glances at the floor. “And when Aya’s scars were put on display,” I continue, “Bianca raised her eyes, afraid of no one in this room reprimanding her for it, just to take in what the rest of us were seeing.” I pause and smile, and then look only at the real Francesca, undoubtedly—almost—the most beautiful woman in this room: dressed like a slave; no makeup; perfect in every way with flowing dark chocolate hair that falls past her waist; creamy skin the color of light caramel; bewitching brown eyes that are black in the right light; and full lips that are plump and shaped like a Cupid’s bow.