Rage consumed me. She was a woman involved with trafficking women—a traitor to her own sex. “How can you, bitch? How can you be a part of this?”
Jagged Scar reached from behind, tapping my cheek in warning. The woman didn’t answer, but averted her eyes. Not from embarrassment, but to secure the leather straps around my forearms. Once secure, she spread my legs into the stirrups and secured my ankles, buckling them so tight the leather bit into my skin like fangs.
Mortification painted my cheeks at being so exposed, so defenceless. I hadn’t even fought.
Through the walls, a scream ripped fast and high, but shut off as quickly as it came. My eyes popped wide. Oh, my God, what was happening?
My breath rasped in the small space, rushed and ragged. The woman secured the mask around her mouth and tore open a sterile packet.
My eyes wanted to close, to avoid knowing what was in the plastic, but I couldn’t look away. I stared with sick fascination as she attached the needle to a pen like contraption, adding a vial of black liquid.
What was that thing?
Jagged Scar grabbed another bottle and doused the underside of my wrist, pushing Brax’s bracelet further up my arm. My heart squeezed in painful loss. Brax. The bracelet was the only thing I had of him. They’d allowed me to keep it. Misplaced thankfulness overwhelmed, at least these bastards hadn’t stolen that, too.
Using a white piece of cotton, Jagged Scar dried my wrist, before nodding at the woman.
She bent over my arm, placing a carbon transfer she plucked from the table, sticking it to damp flesh. She smoothed it against my skin, making sure the image adhered before ripping it off, leaving a purplish outline of a barcode.
Discarding the transfer, she picked up the pen with the black vial and pressed a button. Whirring mechanical noise vibrated.
Shit, they were going to tattoo me! I’d never been inked before, never fell in love with an image enough to want it permanently on my skin, and I definitely didn’t want a barcode.
“Stop!”
Jagged Scar pressed his face close as the sharp nick of the tattoo gun tore into my flesh. Teeny, tiny teeth nipped and sawed.
“Accept that you are no longer a woman. You are merchandise. And merchandise must have a barcode for sale.”
I wanted to spit at him, but refrained. As degrading as it was to be treated like stock, I bit my lip and bore through it. I would get it lasered off as soon as I escaped.
The burn grew fiery hot as seconds turned into minutes.
I was no longer Tess. I was dollar signs.
Finally, the tattoo pen cut off with a snarl. I gasped as the woman smeared some sort of gel over it and wrapped my wrist in plastic.
The black lines looked obscene against my red, swollen skin. My first tattoo and it demoted me from dog to shelf produce. A disposable thing. An item. No more. No less.
My fight deflated, leaving under an avalanche of unhappiness. Every part hurt: my heart, body, and soul. I was sucked deep into the pit where snakes and monsters lived, wallowing in self-pity.
The woman pulled off her gloves and snapped a fresh pair on. She moved to the end of the table, positioning herself between my legs. She turned from tattoo artist to gynaecologist.
Oh, hell, this is too much.
I squeezed my eyes, rolling my head to the side. I willed myself to leave this place, to float and disappear, but her fingers touched and kept me anchored in despair.
She inspected between my legs for an eternity before finally patting my thigh like the good dog I was. I hadn’t barked or nipped. I’d let them own me with not so much as a whimper.
The woman unbuckled my legs, and I scissored them tight, locking my knees together.
Jagged Scar chuckled. “Keeping your legs together won’t save you. There are plenty of other places to violate.”
I gulped, and the clatter of the leather straps hitting the metal table sent goosebumps skittering.
Please, let this humiliating and degrading inspection be over.
I opened my mouth to ask to be released, but the crackle of another sterile packet sky-rocketed my panic.
The woman fumbled with something small before facing me with a cruel smile. The syringe glinted under the spot light. My heart raced. “No. I’ll behave. You don’t have to drug me. Please.”
The thought of living a permanent life in a drug haze terrified me more than the rest of it. The woman didn’t answer and I jerked, trying to get free from the restraints.
I couldn’t look away from the syringe, expecting her to inject whatever it was into my arm, but she didn’t go for that part of my body.
Her latex covered fingers swiped tangled hair off my neck, and stabbed the thick needle into soft flesh behind my ear.
I screamed as a hard bullet shot from the needle, stretching, maiming.
Withdrawing, she giggled, saying something in Spanish to Jagged Scar. She threw the syringe into a bin and picked up an iPhone looking thing. Handing it to Jagged Scar, he waved it over the latest injury. My skin wouldn’t stop throbbing.
A sharp series of beeps filled the room.
“Working, and linked to the barcode,” Jagged Scar muttered.
No! They didn’t. All my courage and hope for escape was ruined. They’d not only branded me, they tagged me, too. Even if I did escape, they could f**king track me.
Tears rushed, desperate to be shed. I didn’t realize how much the thought of escape kept me going. Now, even that had been taken.
I gulped hard, trying to keep my eyes dry. Jagged Scar released my arms, went behind me, and dragged the rope from around my neck.
It took a while to understand I was free, and even longer for my sore body to move.
Jagged Scar helped me upright. I grimaced, holding my ribs, not caring my br**sts were exposed.
I sniffed and tried to sit straighter, but settled for huddling with my eyes down cast. This was the worst day of my life. No, that was wrong. The worse day was the day they took me. When Brax was beaten and left to his fate. A sob bubbled but I swallowed it back. I couldn’t think about Brax, or the nightmare I lived now.
A brown paper bag appeared on my lap. Jagged Scar captured my chin, guiding me to look into his eyes. “Good girl. You give in to your future. Easier, yes?” He caressed my cheek—the first kind touch since I arrived in this hell. After the abuse from Leather Jacket, I wanted to be hugged, tended to. But that would never happen.
Keep fighting, Tess. Never stop fighting.
Heat seeped into my limbs, dispelling aches and bruises. Fighting was all I had left. I wouldn’t give in.