Page 79

Ivy

Layingin the blackness that consumed me, my body jumped and rocked as we drove over bumps and dips in the road. I didn't know how far we had to go to get to the yard, and I didn't know what we'd find when we got there.

But I did know whose face I'd see.

And that made my blood boil.

Remo wouldn't let me go, he wouldn't give in and relinquish his control of me.

No. He wanted what he wasn't ever going to get.

My virginity.

Dante had that, that was the one piece of me he would always have.

I felt the car roll to a stop, the music was still going strong, but it was the first time the vehicle wasn't moving.

Anticipation clawed its way through my body. Waiting for the trunk to open, my nerves electrified, I wondered what face would greet me.

But then we started driving again, and every inch of me was still crawling with nausea. I didn't want to see anyone else, I didn't want to be met with the eyes of pure evil; I only wanted Dante.

The engine still hummed just enough for me to feel its strength through the thin carpeted floor, the jerk of the car caused my body to rock violently as Dante turned a sharp left.

How much longer will this last?

I searched the trunk when we first started the trip for anything at all that I could use. Call it instinct kicking in and the feral need to protect myself had slipped out. The thought of killing myself had briefly crept into my mind and as sick as it sounds, the thought made me momentarily happy.

The idea that if I could control my own death and take that from Remo, too, just like I had chosen to let Dante take my innocence, I'd be the one in control. I'd hold the power that Remo wanted to wield over my head.

But as the thought entered and fluttered around for a second, I slapped it down.

I wasn't going to do that even if I could. I'm strong and I can still survive this. That I was sure of. If I had made it this long, I could go longer.

I'll admit it was a weak moment. But you have to understand what I was up against. I was about to be handed back to the man who beat me, broke me, and stole all the humanity I had. He turned me into his pet, a woman that was being groomed for the ultimate betrayal: contracted rape.

And I was sure that after all this, Remo would have no problem taking out his anger on me. He'd blame me in some way for what the Pisanis did.

Why wouldn't he?

And once he learned that my captor—the trader to his associate Bane—had the luxury of taking the one and only he thing he wanted . . .

I was dead.

I wasn't proud that I allowed my mind to drift to such an ungodly release of myself.

Strength had been my only weapon. I wasn't going to let it fail me now.

It was my every day that I wouldn't have power over, it was the world around me that I wouldn't ever be able to control again.

But my life . . . That was mine.

My soul had been released, my body was Remo's to take.

Let him have the empty shell that once breathed and lived. He couldn't touch me on the inside, I was in hiding deep within these walls.

Suddenly the music shut off, the car slowly stopped again, and I felt the engine shut down.

My heart started to race inside my chest, my mind scrolling through images of what the next moments could be like. The moment I was handed over, the second Remo's skin touched mine again.