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“She was the highest potential profit on the list based on customer feedback.”

“Well, now you have her! Your high potential profit cunt. So, what the fuck are you going to do with her?” Another slam of something from his end of the line. Marcus was breaking things, and for a moment Anthony wondered if that would help ease these strange sensations making his fist tighten, his

jaw clench.

What would he do with her?

The problem wasn’t a lack of ideas, he had too many things he wanted to do to her. Too many punishments in mind, each more severe than the last — but he didn’t want to kill her. He never killed them.

For a time the girl’s defiance had been entertaining, so much better than the more fragile responses of others they had taken. The quick slide into constant crying, fear. This one had felt like a challenge at first, and he had enjoyed pushing her, bending her further and further, making her suffer.

But by this point every other girl had called him Master. By this point they were desperate to please him. Working on their submission, their behavior, learning to be perfect dolls as he erased their sense of self one punishment at a time.

It was why he’d used the drawer. Kept her in it for days, except for the brief interlude when he’d drugged her and hydrated her to avoid seizures, to ensure her kidneys wouldn’t shut down.

The drawer should have worked.

The drawer always worked.

Yet, she had refused to say the simple word.

Anthony despised it when things didn’t work the way they were supposed to, and this slut was clearly malfunctioning. The drawer should have shattered her mind, left her hopeless and begging — and she had begged, and cried, looking pretty and desolate on the tiny night vision cameras — but each time he had pulled her out, she had defied him.

“I’m going to break her,” he finally answered.

Marcus laughed, broke something else, cursed. “How the fuck do you plan to do that Anthony? No girl has ever lasted this long without submitting, and you think you can fully break her?”

“Yes.” It was a quick response, almost too quick. He hadn’t even thought it through.

Was this his pride showing?

“HOW?” His brother yelled the word, and Anthony tilted his head, cracking the vertebrae in his neck in an effort to relax the tensing muscles.

“She thinks she wants to die… I plan to give her a taste.”

“A taste of dying? What the fuck does that mean?” Marcus was muttering curses, randomly shouting in his rage, but Anthony’s mind was finally clearing. A plan forming, organized and purposeful.

“Watch and see. I will let her recover for a day or so, allow her enough strength so that she can be aware, and then I will break her.”

“What if this fails too, Anthony? What will you do with her?” There was a thread of concern there, a nervousness in his brother’s voice, and it made Anthony smile.

“I’ll destroy her.”

14

Soup and sleep.

Water and rest.

The bed was soft, warm, an extra blanket atop the normal sheet. He hadn’t touched her since he had pulled her from the bathtub and settled her here, and she had only left the cocoon she’d created to use the bathroom.

But everything still hurt.

Beth had explored the whip marks in the mirror, stared into the face that used to be so familiar, but now it had changed. She had changed. Dark circles under dull, bloodshot brown eyes. Cheekbones sharper, lips chapped and dry. It wasn’t her, she felt disconnected from the girl in the mirror, didn’t want to be her.

He was tearing her apart.

More than just physically, the worst of the damage was inside. The parts she could only get a glimpse of when she had the courage to stare into her own eyes — but she couldn’t maintain it for long. It hurt too much.