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He was the kind of man Alex had always hated – humourless and relentlessly heterosexual. The former made him dull, and the latter rendered him immune to Alex’s attempts to charm his way out of his exercises.

“You’ll report here every day, and you won’t be allowed to leave until you’ve performed every single exercise I set for you,” Mason barked.

“What if I’m ill, or, you know, can’t be arsed?” Alex said petulantly.

“I don’t care if you’re fucking well dying – you’ll do every single exercise I’ve given you,” Mason retorted as he uploaded the programme to the smartwall, which displayed every exercise, complete with guide videos showing him how to perform them. “Understood?”

Alex shrugged.

Mason took two threatening steps towards him. “Understood?” he barked again, his moustache so close that Alex could almost feel the bristles.

He stepped back and gave Mason a withering look. “Oh, yeah. I understand,” he said, as insolently as he could manage.

“You’re a sorry excuse for a man,” Mason yelled. “If I have to drag you from your deathbed to make you work out, then I will. Don’t fucking try and pull any shit with me, or you’ll regret it. I’m not one of the pussy boys you’re used to – you’ll soon learn who you’re dealing with.”

“Aw, bless. You think you’re special, darling,” Alex drawled in his best camp voice.

“Listen, Muscleman, I’ve been expelled from three of the top boys’ boarding schools in this country.

I’ve eaten their shitty food, run their lousy cross-country courses, and been bawled at by their sadistic phys ed teachers.

I’ve met plenty of men like you. You’re not special, you’re not unique – you’re not even close.

” Leaning forward, he planted a kiss on Mason’s cheek, then ducked out of reach .

However, much like his old PE teachers, Mason soon took his revenge by making him do press-ups for the rest of the session.

When he returned to his room, he was startled to see that the walls were now a vibrant orange.

Tyler, true to his word, was showing him just how much control he had over Alex’s environment.

His bedroom walls changed colour every day thereafter – sometimes several times a day.

The walls might be blue when he left to enter his en-suite bathroom, only to be yellow when he returned half an hour later.

If Tyler meant it to be disconcerting, it backfired.

Alex was glad of the variety, because otherwise everything was the same.

The same monotonous routine every day: breakfast, gym, lunch, downtime, and then dressing for dinner.

This last was enforced, even though it was just him and Solange sitting down to eat.

He went along with each and every indignity, aware that they were minor compared to what awaited him.

It was one thing to allow Lorenzo to shave and style him, but was he really going to sweet-talk one of Tyler’s “guests”, take them to bed, and fuck them?

Could he do that? And what would happen to him if he refused?

He didn’t consciously stop eating, but a great lethargy came over him in the following days.

He’d lost several pounds in prison as his stomach seemed to have stopped telling him when he was hungry – or if it did, he wasn’t listening.

He would walk to the kitchen three times a day and sit down.

Food would be put in front of him, but he’d push it around the plate, barely able to manage more than a few bites.

Solange tried to make conversation, but when he could be bothered to reply, he only wanted to hurt her.

“Is this place just for us whores?” he asked one morning.

“I mean, I’ve been here a fortnight, and the only other indies I’ve seen are Lorenzo, Mason, Chef, and the goons, and none of them seem to live here.

” He gestured in the direction of his two guards.

One was standing by the door, while the other sat at the breakfast bar, sipping a cup of coffee.

They did have names, but he couldn’t be bothered to remember them, so he’d taken to calling them Scarface and Fatso instead.

Neither of them had so far risen to the provocation.

They did shift rotations with two other guards, to whom he’d given equally facetious nicknames.

“It’s the suite Tyler keeps for entertaining his clients,” Solange told him, pouring a glass of orange juice. “It’s our job to make them comfortable; we’re the only people who actually live here.”

“Where do the rest of Tyler’s indies live?” he asked.

“There’s a dormitory level on the floor below. Most of them sleep there, in shifts. Conditions up here are much nicer.”

“Aren’t we the lucky ones,” he said bitterly.

“As a matter of fact, we are. Downstairs, nobody even has their own bed, let alone their own room. The major-domo, Mr Drummond, runs Tyler’s IS programme like clockwork.

They’re assigned a bed at night depending on who is working where.

The beds are packed in, dozens to a room.

They’re just a place to sleep when the indies aren’t working. ”

Alex noticed Scarface peeking over the top of his coffee mug, gazing at Solange intently as she spoke.

“You don’t want to get on the wrong side of the major-domo, sonny,” the man said, getting up to pour the dregs of his coffee into the sink. “He might look like a banker, but he hits like a boxer. No IS gets on his bad side, not even the security detail – and we don’t scare easy.”

“Thanks for the unwanted advice, Scarface,” Alex snapped.

“You should listen if you want to get by in here.” Scarface glanced at Solange. “You tell him, Miss Solange,” he added in a gentler tone. “For his own sake.”

“He’s right,” Solange said.

“Seriously?” Alex rolled his eyes. “Come on! George Tyler’s IS programme gets monitored by the IS Agency, just like my father’s and everyone else’s. It might not be nice, but it can’t be as bad as you’re making out.”

Solange gave him a worried look. “Tyler doesn’t run his IS programme like your father runs his, Alex. Most people don’t. If you hadn’t walked through life with your eyes closed, then you’d know that. You screw up here, and the consequences won’t be pretty. ”

“Forgive me for not taking the advice of the person who lied to me for years on end,” he snapped.

“You should listen to her,” Scarface advised. “She knows what it’s like here. You need to get your head around the fact that you’re not free anymore, sonny. You’re just an IS with a job to do now – and Tyler will make you do it.”

“Be his whore you mean, like her?” Alex jerked his head at Solange, noticing the little wince that passed across the guard’s face at his choice of words.

“When does the whoring actually start?” he asked, throwing the word out again to enjoy Scarface’s reaction.

“So far, all I’ve done is work out and sit around in this place. ”

“Tyler’s guests are important people, and he needs them onside for a reason,” Solange said. “I doubt he’ll let you get close to one until he’s sure you’ll… perform.”

“I’ll be interested to see how he’s going to make me,” Alex drawled, with more bravado than he felt. “I mean, it’s a bit different for you. My anatomy might not actually work to order.”

“You’d better hope it does,” Scarface said. “Would you like more coffee, Miss Solange? Mason will be here soon.”

“No thanks. I’m good.” She shot him a grateful smile, and Alex noticed how his cheeks reddened.

After breakfast, they went to the gym for their daily session with Mason.

The trainer viewed fitness as a quantifiable resource to be measured, weighed, and achieved with the help of copious charts and spreadsheets that he updated daily and displayed on the smartwall.

Baiting the dour despot had become one of Alex’s favourite pastimes.

Mason had a habit of barking orders that Alex liked to pretend he hadn’t understood, causing Mason to repeat them ever more frenziedly.

He hated completing Mason’s charts showing how many weights he’d lifted and how far he’d run each day, so he took to making them up, filling them with false data whenever Mason was busy supervising Solange, and enjoying a small thrill of triumph from the rebellion.

Today, though, it appeared that rebellion hadn’t gone unnoticed, because Mason wasn’t alone: Tyler was with him, and they were both studying Alex’s charts on the smartwall.

Beside him was a tall, muscular, bald man dressed immaculately in the Tyler livery of black shirt and tie – Alex noticed a thick leather strap hanging from his belt.

Solange stiffened and gave a little jerk of her head in warning, so Alex assumed the bald guy must be the major-domo she’d referred to at breakfast. He wasn’t afraid. He’d endure any beatings Tyler and his sidekick wanted to hand out; he had nothing left to lose.

“So, we have a problem,” Tyler said as Alex and Solange entered the room.

“Do we ?” Alex emphasised sarcastically.

“Yup. Mason says you’re fucking with his charts, and you don’t do your exercises properly, and Chef says you don’t eat a bloody thing he puts in front of you, so you’re skin and bone, which…

” Tyler took a step back and surveyed Alex for a second.

“While lending you a certain waifish charm, can’t go on. You need to eat.”

“I’m not hungry.” Alex shrugged.

Tyler glared at him. “I expected a certain amount of bullshit to begin with, but I didn’t spend a hundred and sixty million quid to watch you starve to death. You’ll do what I want, when I want.”

“Make me,” he challenged.

The entire room suddenly went very quiet.

“This is my major-domo, Mr Drummond.” Tyler gestured to the man beside him. “You might have noticed his strap. Do you know why he uses this particular one?” He held out his hand, and Drummond passed him the length of leather.

“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Alex said defiantly, waiting for the first blow. At this point, he thought he’d actively welcome the pain.