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CHAPTER 42

LOGAN

T he link to the auction room came through while Sloane and I were sitting anxiously in my office, my laptop open to some protected web browser that supposedly would keep me hidden from the feds. The PI had sent the auction link with a short message: This is your in .

Sloane sat beside me, perched on the edge of the leather chair like it might swallow her whole. Her hand that wasn’t still handcuffed to mine was clasped tightly in her lap, and she kept rubbing her thumb over her palm—a nervous tic I’d noticed she did when she was trying to hold herself together. Her breathing was shallow, her chest rising and falling rapidly, and she was staring at the laptop screen like it was a ticking bomb.

I was staring at it the same way. The auction was about to start, and I still hadn’t heard from Lincoln or received a wire transfer yet. Which meant I was about to start bidding with money I didn’t have.

I clicked on the link, and the screen loaded with a dimly lit room, where a video of Sloane appeared. Sloane gasped and averted her eyes from the tape as it began to play, and my stomach dropped. It was her, but not the Sloane I knew now. This was from before—before me, before anything resembling hope or love in her life. She was wearing some barely-there black lingerie, her walk deliberate and sexual, her expression vacant yet practiced. She was moving toward someone off-screen, and then she slowly sank to her knees.

The bile rose in my throat, and I looked away, unwilling to watch even a past her with another man.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured beside me, and I grabbed her hand.

“Nothing to be sorry for, Red,” I said sternly.

A chime rang out, and I stared at the screen again. The bidding was beginning.

I tightened my grip on the mouse, watching as the numbers began to climb. A million.

Okay, I could pay that myself.

Two million.

Five million.

Fuck.

The numbers began to make my head spin as I struggled to comprehend that this was an actual thing, buying people like this. There wasn’t a number that equaled what Sloane was worth—what any human being was worth.

But it was still money I didn’t have.

I glanced frantically at my phone, desperate to see something from Lincoln. But there was still nothing there.

Fuck. Where was he?

Sloane gripped my arm, her nails digging into my skin. “Logan. You have to pay immediately if you win. You can’t make a bid if you can’t pay it. Please. Don’t even try.”

“He’s going to come through,” I told her, even though my own panic was building with every second that passed.

The screen showed the bids accelerating, the numbers leaping higher, faster. My chest tightened with every increase, fury…and fear bubbling under the surface.

Nine million. Ten million.

I leaned back, my jaw clenched.

Thirteen million.

Fourteen.

The countdown clock to the end of the auction was ticking in the corner of the screen, every second dragging out like an eternity. Finally, the bids slowed, hovering just under fifteen million. I sat there, staring at the screen, my hand trembling over the mouse as the final seconds ticked away.

And then it stopped.

Fifteen million.

“Logan. Please. I might as well be dead if something were to happen to you because of me. Don’t click that button,” Sloane begged.

I swallowed, an icy resolve sliding through me.

And then I clicked the button signaling I was making a bid.

Sloane was sobbing next to me when the screen shifted, showing a message that the auction had ended. My chest heaved as I exhaled, not realizing until that moment that I’d been holding my breath.

I’d won.

I glanced at my phone screen desperately. But it was still blank.

A second later, wire instructions popped up on the laptop screen and a five-minute timer began.

“I have to call Everett, Logan. I have to tell him to start the auction over. Please, you don’t understand.”

She tried to grab her phone, but I pushed it out of her reach.

Lincoln was going to come through. He had to.

Fifty seconds left…

“Come on, come on,” I muttered under my breath, my fingers hovering over the keyboard. I had everything ready, but without the funds, it was pointless.

My phone buzzed.

Lincoln.

The message was short and to the point: Done. Wire it.

“Holy shit,” I breathed, my hands moving on autopilot as I entered the transfer details. My fingers flew over the keyboard, sweat slicking my palms. Five seconds. Four. My heart was pounding so hard it felt like it might burst. Three. Two.

The confirmation screen popped up.

Transaction complete.

I sat back in the chair, my chest heaving as I stared at the screen. The auction was over. The final bid was mine. She was mine.

She was safe .

Fifteen fucking million.

I’d figure out how to pay Lincoln back later. But we’d done it, Sloane was free.

Sloane was gaping in disbelief at the screen, her face pale, her cheeks still streaked with tears.

Before either of us could say anything, her phone rang. The same fucking phone that had started all of this.

Sloane stared at Everett’s name on the screen, but she didn’t make any move to reach for it.

“You did it,” she choked out, her voice trembling. “You won the auction.”

I grabbed the key out of my pocket and unhooked the handcuff from her wrist with a quiet click . She didn’t move, her gaze searching mine, tears still streaming silently down her face.

“And now you’re free,” I said, my voice low and rough. “It’s over, Sloane. You’re done. No one gets to decide what happens to you ever again.”

Her breath hitched, and for a moment, we just sat there, the weight of everything that had happened pressing down on both of us. Then she collapsed against me, her body shaking as she sobbed into my chest. I wrapped my arms around her, holding her as tightly as I could, as if that alone could erase every awful thing that had brought us to this moment.

“You’re free,” I whispered again, my voice breaking. “You’re mine, but only because you want to be.”

She blinked, and one last tear slipped down her cheek.

“I’m yours.”