Highest Bidder Collection - Lauren Landish Page 0,166

my face and give her a long languid lick.

“And your body?”

“You, Master.”

I suck her clit, moving her hand to the back of my head. And then her other. Letting her know she can touch me, she can lead me.

I pull away slightly, her fingers spearing my hair.

“And your pleasure? Who does that belong to?” I ask.

“You, Master.”

I’m a selfish prick for allowing it. But I make a promise to myself that once she’s healed, I’ll let her go. There are only fifteen days left.

I won’t break her.

I’ll only heal her and then let her walk away.

“Tonight it belongs to you, kitten.” I lick her once and then look into her beautiful eyes glazed with desire. “Take it from me.”

“Katia, what does being a Master mean?” I ask her as I lay her in bed.

“It means you own someone. Mind, body and soul. They belong to you completely. And their Slaves desire it. They are complete with their Master.”

“Is that all, kitten?” I ask her.

“I don’t know, Master,” she answers in a hushed voice, exhausted from the long night. She’s so very close to understanding.

Chapter 26

Katia

I lie still in bed, my eyes wide open and staring at the ceiling. Just like I have the last few nights. The terrors don’t come in my dreams. Now they flash before my eyes as soon as I lie down.

The soft sounds of the night turn into something else. The chirps of the crickets morph into the drips of water from the pipe in the dungeon. It leaked every fucking day I was in there. Drip, drip, drip. In my mind it became a part of my fucking punishment. No daylight, and never any quiet.

But the sound I keep hearing over and over in my head is different. The sound that keeps me wide awake and on edge is the sound of metal. Of the chain scraping on the bare concrete floor.

The chain. Always the chain.

They’d drag me by them, either the one on my ankle or the one on my throat. Choking off my air supply, not caring whether they broke my neck or how much pain it caused me. I can still feel it now, biting into my tender flesh as I’m dragged across the concrete floor. My thighs would scrape against the floor as I was dragged, opening wounds and causing nasty abrasions that would last for days. I learned to be good because of those chains.

The ankle was worse, because even when they weren’t there, I was enslaved by it. And the scratching of the chain followed me everywhere; the pain in my ankle from the shackle was a constant in the four years I spent there.

I sit up with my hands clenched, anger consuming me in my darkened bedroom, sweat covering my forehead. There’s a stream of moonlight coming through the window, making it easy to see. Everything seems so easy to see in this moment.

I rip the covers off to gaze at my anklet. My heart skips a beat the sight. It's gleaming in the moonlight, seeming to taunt me. Rage fills me. I hate it. I hate this. I hate what those bastards did to me. I could never take the anklet off. Ever. Tears fill my eyes, but I refuse to acknowledge them. Instead I stare at the blurred vision of the beautiful anklet. I’m still imprisoned, still under his control. The thought sends a chill through my body. He doesn’t own me.

He never owned me. Never!

I clench my teeth as a fiery rage boils up from the pits of my stomach, spurring me to rip off the anklet. I nearly scream with frustration as my fingernails cut into the tender skin as I try to get this fucking thing off of me.

Get it off!

The tiny cuts are nothing; they can’t scar me any worse than I already am.

Because of him.

Because of this! I scramble from my bed, the anklet in my hand, staring at it as though it’s him. The sparking of the crystals are akin to his gleaming smile. Always smiling. I made him so happy. A sickness stirs in my stomach. I hear his laugh, smell his breath. Even the night I murdered him, just moments before I stabbed him, plunging the shard of glass deep into his throat over and over, even then he was smiling.

I rush over to the nightstand and set it down gently, ever so gently even though my hands are trembling. I quickly grab the lamp sitting next to