Twisted - Esme Devlin Page 0,2

“I promise it’s juicy.”

I sigh. “Go on then. Spill.”

“Well, this is all unconfirmed, of course.” If only she’d mentioned that before I made the bargain.

I would shake my head at her, but she’s brushing my hair into a ponytail so high and tight that it almost burns my scalp. “Apparently, there are important guests tonight. Not your usual mediocre riff-raff. The high-society types.”

I swallow as the familiar heavy feeling settles in my stomach.

For someone like Ruby, the prospect of important visitors means new faces, new opportunities, new stories of the world outside.

For someone like me, it means my time could finally be up.

I’m glad for all the paint because I think my face would be noticeably blanching without it. But paint or not, Ruby has apparently noticed because she’s stopped brushing my hair.

“Shit. Sorry. I didn’t even think. I’ll shut up before I freak you out even more. It’s just something I overheard Conrim saying. It might not be true.”

I smile at my friend’s reflection. “It’s all right. I know.”

She comes beside me and leans her bottom against the edge of the table. “You know it’s bound to happen at some point, right? And you can speak to me about it. Whatever you want to know, I’m here.”

I shake my head, politely declining her offer. She’s right, of course. That’s exactly the reason I’m nervous. Most nights are fine. My price is so high that I’m basically unaffordable. It’s a marketing ploy, masterminded by Maxim. No one can afford to own me, but they’ll pay what they can to feel like they have a little slice of power over my life.

It’s genius… until the day someone walks in with the means to pay.

Thankfully, that day has never come, but it will eventually. “I’ll be fine,” I assure her. “Ready?”

She smiles down at me. “As I’ll ever be, kid.”

2

Baron

Fucking curious.

I admit, I’ve heard a great many things about this place.

They call it a carnival, though it is my understanding that in the old days such things moved around. This place stays exactly where it is. Unmoving. Predictable. A destination.

A target?

Perhaps.

Besides that glaringly obvious difference, it remains true to its namesake in many ways. It is a place people come to be both shocked and entertained.

I say people—I mean men.

I doubt the few women who come here as guests have much choice in the matter.

Famous throughout the world, men flock like sheep to see something spectacular. Something forbidden. Something no one else would have the balls to do.

Except perhaps me.

My guests wanted to come here. They arrived from China four days ago, and since they are here at my request, it would be rude not to indulge them in whatever desires they wish to partake in.

You have to schmooze them.

Andrei’s words, not mine.

I only have one word for it—bullshit.

Four of them. Chen, Leonardo, Dimitri, and Yuanjun. They have years on me and will remember more of the old world than I can. Not that it matters much. Andrei, my second-in-command and the one who invited them, told me they were some hotshot tech-business moguls and the son of an old-world oilman. Apparently, they have the solution to the inconvenience of our electrical grid being about as useful as an ashtray on a dirt bike.

It’s been four days filled with nonsense like this, and I still haven’t heard my solution yet.

But I’ve remained calm.

I’ve remained patient, just as Andrei urged me to.

We’ve been together since we were just boys, but he still does not grasp the extent of just how hard that is for me to do.

And for four entire days, with the end an entirely unknown factor?

I am already sick of them. Of having to keep up the charade. The pretense that in a world full of fucked-up people, I am only just as fucked up as the rest of them, and no more.

It’s like having a pack of rabid Cane Corsos on a leash inside my head and trying to keep them all in a straight line. Exhausting, at best.

Darkness has already fallen by the time we arrive. I have vehicles that are armored and give protection from the things that lurk in broad daylight, but many do not have that luxury, so the performance only ever happens at night.

The opening to the cave looms in the distance, a black hole against an almost-black mountainside, with the spikes of metal bars raised two feet above the ground.

The Carnival Cave.

Someone should give the cunt who named that a medal.

My driver, whose name