Auction

There, I am tended to. They examine my pussy, clean it carefully. Tore is particularly affectionate, holding me close and kissing my hair and my face and telling me what a good girl I was for him.

I curl up in his arms and I let them do with me as they will. I am exhausted on every level. I crave rest and quiet. I need time to understand what just happened, and who I now am.

All there is left to do is sleep. I have not been awake for very long, but exhaustion and satisfaction take their toll.

The sex was brutal. It has left me feeling ravaged, utterly taken apart—but also more complete. Nothing has ever felt that way, not any of the caresses, orgasms at the hands of the others, my own fingers could not begin to touch the depths Tore's cock just found.

"Are you sore?"

I nod a little. He makes a sympathetic little sound. "Get some cream for her..."

I don't know who he's talking to. I curl up against his chest and I let them do what they need to do. Large hands spread my thighs, a warm cloth finds my sex. I whimper a little, but it doesn't feel bad. It feels nice to be taken care of, and when the warm cloth becomes a cooling cream, that too has an effect.

There is no fight left in me. I am not broken, but I am drained.

"So quiet now," Tore muses, tipping my chin up so I look him in the eye. "But no less dangerous, I'd bet."

I don't know if that's true.

"Who are you?"

The question leaves my lips softly. I do not know these men. I especially do not know this man, the first to ever breach the innermost parts of my person. Tore ripped my virginity away from me, turned it into a spectacle for the crowd. I should hate him. Perhaps I do.

"Tore Olsen," he says. "That's my full name. You already know what I am, a mercenary."

"Did you come to kill the sheriff?"

"Perceptive little thing," he smirks. "My associates and I came here on a contract."

"So you will be paid for the sheriff's death?"

"Very well."

"But I was the one who took his life."

"And you shall share in the spoils." He smiles at me. Looking into the pale blue of his eyes, I feel a chill prickling across my skin and down my spine. This man is ruthless. They all are. They came here dealing death for money, and now they have me.

"So who will become leader now?"

"That is not a question for us to answer."

"But you know."

"I do not," he says, wrapping his big protective arm around my waist. "There are many possibilities. It may be that one of the men who paid us will..."

"How many men paid you to kill the sheriff?"

"Fifteen, in total, I think."

"Indeed," Tore says.

"I want my cut."

He lets out a laugh. "Easy, girl. You'll have what you need."

"I don't want what I need. I want what I'm owed." I snap my fingers beneath his nose. "Pay up."

"This is starting to become far less cute," he warns in a growl.

"What is?" Silver dips in, interjecting without any sense of shame, or acknowledgement of the moment we were having.

"I want my money. And I want my clothes. And I want... whatever else I can think of when the time comes," I say, pushing up and away from Tore. I grab the blanket that was put over me and wrap it around myself. "I was feeling bad about what I did. Now I know one of you was going to do it anyway."

Silver smiles one of those enigmatic smirks. "A business-minded young woman, aren't you. You think you should get what you're owed?"

"I do!"

I absolutely want my money. I have been poor for a very long time. If I had riches, I could hire guards, support myself. I could be free and independent. I could have the life my parents always planned for me.

"What if you're owed more than money?"

His voice is low and enticing. His eyes seem to flash as they draw me in. There is something magnetic about Silver, something I can't draw my attention away from.

"What do you mean?"

"What if you're owed sex? What if you're owed ownership? What if you need to belong to a group of men capable of handling you? You're a dangerous, wild little thing, Trissa, but we will succeed where others have failed."