Total pages in book: 208
Estimated words: 207002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1035(@200wpm)___ 828(@250wpm)___ 690(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 207002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1035(@200wpm)___ 828(@250wpm)___ 690(@300wpm)
Only pain could do that.
The pain of my missing limb.
The pain of the buckles around my thigh and the clunky carved foot that was shoved inside a polished shoe Cem had insisted was used to hide the fact that his son and heir was damaged.
Damaged by him.
Hacked into pieces by him.
I knew he disliked that I wasn’t whole.
That I was disabled, for use of a better word.
But it hadn’t stopped him from publicly announcing me as his next in line.
I wore the scar on my palm to prove it.
He’d given me power.
But with that power came retribution, and if I ever stepped out of the fog of obedience, a bullet would fly into my brain as quickly as the one I’d sent into the stranger I’d just dispatched.
His guards were loyal.
His guards were fucking everywhere.
“I’m fine, baba,” I muttered as I followed him outside. Glancing at the full moon above, we were ushered into a black SUV. Guards climbed into the three SUVs in front and behind us before we pulled out in a snaking convoy.
My fist curled around my cane as I stabbed it between my legs. The roaring lion glowered at me in the gloomy car interior. “Are we going home?”
Cem shot me a look where we sat side by side in the backseat. He typed something on his phone; I tore my eyes away from the glowing screen.
I’d been given everything I could ever want.
I knew the pins and passwords to Cem’s every account.
He’d taken me to his bank manager and had my name listed on every document required for access and transfers, and he’d even amended his will so I, and only I, inherited his almost billion-dollar empire.
He gave me his trust by giving me his business.
Yet he never gave me access to a laptop, phone, or tablet.
For a long time, I hadn’t cared. My brain was mush, and I’d existed in an in-between place of submission and servitude.
But now...those little whispers hissed to snatch his phone.
To call a siren.
To message my soulmate—
“No. We have another errand to run tonight. We’re visiting the Peri Ev.”
My insides turned to ice. I hardly ever translated Turkish to English in my head anymore, but that name, it fucking horrified me. Peri Ev: Fairy House.
“Has there been a new arrival?” I asked coldly.
Cem finished typing and put his phone into his breast suit pocket. “Yes. Six new girls. Four are accepting. Two are not. They’re causing problems.”
“What sort of problems?”
“Breaking in problems.” He shot me a look. “That’s where you come in.”
“Me?” A shiver ran down my spine. “What do you expect me to do about it?”
“Teach them a lesson. Show them that no is not an option. We cannot sell merchandise that doesn’t behave, Aslan. You know this.”
“You want me to fuck one of them?”
His eyes narrowed. “Is that going to be a problem?”
I held his stare and ignored his question. “Did you mean what you said? That the day I became your son, you’d let me pick my own woman?”
He stilled beside me, his nostrils flaring. “Are you finally ready to take a wife and make your own heir, or is a piece of you still clinging to your Australian fling?”
My teeth gritted. He knew she was more than just a fling. And he also knew that Neri was the trick I’d used to avoid his mind control for so long.
But I daren’t speak her name.
I barely even had the courage to think it.
But I also couldn’t tell him that the chances of me having an heir with anyone was slim to none. I could never sire a child with someone who wasn’t her because my body was incapable.
I looked out the window at the pretty streets and imposing buildings.
I didn’t reply.
* * * * *
“This is Tulip,” a big-breasted woman with black hair down to her ass and a slim cigarette dangling on her bottom lip said. Puffing on her smoke, she cocked her head at the naked girl bowing at my feet. “She’s refusing to use the arts she has been taught, which means she cannot be sold. She claims all the men I’ve brought her don’t deserve her pussy or her mouth.” The madame grinned with yellowed teeth. “But she cannot say that now.”
Striding forward in her chunky combat boots and floaty purple dress—a direct contradiction of fashion—the heavy-set woman kicked the naked girl and spat on her bare thighs. “See, Tulip? See that I do care? You said no man deserves to touch you. Well, I have brought you a lion.”
Turning to bow at me, the madame blew out a ring of blue smoke. “Thank you for coming, Aslan Kara. We have heard much about our patron’s heir. It is a pleasure to serve you. I just wish I could offer you a girl better trained, but...” Her dark eyes flicked to Cem. “Your father insisted that you are skilled at pleasure and can help break in this new fairy. We have a trade lined up with a most honourable client, but...until she is correctly trained...well.” She chuckled with a shrug. “She will have to have her wings clipped here, so she knows her place and doesn’t dishonour our reputation for the highest quality girls.”