Chapter 9

“Here’s my mercy,” he said. “Within one month, put five million dollars on this card. Do that, and I’ll let you off. Generous, aren’t I?”

He released her hair and flicked the card lightly against her face.

Mercy.

To Oliver, five million dollars might not cover a wild night at Scarlet. To Sophia, it was a mountain so high it might as well have been the edge of the sky. Even if she stopped eating, stopped sleeping, stopped existing as anything other than labor, one month would not be enough.

She did not truly believe he would honor the promise. Men like Oliver did not obey conditions set for people beneath them. But the card gave her something a person in a cage needed even more than trust: a number, a direction, a reason to keep breathing until tomorrow.

Oliver stood over her like a benefactor granting crumbs. “I don’t care how you get it. Beg. Sell drinks. Sell yourself. Whenever this card reaches five million, I’ll release you. And don’t think about running.”

His eyes lowered, dark and absolute. “As long as you’re alive, I can find you anywhere in the world.”

A pause.

“Even if you die, I can dig you out of the ground.”

He did not have to explain the rest. Her conviction could be twisted into fresh charges. A client’s accusation could become a police report. A disturbance at Scarlet could become another cell door closing behind her. She had no money, no protection, no family willing to claim her, and no one in Sterling would believe Sophia Watson over Oliver.

The words wrapped around her like a curse and crawled into her skull until her head ached.

Sophia stared at his cruel smile with a face gone bloodless. Her lips moved, but no sound came out.

The residence door opened.

Luna Thompson stepped inside and froze at the sight of Oliver’s back.

Even without seeing his face, she knew the man was not ordinary. His suit, his posture, the cold weight in the air around him, all of it spoke of money and power.

Then Luna saw Sophia on the bed, hair disheveled, body battered, a bank card lying near the pillow.

The conclusion formed itself neatly and viciously in Luna’s mind.

So that was what Sophia really was.

Luna had thought the woman was uneducated but at least honest, someone who put her head down and earned money the hard way. Apparently she had been wrong. Sophia had no bottom line after all.

As Luna passed the bed, her eyes flicked to Sophia’s slippers on the floor.

She stepped on one as if by accident, caught her foot, and pitched forward. Her body fell directly across Sophia’s lap, her knee landing with perfect cruelty on Sophia’s injured leg.

The pressure came before Sophia understood what was happening.

Pain exploded from the bone upward.

Cold sweat burst across her skin. Her face emptied of color, and her lips parted without a sound.

Luna covered her mouth with both hands, performing panic. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

Sophia could not hear her. The room had gone white at the edges.

Three years ago, Oliver had broken her legs. Before she received proper treatment, she had been sent to prison. The damage had never healed right.

She knew accident from intention. She knew this was not an accident.

Still, she shook her head with a face like paper. “It’s fine.”

If possible, she did not want to offend anyone. She wanted only to earn the impossible money, buy back her freedom, and vanish.

Oliver’s gaze stayed on her pale face. His voice lowered, threaded with a venomous kind of longing. “Why wasn’t it you who ended up paralyzed back then?”

The words were almost a sigh.

They pierced deeper because of it.

He turned and left without looking at her again.

Only after he had put some distance between himself and the residence did he call Isla.

“Mr. Williams?” Isla answered. “What do you need?”

“From now on, pay Sophia at minimum wage.”

He hung up before she could respond.

Isla stared at the phone, baffled and sick with it. The order made no sense. But Oliver was still Oliver. Pity did not outrank power at Scarlet.

Back in the residence, Sophia curled her injured body into itself and stared at nothing.

“Mace,” she whispered. “I can’t do this anymore. I miss you.”

Her eyes were hollow, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

She had thought of death before. More than once. Every time the idea came near, Mace’s hopeful face rose in her mind and stood between Sophia and the dark.

Sophia’s life had been bought with Mace’s.

In prison, Sophia had promised Mace, the girl who had walked toward death so Sophia could keep breathing, that she would live. She had promised she would carry Mace’s eyes to all the places Mace would never see.

Montana. Open grass. Blue sky.

Sophia swallowed until her throat hurt.

Then she got up and went back to the kitchen.

Sophia had barely reached the dish station when Luna’s voice sliced through the kitchen.

“Well, look at that. Landed yourself a rich man and still came back to wash dishes? This is a respectable kitchen. With that cheap perfume clinging to you, you’ll dirty the place.”

Sophia lowered her head and kept working.

Her hands wouldn’t hold still in the sink water. The rest of her refused to answer.

The silence only made Luna angrier. She shoved Sophia hard. “What are you pretending for? You’re the one who doesn’t know how to behave. You sell yourself, then still want people to treat you like some pure little saint?”

Her voice rose with every word. Another shove followed.

Sophia’s bad leg caught wrong. She stumbled and fell to the floor.

“Hey, don’t hit her,” someone called from the side, more alarmed by liability than compassion.

What Sophia had supposedly done was disgusting enough to gossip about, but if she got seriously hurt in the kitchen, everyone working there could be dragged into trouble.

“Who says she isn’t faking it?” Luna snapped. “I barely touched her.” Then she snorted. “Maybe that helpless little act is how she hooks customers.”

Sophia said nothing.

She endured the pain, pressed both palms to the floor, and climbed back up.