WHEN ONE OF my business associates suggested we take a little trip, I didn’t think it would involve traveling in a private jet for hours to some remote island in the middle of the fucking ocean. Thiago was very secretive about this whole thing, claiming it would all be worth it in the end, but he did tell me that one of the rules of where we were going was no weapons.
The moment we land and exit the plane, there is a team of security that runs metal detector wands up and down our bodies to make sure we’re not carrying. Little do they know that my suit has a special lining that fools archaic methods such as this, and I’m happy that my Glock is secretly resting near my heart inside my jacket where it belongs.
“Getting felt up by these men is your idea of a good time, Thiago?” I quip, irritated by the fact that they’re attempting to pat me down, clearly not trusting their previous search. “Touch me again and I’ll break your goddamn fingers,” I tell one of the men. I don’t fully relax until he puts his hands up and slowly steps back, knowing that I’ve had enough of this bullshit.
Thiago chuckles. “Calm down, Mateo. It’s just protocol.”
I glower at him, contemplating all the ways I could kill him right now. I know numerous ways that would be particularly painful, and I wouldn’t even have to make it look like an accident.
After the security guards have deemed us safe and acceptable, we’re put into a car and driven for a while to a large, nondescript building in the middle of the island. From there, we’re led down a long hallway and into a small ten-by-ten room where we’re told to wait.
Fed up with the theatrics already, I turn to Thiago and ask, “What the fuck are we doing here?”
He tells me cryptically, “You’ll see.”
I tower over him, wanting so badly to put my fist through his puffy, red face. He’s short, much shorter than my height of six-foot five, and about as wide as he is tall. He glances up at me and flashes a mouth full of yellow teeth as he runs his fat fingers through his dark slicked-back hair. The dated hairstyle makes him look older than he actually is when, in fact, we’re the same age of thirty-five.
Sighing in barely confined frustration, I stare out the wide viewing window before us, stepping closer to examine it. I can see myself in the reflection since the outside of this room is completely darkened. I tap on the glass, curious.
“It’s one-way. We can see out, but no one can see in,” Thiago informs me. “It keeps everything private,” he says, stressing the last word.
“So, you’ve been here before,” I presume.
“Oh yes, many times,” he confesses.
He’s never told me about this place, or perhaps I never remember him telling me. Thiago has a tendency to run his mouth a lot, and most of the shit I just block out for my own sanity. I’ve known him for years. He’s one of my closest associates and biggest dealers, distributing the rainbow-colored fentanyl that my people produce in the numerous warehouses in Mexico that I own and run. So, I let a lot of his shenanigans slide, for the sake of business alone and for the amount of money he makes me.
But our partnership goes both ways. Thiago wouldn’t have the drugs to sell without me; and thus, wouldn’t have the extremely lucrative income that he does. So, for those reasons, I trust him…to an extent. I know he wouldn’t double cross me, because he knows he would be a dead man before my corpse even got cold.
“Have a seat,” Thiago suggests. “The show is about to begin.”
Grumbling, I go to a chair situated in the corner of the small room as he takes a seat in front of a computer with a keyboard. The monitor flickers on, and a bunch of information runs across the screen. Warnings and disclaimers, I think. He signs in, and then all the fine print blinks away to a black screen with a countdown of five minutes in big, red numbers.
I want to ask him what happens in five minutes, but I know the bastard won’t tell me. He’s being ambiguous, for some reason, and it’s driving me insane. I’m already thinking about who will replace him after I put a bullet in his head. It wouldn’t be difficult. Everyone is replaceable, to an extent. Even me.
Pulling my lucky coin out of an inside jacket pocket, I begin to roll it over the knuckles of my right hand. I do the maneuver repeatedly, and it begins to calm my nerves, like usual. Call it a nervous tik or whatever you want, but it helps me to think, helps me to concentrate.
I stare through the dark glass, assuming I’m going to see something soon since the counter is down to three and a half minutes now. Sure enough, bright fluorescent lights begin to flicker on, illuminating a circular room and what appears to be a round stage with a runway leading up to it in the middle. The room is huge, and I can see numerous large, square windows facing the stage. I’m assuming beyond the windows are other rooms, just like the one I’m currently sitting in. But Thiago was right about the one-way glass since I can’t see into any of them to confirm.
Glaring at the runway in the distance, I scoff, “You brought me all the way here for a fucking fashion show?”
“Oh, it’s not a fashion show, although you will see many beautiful girls here tonight. I can promise you that,” he mutters under his breath.
I’m just about to demand he tells me what’s going on when a robotic-sounding female voice comes over the intercom speaker above us, interrupting me.
“The first auction will begin in three minutes,” the voice announces.
“Auction?” I question. “What are you bidding on?”
“I’m not going to spoil it. You’ll just have to wait. The first time is always the most exciting,” he states, smiling cruelly.
I steel my features. This is a new side of Thiago that I haven’t witnessed before. Hell, we’re all seedy motherfuckers in the cartel, but he’s bringing on a whole other level of sordidness. After tonight, I’ll decide if I want to keep doing business with him…or kill him. The more time that goes on in this room with the two of us, I’m beginning to lean more towards the latter option.
He’s quiet for a while, his knee jumping and anxiousness marring his features. He’s excited for this, like a gambler before a big horse race.
I watch the countdown on the screen, and when it gets to zero, I can’t help but hold my breath for what is about to happen. The stage lights blink a few times, and then a blonde woman is walking down the runway with what looks like an armed guard behind her. He’s wearing tactical gear and a black mask. I narrow my eyes as I turn my attention to the woman.
She looks young, late teens, early twenties maybe, with short, blonde hair and long legs under a white dress that is so sheer I can see the color of her nipples. She glances around the room when she reaches the end of the stage, looking lost and confused.
“Dios mío, she’s pretty,” Thiago remarks, and I look on the computer monitor, realizing there is a camera pointed at her face and broadcasting it on the screen. Zoomed in, I can see the fear in her deep blue eyes. She looks absolutely terrified.
The robotic voice announces over a speaker in the ceiling, “Age nineteen. Place of origin, Russia. We’ll start the bidding at fifty thousand dollars.”
Almost instantaneously, several red lights above the darkened windows around the stage begin to flash, lighting up the numbers. The windows are all numbered, and the highest one I see is twelve. There are twelve rooms. Twelve men bidding on women.
“Three hundred thousand dollars,” the robot says after filing through multiple bids. “Three hundred thousand going once…going twice…sold to number eleven.”
The girl is forced off the stage by gunpoint, and I turn to Thiago, who is grinning ear to ear, enjoying his time here like we’re at a normal sporting event and not at an auction for human beings. “What the fuck are we doing here?” I demand. I’m tired of him pussyfooting around.
“When you told me you’ve never been to an auction before, I knew I had to invite you.” He pauses. “I haven’t bid on any girls yet, but it is quite entertaining.” He shifts in his seat then and not so subtly adjusts himself through his pants. Fuck, is he getting aroused by this?
I vaguely remember him discussing his sick fascination with paying for whores, but I had no idea he thought I would ever remotely be into this. The very thought of it makes me feel sick and stabby, and I’d love to stick the blade of a knife right through his carotid right now. Even though we’ve been cohorts for years, he went too fucking far this time.
I may live in a sick, fucked-up world where there are no rules except kill or be killed, but I draw the line at hurting innocent women. Thiago doesn’t know about my past or what I went through as a young boy. Hell, only one other person knows, and that’s my uncle. Thiago couldn’t have possibly known that this would trigger me, but that doesn’t make any of this better or okay.
Several more women are presented on stage, and the bids go higher and higher each time. I pace the floor of the small room, two seconds away from losing my shit. My eyes squeeze shut as a barrage of memories assault my mind. I swear I can still hear them screaming…
“The premier female is being presented now,” the robot voice says, thankfully interrupting my thoughts, but not fully pulling me out of them.
My breathing is labored as I watch the next woman forced on stage. Her long, brunette hair has my hands clenching into fists on top of my knees. She struggles with the guard and is rewarded with a hard slap to the cheek. She crumbles in her high heels, falling to the stage, her dark hair hiding her face.
And, suddenly, it feels like my head is under water. I’m drowning between the past and the present, and then I’m right back where I was all those years ago when I was just a little boy…
Her dark hair covering her face as the men force themselves upon her. Her screams fill my ears until that’s the only sound I can hear. Her begging for them to stop, but they don’t stop. They don’t stop until she’s quiet and not moving. Why is she so quiet?
“She’s a lively one,” Thiago comments with a dark chuckle. “Whoever takes her home is gonna have fun with her.”
He’s finding all of this oddly amusing while I’m over here trying not to lose my shit, thinking there is a ghost out there haunting me. I stand up abruptly, knocking over the chair I was sitting in. Moving towards the glass, I point with a trembling finger at the ghost on the stage. “Her face,” I whisper.
Thiago’s eyes widen as he watches me intently. He’s probably never seen me this on edge before, about to lose my shit. I try to always remain calm, regularly masking my inner thoughts, like I’m constantly in a game of poker in this fucked-up world we live in where one wrong move can get you killed.
“Her face. I need to see her goddamn face!” I demand almost in a panic. What I don’t add is that I need to make sure it’s not the face of my dead mother or sisters.
Thiago stares up at me, confused. “Okay, okay,” he concedes before he quickly types something onto the keyboard.
I watch through the window anxiously as the guard checks his radio before grabbing the woman’s arm in a bruising grip. She’s still on the floor, and I can see his lips moving as he instructs her on what to do. She just lays there, not moving, not listening. Finally, the guard forces her into a standing position, swinging her around to our viewing window. Then, he roughly brushes her long, dark hair away, revealing her face.
As if sensing me staring at her, the young woman looks directly at me even though it’s impossible for her to see into the room. A lump lodges itself in my throat, and I’m finding it hard to swallow or even breathe at this point. Those piercing amber eyes of hers seem to somehow focus on me, and I can’t seem to tear my gaze away.
“Hermosa,” Thiago comments.
Beautiful. No. Beautiful isn’t even enough to describe someone like her. She looks like a broken angel, fallen to the earth, displaced from her otherworldly home. Almost too perfect to be real.
The guard releases her, and the woman stares through the window before elegantly raising her middle finger and flipping me the bird. I can’t help the smile that stretches across my mouth as Thiago roars in laughter behind me.
The gesture earns her a verbal reprimand from the guard, and then the connection we shared is severed as he forces her to stand facing in another direction.
“United States origin. Twenty-one. Certified virgin,” the robotic voice says over the speakers in the wall. “We’ll start the bidding at…one-hundred thousand dollars.”
The bidding takes off quickly; and before I can even blink, it’s over a million.
Thiago points to his screen. “That bastard,” he says with a chuckle.
“What?” I ask, reluctantly tearing my eyes away from the girl to go take a glance at the computer monitor. I realize it shows the number of bidders and how much each one has bid on a particular woman. Number ten is lit up with the current max bid.
“This is the fourth virgin he’s bid on in the past few months.”
“Who?”
“I dunno. Damion something.”
So much for anonymity at The Island, I think to myself.
“I actually feel sorry for the girl,” Thiago continues. “I heard that he tortures and kills them after he brutally rapes them. He brags about it all the time to the others.” He shakes his head solemnly. “I’ve even seen some pictures of the aftermath. Fucking gruesome. He’s one sick son of a bitch.”
My blood boils at his words, and the nagging memory of that fateful night hits me with full force once again. Enraged, I grab Thiago by the collar of his shirt and force his beady eyes to look at me. “Why did you bring me here?” I hiss at him. Does he somehow know about my fucked-up past? Is he doing this to hurt me, to fucking destroy me?
“I-I-I thought you would enjoy it!” he stammers with fear in his eyes.
“Enjoy it?” I say through clenched teeth. I’m two seconds away from ripping out his fucking throat and leaving him to bleed out on the dirty floor.
“Si! The girls here are exceptional. You can simply look…or buy. You could buy yourself a sex slave!”
“You think I need to pay for pussy?” I ask with a glare, barely containing myself from strangling him to death.
“No, no, of course not!” His hands cover mine when I grip his throat. “Por favor, Mateo!” he cries out. “It was my mistake!”
“The current bid is at two million dollars for the premier choice,” the robotic voice announces.
Suddenly, I release him and take a step back. My eyes go to the girl on the center stage. Even though she can’t see anyone through the mirrored glass, she flips everyone the bird. She’s screaming something, but I can’t hear her words.
The guard comes back and thrusts a long cattle prod in between her ribs. Her entire body shudders from the electric shock, and she collapses to her knees.
None of the other women even came close to defying their captors. They probably knew what would come as a result of their misbehavior. This woman doesn’t seem to be scared of anything even though her fate lies in the balance of everyone in this building.
“This doesn’t bode well for her. Damion likes when they fight,” Thiago says in barely a whisper.
I growl at his words. She’s fighting for her freedom, for her life out there. And if these men can’t recognize the courage it’s taking her to defy it all, then they’re just idiots.
“Three-point-five million dollars going once…going twice…”
Before I even know what I’m doing, I yell to Thiago, “Bid!”
Thiago presses a button on the keyboard before I can even second-guess my decision.
“The current bid is now four million dollars.”
“F-f-four million dollars for a sex slave?” he asks, stuttering in disbelief.
“Counter bid is four-point-five million dollars.”
I can see number ten lit up on the monitor. Damion is bidding against me, determined to win her. Determined to rape and maim this poor, young woman and have her become another one of his lifeless, mutilated trophies that he brags about to his friends. And in that moment, I decide that I’ll die before I let that happen to her.
“Bid again,” I tell Thiago, my jaw set in determination.
“Four-point-five million dollars is the current top bid.”
“Again,” I instruct Thiago, but he hesitates.
The robot begins saying, “Four-point-five million going once…going twice…”
I pull the Glock out of my jacket and press it against Thiago’s temple. “Bid. Now!” I roar.
With a trembling finger, he presses the button on the keyboard, securing my bid. “How the fuck did you get a gun in here?” he asks, his voice shaking.
“Don’t worry about it. Just keep bidding,” I instruct him through gritted teeth while the robot announces the counterbid from number ten.
We play this game of bidding and counterbidding until it goes up to seven million dollars. That’s when Thiago informs me, “There’s no way he’ll counter that, Mateo. He’s never gone over seven mil for a virgin before.”
“Seven million dollars going once…going twice…going three times. Sold to buyer number two for seven million dollars.”
A sense of relief hits me at first, but then I’m consumed by confusion and then disbelief. I just spent seven million dollars on a virgin.
What the fuck have I done?
