Prologue
Marshall
It could be said that I lead a double life. Two faces, one man. Two sides to a coin.
On the one side, there’s the me most of the world knows and sees. Father, entrepreneur, provider. Hedge fund manager. Retired Navy Lieutenant. Divorcé. They see a man with wealth—not the flamboyant, obnoxious kind with neon cars and an Instagram-catered lifestyle of yachts and women, but real, sizable wealth.
They see a man who’ll stop at nothing to get you favorable returns on your investment in his hedge fund, one of the top five hedge funds in all of New York City. They see a man who still drives his daughter to school, when she lets him. A man who enjoys swimming and running to keep in the same shape at forty-two that he was in at half that age.
He lives in the very moneyed Greenwich, Connecticut, thirty-five miles north of Manhattan. He sits on the board of directors of three charities, two museums, the Metropolitan Opera House, and two green energy startups.
And then, there’s the other side of me. I won’t say it’s my “dark” side, because that sounds cliché. But maybe it is. It’s the side of me that hungers for the primal—for the illicit. For the rush of the forbidden. It’s a side of me a man of my means can afford to indulge, too. Hence the luxury condo I keep on Central Park West. Hence the membership to La Société Rouge, a very exclusive, very secret, very fucking expensive underground club for men like me.
The rest of the world knows nothing about this darker side of me. Not Amy, my daughter. Not my employees. Not the other board members. No one. None of them knows or even really understands that a man like me, living in the world I live in, with the sort of billion-dollar decisions hanging above my head, needs to disappear into the shadows sometimes. That’s where The Society comes in.
There, I can blend as faceless no-one. Masks are optional, but you can be damn sure I wear mine. A man can do… well, just about anything at The Society. Women, drugs, drink, blood-sport. Whatever you crave, it can be made possible for you. Me? I stick to a few vices: the underground fights they host, and drink.
What can I say, I have a taste for ludicrously expensive bourbon.
The drugs I want nothing to do with. And as for women? Well, I’ve watched, when there are shows. But that’s it. I’m aware of my situation, being wealthier than a god, in the shape of a college guy, and single—divorced, actually, for the last seventeen years. And yet, I don’t really chase that. There are women, of course. And I’ve dated here and there, but nothing’s ever stuck. And of course, there are women for, well, more casual, short-term relationships at The Society, but it’s never interested me.
…That is, until a week ago. A week ago, when I broke.
A week ago, there was an auction. Not live, but online, though a private website The Society operates. I’d heard of them before and rolled my eyes at them. And yet this time, for whatever reason, I logged on. In my dark wood and steel industrial chic condo overlooking Central Park, bourbon in hand, shirt undone, I’d opened the auction on my laptop.
…And I’d seen her. Well, from the lips down.
She looked young, though the site listed her as twenty. Young, stunningly gorgeous, and sexy as fuck even though there was this air of total innocence about her. Blonde hair, full, pouty lips, a body made for sin. A body made for me. One look, and something broke in me. A switch flipped. A gear turned. A spark went off, and the fire was lit.
Beautiful, tempting as original sin, and for sale.
The starting bid was $250,000. And the prize?
Her virginity.
No face. No name. Just the website screen name of “Cherry Pie”. The name made more sense later, when I won.
Oh, I bid. And I kept bidding in the ensuing online silent auction, until for a million dollars, she, and her innocence, were mine.
I’d never paid for a woman before. I’d never even dreamed of it. And yet, with her, it didn’t feel like I was paying for her. It felt like I was paying a fee to keep her safe. To keep her mine. To keep that innocence out the hands of any other man. I fucking wanted her, make no mistake. But the price was half desire, and half the need to protect, in a caveman way.
Well, a caveman with an Amex Black card and a limitless bank account.
Later, when we video chatted in silence—only typing, no talking—I figured out the “Cherry Pie” nickname cheekily came from the tiny little cherry tattoo on her hip, right in the little crease of her thigh, barely covered by the edge of her little white lace panties. That’s all I saw—just her from the mouth down, in that matching bra and panties, somehow looking both confidently sexy as hell and innocently nervous at the same time.