Damaged Queen (Darkness Within Duet 2)

Harper stepped up close.

All of the training she remembered from years ago rushed toward her, and she caught him by surprise. The man was more interested in getting his dick wet than protecting what was behind that door. Drawing her knee up, she hit him square in the nuts, and slammed her fist against his face. With him distracted, she grabbed the gun and used it to knock him out cold. She held the gun in her hands, and without wasting any time, she stepped over him and opened the door to the basement.

There was a light on, a single light, and she heard sniffling. Tears.

Harper tensed up and held the gun in her hand, not that she knew how to use it.

Walking down the steps, she stopped, and as she took in the cages, Harper just knew.

Women.

A quick head count told her there were at least twenty women spread out on the cells. None of them spoke, even as some of them cried.

She stared at them and felt ill.

“Are you guys here because you want to be?” she asked.

“We can’t talk. We’re not allowed to talk,” one of the women said.

She looked at each of them. Harper walked toward the cages. They were all locked up. She gripped the bars and tried to pull it open.

Did Draven know about them? This?

“You shouldn’t be down here,” Tillie said.

Harper turned to see Tillie on the stairs, wearing a smile.

“You know, I’ve got security around every single room of this place. I like to take care of all of my assets.”

“They’re people,” she said. “Real people.”

“They’re a commodity, Harper. Men and women pay for the pleasure of using them. They’re expendable.” Tillie folded her arms. “When one of them dies, another will take their place. It’s a natural circle of all things. They get fed and are well-kept.”

“You’ve got them in the dark in a cage.”

“I feed them. They’re allowed to use the bathroom, get washed. I’ve got ten women upstairs working the men who paid for them.” Tillie laughed. “Draven hasn’t told you a thing, has he?” Tillie stepped up toward her. “I thought he was ready to move up in the world when he had me whip your back. Such a pretty back. I offered to take you off his hands. To show him how to treat a bad girl like you. I’d mark you up real good and have all my customers that like to make my women bleed, have their fill of you.”

Harper drew her fist back and slammed it against the woman’s face. She’d taken her by surprise, and as she held the barrel of the gun, she swung it around, and hit her again.

“You want to try and tame me, bitch? Let’s see how you can handle a beating. You like to dish it out. Let’s see you take one.”

She stepped over Tillie. The other woman tried to fight her, but Harper had years of anger. She was done with being pushed around. By Draven, by Axel, by fucking Alan. It was done. This bitch was going down.

She drew her fist back and hit her again.

Harper got three more hits in before she was pulled off, and she screamed at the unfairness of it.

Draven had her locked against the wall, his hands holding hers above her head.

“Enough!”

“No! Never enough. You knew. Didn’t you? This is what this all is. You didn’t go your own path. Your father made sure you followed in his footsteps. The women, they’ve been taken, trafficked out. The sex trade?”

“I’m not talking with you about this.”

“You wanted to change. You hated your father, and yet, you’ve become him.”

“Nothing could change, Harper.”

“It could change. You could make it so. This is not you. You were supposed to be better than this. You shouldn’t be doing this. They’re real people, Draven. Real women, just like me. You need to let them go. To let them live. This is so fucking wrong, you don’t even know how much. None of them deserve this, none of them.” She stopped, feeling a sob work its way up her throat. All of these women deserved a chance. There’s no way she could let them down, not again.

“Get her out of here before I deal with her,” Tillie said, getting to her feet.

“Come on, bitch, I’d like to see you fucking try. I’ll kill you. I swear I’ll fucking kill you.”

Draven lifted her up, and she was pulled from the room. The guy she’d been teasing was nowhere in sight, and she was so fucking pissed.

Draven carried her out of the car, and she kept on fighting him.

Draven didn’t put her in the passenger seat or even in the back. He dumped her in the trunk.

Tears filled her eyes as he closed the trunk, and she kept on hitting it and screaming. All the while her heart pounded with what she knew to be the truth. This was what Axel wanted her to know, what he needed her to know before she committed to this. He didn’t like selling people, and it must be why he had an aversion to the cells.