Chapter 24

Katja~

W hile I was doing my best to concentrate on living a normal life, it wasn't easy. After Maksim had used me the other night, I had convinced him to give me a few days to get some air, and luckily for me, he had agreed. While we might be playing right into what Klive had been hoping for, I had explained how I couldn't keep disappearing at night without my grandfather getting suspicious, and so Maksim had agreed to give me a few days to live my life normally, though he'd made it clear that it would be a small reprieve and nothing more.

At any rate, while my grandfather and Artur seemed to be settling in nicely, I felt like I was going crazy, and the regular banality of work was actually the only thing that felt comforting. When I was at work, I didn't feel as if my life was falling apart. When I was at work, I didn't have crazy Russians threatening to kill me and my grandfather. When I was at work, I didn't have a high-ranking member of the Russian Bratva hypnotizing me with things that were impossible. When I was at work, I was simply Katja Volkov, IT tech.

Nonetheless, as crazy as I felt, I wasn't a complete fool. Letting Maksim go without protection the other night had been the worst thing that I could possibly do, and that was saying something, considering everything that I'd been through these past few weeks. While I had every confidence in my birth control, nothing was guaranteed, so using condoms only bettered the odds against an unplanned pregnancy. After all, the last thing that I needed was to get pregnant by Maksim freakin' Barychev. Though he'd made some very cryptic statements the other night, I'd been too tired and lost in his touch to demand further explanation. Like a coward, I'd stuck my head in the sand, then had left it there until Maksim had delivered me safely to my front door the next morning.

Unfortunately, I wasn't going to be able to play blind for much longer. Things were becoming complicated, and my feelings for Maksim were at the center of all the complications. I was never supposed to have fallen for the man, but I'd had. Like a fucking idiot, I'd had, and now I had no idea what I was supposed to do.

"Oh, it is you."

I turned to see a woman pulling her grocery cart up next to mine. "Excuse me?"

"It's your eyes," she said, further confusing me. "They're kind of hard to miss."

My brows furrowed. "Do I know you?"

Admittedly, I came across a lot of people in my field of work, but this woman was pretty enough to be rememberable. She was shorter than I was, putting her at around five-foot-one, had silky brown hair, dark eyes, and she was petite enough to feed every stereotype about delicate Asian women. She was truly an exotic beauty, so I was pretty sure that I would have remembered if we'd met before.

"Well, no," she answered, pushing her cart closer, putting us right in front of each other. "We weren't able to meet that night."

The hairs on the back of my neck immediately stood up. "What night? What are you talking about?"

She leaned in conspiratorially, then lowered her voice to a whisper. "The night at Millie's."

Dread started forming in the pit of my stomach. The night at Millie's, neither Maksim nor I had spoken to anyone. As soon as I had arrived, he'd taken me straight to the suite, and we had left immediately after he'd been done with me. Neither of us had socialized with anyone, and I honestly couldn't remember seeing this woman there. Granted, I hadn't been looking to make any new friends, but I would have remembered seeing her there; I was sure of it. Plus, why would we have needed to meet each other?

"I'm sorry," I said, trying to keep my voice steady. "I…I don't remember seeing you there."

"Well, considering that you were only there for the showing, I'm not surprised," she replied. "Not to mention that you had Maksim Barychev showing you off."

Even though I had no idea what she was talking about, I didn't want her to know that. It was obvious that she knew something that I didn't, and I needed all the information that I could get if I was going to be able to navigate through all this shit and still remain alive.

"Does…does Maksim not do that often?" I asked, my stomach already tied in knots.

"No," she answered. "As you probably already know, Melor Kotov oversees the bratva whores, and before he got married, he used to break us in every once in a while, but never Maksim. In fact, it's usually the guards or street soldiers that break in the whores."

What in the fuck?

"Who…uhm, who gets to decide?" I asked. "I mean, I can only imagine how many men sign up for the privilege, right?"

She laughed, and it sounded like a lullaby. "It depends on the girl," she answered. "And considering how beautiful you are, I can see why Maksim insisted on breaking you in himself."

"How…how long have you…you worked for the Kotovs?" I asked, my heartbeat drumming in my ears.

"About four years already." She shrugged a shoulder. "Before that, I was on my own in the streets, so working for the Kotovs is so much better. However, because I'd already been… seasoned , there'd been no need to present me in the showcase room."

"The showcase room?" I echoed.

She nodded. "Yeah, where you and Maksim had sex." I felt like I was going to throw up, but before I could, she kept prattling on. "I saw you guys walk in, but when Maksim flipped the switch to inform the patrons that a new whore was being showcased, the guy that I was with that night had wanted to see the new merchandise." She shrugged like it didn't bother her, and maybe it didn't. "So, we were able to procure one of the rooms, and when Maksim hit the switch to lift the curtains, the second that my date saw you, he was already informing me how much he was willing to pay to see us together."

"I…I must have gotten turned around, because…I didn't see anyone," I semi-lied.

The girl rolled her eyes. "You mean that Maksim didn't tell you how it worked?"

I shook my head. "He just said that I needed to audition for him."

"The walls to that room are two-way mirrors," she announced, and it took everything that I had in me not to throw up everywhere. "It's surrounded by eight individual rooms that patrons can rent to watch the show. They see what's available, then put in their bids." She leaned in a little bit closer, like we were best friends that were sharing secrets. "Last I heard, the bid to be your first is at twenty-thousand dollars."

"What?" I choked out.

She nodded. "With the bratva taking twenty percent, that's still a good chunk of change. Plus, the fact that Maksim Barychev was the one that broke you in upped your value considerably. If you can take a dick that size, then there probably isn't much you can't handle. There's also the fact that everyone heard how you're an anal virgin, so the men are probably climbing the castle gates to get to you."

It was hard to speak, but I managed. "What's your…your name?"

"Oh," she grinned as she stuck her hand out to shake mine. "Janet. Janet Woo."

I shook her hand. "I'm Katja Volkov."

"You know, it's none of my business, but I can't help but wonder how you got mixed up with Maksim," she said. "You don't seem like the…like one of us."

Sticking to the truth as much as possible, I said, "I have debt."

She gave me a small nod of her head. "Well, I'll be at Erato's this Friday for their annual ladies' night, so if you're there, I can show you around," she offered. "If you have debt, then I can tell you who tips well and who doesn't. Plus, since you're new, I can also tell you who to stay away from and who is actually decent to their dates."

My throat was dry, but I managed to say, "Thank you."

"Well, it was nice to officially meet you," she replied happily. "However, I need to get back to my shopping."

"Yeah, so do I."

I watched as she wrapped her hands around her cart, then jetted off, leaving me to stand in a puddle of shame that I was never going to get free from. Maksim had taken me in front of an audience without letting me know, and what kind of monster did that? How many other people were going to randomly walk up to me, so that they can inform me that they'd seen me getting fucked by Maksim Barychev? He had ordered me to show him what kind of whore I could be, but that'd been for the audience, not him. When this was all said and done, I really was going to become a bratva whore, and I'd have no choice if I wanted to keep my grandfather at home with me.

I placed a hand on my stomach, doing my best not to throw up in the middle of the grocery aisle. I'd never felt so violated in all my life, and it felt like my skin was trying to crawl off my body with shame. Strangers had seen me at my most vulnerable, and they were bidding on me like I was an object to be used and played with, and why wouldn't they think that?

I finished my shopping on autopilot, then went straight home to hide from the world.