12. AURORA #3
In this dim, grimy basement, the image is hauntingly clear.
For a heartbeat, the flickering amber bulbs become the shimmering city lights of Havengard, reflecting off the floor-to-ceiling glass of a boardroom.
He looks like he’d dominate that table. I can see him in a crisp, white collar and a suit that costs more than a Digger could ever imagine, leaning in to dismantle an opponent with a single, lethal sentence.
He isn’t a prisoner here. He’s a shark, waiting in the deep for the perfect moment to strike and destroy his enemies.
The traffickers.
The Conclave.
The Elite.
People like me.
I swallow hard, the boardroom fantasy dissolving back into humid reality. “What else do you remember, Candy?” I ask, my voice as gentle as I can make it while my own heart hammers.
“Well, some time later I was told I had a new owner,” she continues, her grip on my hand tightening. “New men took me off. They said I was going to a special school.”
She lets out a hollow, broken laugh. “It wasn’t a school.
It was a huge house on an island. There were some horrible women there.
They taught me to do things. Sex things.
Then Mr. Grieves would come and take me and the others to ‘parties.’ Mostly on fancy boats, yachts.
Rich men would sail up to the island and we’d be sent onboard.
They’d do whatever they wanted. It wasn’t so bad when there were no parties.
I made friends at the house, we ate nice stuff, but I hated… working.”
Layla gets up from her perch and moves closer until she has a hand on Candy’s hair, stroking it with a tenderness that seems out of place from a woman with a buzz-cut and jacked up muscles.
“I escaped during a transport to a mainland party.” Candy’s eyes are filled with shadows of everything she’s experienced.
“I jumped from a moving van and ran into the woods.
I lived on the streets for a year, eating scraps from trash cans and sleeping in empty houses.
But this family came home from a vacation and found me.
Locked me in a room then called the cops.
She starts to shake, a violent, full-body tremor. “And now I’m here. What if Mr. Grieves finds out? I can’t go back, I can’t. I’d kill myself first.”
The silence that follows is heavy. I look up at Taliesin. I’ve never seen him so purely, thoroughly angry.
“Doyle Grieves,” he says, the name sounding like a curse. “I know the name and the reputation. And his son, Regan. They’re the worst kind of filth Havengard has to offer.”
“But Candy’s OK here, surely?” I ask. She’ll be safer among the Diggers than she ever was in the world I came from. Out there, the “Elite” bastard men of my class think a woman’s vagina is theirs for the taking. A female body is merely a commodity to be bought, bartered, or broken.
But in this foul cell block, Taliesin keeps those monsters at bay. A bubble of hysteria rises in my throat, but I quickly quash it. It’s a weird fucking truth, but it’s the truth nonetheless.
This is the safest place I’ve ever lived.
“Has the warden seen you?” Taliesin questions. “Does he know any of this?”
“I don’t think so. My record only shows breaking and entering. I never said anything about my past. I guess no one ever filed me missing or anything, because my name didn’t show up in the database.”
“What is your full name?” Layla asks.
“Candy Kay,” she replies.
Candy Kay? The name sounds totally made up. More suitable for a stripper than this poor child.
“Are you sure, sweetie?” Layla urges gently. I understand the question. If Candy doesn’t remember her early years, then she could have been given a false name. Candy Kay doesn’t exactly sound like something a new mom would name a child.
“I..I don’t know. It’s all I’ve known, but in truth, I hate it. The men would always talk about licking and eating candy.”
A tear rolls down her cheek and my stomach twists.
Taliesin lets out a deep sigh, looking at the wall somewhere above Candy’s head. “Thanks for telling us, kid. We’ll keep you safe here. The worst of it is over.”
Candy looks at me, a tiny spark of hope flickering in those hollow eyes. “You promise?”
“Absolutely. We’ll go to war for you if we have to, Candy,” I tell her, making the commitment without a single doubt. And I don’t have to ask if Layla and Taliesin are with me…I know they are.
Fuck. Is this what it’s like to be…on a team?
A family?
Candy gives me a small smile, and something occurs to me. “What do you think about choosing a new name for yourself? You said you don’t like Candy, so you could have a fresh name for a fresh start.”
That makes her smile widen. “I’d love that, but what should it be? Can you choose, Rory?”
“We can brainstorm together if you like, but this choice is going to be all yours. The first of many independent decisions you get to make from now on.” I pull her into my arms and squeeze her tight. Poor fucking Candy.
No. Not Candy.
Taliesin and I meet eyes and I know we are in agreement.
We are going to make sure she is never Candy, ever again.