Chapter 28
The Final Auction
Secretly famous
When I get home, I collapse on my bed, still woozy from the events I’ve experienced over the weekend. For laughs, I send Gwen a meme of Lucy Ball and her friend Ethel with the text, “Best friends are like condoms…they protect you when things get hard.”
I’m surprised when she immediately texts me back. Instead of commenting on the meme, she asks.
Have you seen the video?
Alarm bells go off in my head.
What video?
Gwen immediately calls. “I have to talk softly so Helen doesn’t jump down my throat. But I can’t believe you haven’t seen the video. It’s been blowing up!”
I suddenly remember Amethyst wanted to show me something during class. “What’s it about?”
“Here…let me send it.”
“Oh, my God,” I groan when the video pops up, and I see it’s of me with my hands up in the air, holding the Bumpboxx. The caption above reads: Well, this just happened. A woman who looks like she put her finger in an electric socket is playing this outside of my apartment.
“It has 100K views and keeps growing,” Gwen whispers excitedly.
I groan in mortification. “Why are you showing me this, G? I thought we were friends.”
“You gotta read the comments,” she insists.
“I seriously can’t handle the humiliation right now.”
“Read them,” she insists, then adds in a rushed voice, “Gotta go.”
Even though I’m dreading it, I begin to scroll through the comments to see what the trolls have to say about my disheveled hair.
“Talk about serious bed head.”
“I bet the skank hasn’t brushed it in a year.”
“Bitch should just shave that shit off.”
“That’s not a rat’s nest, it’s a whole colony.”
Naturally, some take a stab at my weight as well.
But what snags my attention is the overwhelming number of comments asking about my music.
Many want to know the title, who wrote it, and where they can buy it.
I read through the thousands of comments in a state of wonder, and I can’t stop smiling when I see all of the people begging for more information.
Holy shit!
Out of curiosity, I go ahead and hit play. The video was filmed at night and isn’t the best quality, but I can still hear my music being played in the background as the people at the apartment yell at me to shut it off. Then, they begin to quiet down, and the person recording murmurs, “Whoa…”
I noticed cars on the street slowing and rolling down their windows, while pedestrians stop to listen as they gather behind me.
I lay there in bed, my heart racing, as I watch the number of views as it keeps growing while I play it. I cover my mouth and giggle in disbelief.
Needing to calm myself down, I set the phone on the nightstand, take a deep breath in, and then let it out slowly as Tono instructed me. I can’t allow my mind to conjure up what this might mean for me in the future, because I’ll only be bitterly disappointed if I do.
Instead, I simply listen to the music—my music—as it continues to play, hoping that other people who are hurting will find some comfort in it.
Thanks to the darkness and poor video quality, along with my disheveled appearance, only a handful of people recognize me, so I’ve been able to keep a low profile while we prepare for what we’ve been told will be the final auction of this course.
Nash remains part of our class while still denying he did anything wrong, and I have no evidence to say otherwise.
Although I’ve finally been given a case number for my police report, an officer has yet to contact me, and I remain in limbo waiting to find out the identity of the person who owns the AirTag planted in my car.
But after my platter session with Nash, he hasn’t been nearly as irritating, and I’m beginning to doubt he was the one who did it.
I can’t believe that Graduation Day is coming up next week! On one hand, the weeks have raced by. But it almost feels like a lifetime has passed because of how much I’ve grown. I joined the Submissive Training course out of curiosity and a need for change, and have found myself in the process.
I arrive at the Luxe Escape with my overnight bag, anxious to start this last auction. With such a varied selection of appetizers, I’m curious about how this will play out.
Headmaster Wallace meets me in the lobby, dressed in a stylish grey suit with a blue tie that matches the color of his eyes. “Good evening, Miss Lane.”
I look at him curiously. “You look quite distinguished tonight, Headmaster Wallace.”
He winks. “You may wait with the others while we wait for the last few to arrive.”
I walk over to join the group standing beside the giant two-story dragon made of black stone. I remember the impression it left on me when I first entered this hotel. The soothing sound of the water flowing down from the ceiling helps to settle my jangling nerves.
I walk over to Amethyst and ask, “What do you think’s going on tonight?”
“I don’t know, but there isn’t a limousine waiting for us outside.”
I glance at the entrance, stunned to see that she’s right.
Michelle hurries to join us. “I wonder where we’re heading this week.”
“I have no idea,” I tell her.
She giggles as she glances about nervously. “I was certain you knew since you were literally covered in appetizers this week.”
I chuckle. “Sorry, I’m as clueless as you are, but it seems this isn’t going to be a typical auction.”
Nash is the last to walk through the entrance, arriving just seconds before eight. He immediately receives a firm reprimand from Dono Marcelo. It’s as if he wants to get in trouble. I don’t understand why he would keep testing the trainers when we are so close to the end of the program.
After he joins the group, Headmaster Wallace addresses us with a glint in his eye. “Follow me.”
We look at each other questioningly when he turns away from the entrance and leads us down the hall to a red door with the same style of dragon as the statue in the foyer.
Swiping his passkey, Headmaster Wallace opens the door and takes us down an escalator to a lower level that I never knew existed.
The space opens up to a large ballroom with red carpeting and opulent black and gold curtains set behind a stage.
The gold ceiling above us is dotted with several massive crystal chandeliers that reflect the light to create a glowing, dramatic effect.
“Wow…” I murmur, taking it all in.
“Stand behind the curtain and wait for our esteemed guests to arrive.”
“It looks like the auction is happening here, right now,” I laugh, glancing at Tamara as we make our way to the back of the stage.
I’m curious if Doms from all over the country, or maybe all over the world, will be in attendance tonight.
If so, that could explain why there was such a variety of food.
I’m looking forward to seeing who the winning bidder will be and where I end up traveling to for this final auction.
Although it feels slightly anticlimactic after all of the countries we visited, it only makes sense to end it at the Big Apple.
I wait anxiously for Mistress Kim to call out our name to join the line. But she lines us all up at once, calling out our names alphabetically, which means I’m fourth in line, with Nash right behind me. I swear that fate is laughing at me.
The two of us ignore each other as Michelle takes the stage first. After a spirited bidding, she leaves with a highly respectable winning bid of nine hundred dollars.
The winning bids continue to get higher with each submissive who takes the stage.
I wait at the stairs, anxious to see if the trend continues.
I’m reminded of the first time I took the auction stage, and Anton reprimanded me for my lack of confidence.
When I hear my name, I walk onto the stage as the announcer introduces me. “It is my pleasure to present to you, Miss Lane. She is twenty-six and a distinguished piano pedagogue and composer…”
It takes everything for me not to turn my head and stare at the announcer.
I can’t believe he just introduced me as a composer.
Although the video now has more than 600,000 likes, that doesn’t make me a composer.
Still…I stand there brimming with greater confidence on hearing that title applied to my name.
I have a sneaking suspicion that Anton may have had something to do with this.
The bidding starts with a frenzy of several Dominants topping each other as soon as a bid is made. It isn’t until it starts to slow down and it hits a thousand that I recognize the voice of one of the bidders.
“I bid twelve hundred,” Leōn calls out.
After a few seconds, a man with a Southern accent shouts, “Fourteen hundred.”
I hold my breath, hoping not to hear another bid.
Anyone but Leōn…
“Sixteen hundred.”
After several seconds, the announcer states, “The bid stands at sixteen hundred.”
“Two thousand,” the Southern gentleman shouts.
Silence follows, and I breathe out a sigh of relief when I hear the announcer say, “The bid stands at 2000. Going once…going twice…”
“Twenty-five hundred!” Leōn calls out.
It feels as if time has slowed to a crawl as I hear the announcer say, “Going once…going twice…sold to Leōn Onassis.”
Onassis?
I freeze in place, barely able to breathe, when Leōn walks onto the stage to collect me.
Keeping my head lowered as I walk off the stage and stand beside him, I listen as everyone else is bid on.
I hate that my damn body responds to his presence.
The chemistry we share hasn’t changed despite everything that has happened.
Concerned about being hurt, I remind myself that Leōn is a vetted Dom of the Training Center.
They are required to end a scene if the submissive calls her safeword—for whatever reason.
If Leōn does anything to hurt me emotionally, I will simply use my safeword and call the Training Center to have a driver pick me up.
But there will be hell to pay!
I tense up when the auction officially ends, silently cursing my luck that my last auction is going to be with the one Dom I wanted to avoid.