1. Chips and Broken Glass #3
Something cold slides down my spine. Not relief. The opposite of relief.
"How did you fix two-point-three million dollars in debt to the Moreno family?"
"Someone reached out to me." Bennett won't hold still, gaze darting everywhere. "This evening. A few hours ago. Some guy in a suit—said he worked for York. Sebastian York."
Sebastian York.
The man who stood at my table less than an hour ago. The man whose gaze I can still feel on my skin like a brand.
"York's people contacted you?"
"They found me at my apartment. Said York had heard about my situation. Said he had a... a solution."
My stomach turns to ice. York's people don't just "hear about" small-time gambling debts. York's people don't knock on the doors of nobody addicts living in shithole apartments. Not unless York wants something.
"What kind of solution?"
Bennett's hands tighten on my shoulders. The shaking is getting worse.
"You."
The word hangs in the air between us. A small word. Three letters. The weight of it is crushing.
"He wants you." Bennett's voice has gone flat. Distant. Like he's reading from a script he doesn't understand. "One night. That's what the guy said. One night with you, and the debt goes away. All of it."
One night.
I should feel horror. Violation. Rage. My brother has just told me he traded me to a stranger for sex. My brother, who I raised. My brother, who I sacrificed everything for. That brother just handed me over like a chip on a poker table.
But all I can think about is the way Sebastian York looked at me.
The weight of his gaze. The heat that spread through my belly. The shameful, secret part of me that wondered what it would be like.
"When." My voice comes out strange. Not my own. "When exactly did this happen?"
"I told you. A few hours ago. Maybe six? Seven? The guy showed up, laid it out, said York needed an answer by morning."
Six or seven hours ago.
My shift started at six.
Which means York's people made their offer to Bennett before York appeared on the casino floor. Before he stopped at my table. Before he watched me deal and said efficient in that voice like smoke and sin.
He wasn't doing a surprise inspection.
He was inspecting me. Checking on his purchase before he finalized the deal.
"Chloe?" Bennett's voice is distant, muffled, like he's speaking through water. "Chloe, say something. Please."
I stare at the wall, some corporate-mandated motivational poster about teamwork and success, and I think about Sebastian York.
The whispers about him are legend in this town.
Not rumors. Facts. He started with nothing and built The Sovereign into the most profitable casino in the state.
He went to war with the Moreno family, a family that had owned this city for three generations, and won.
People who cross him don't get second chances. People who betray him don't get found.
Cold. Calculating. Patient as a glacier and twice as merciless.
That man looked at me tonight like I was something he intended to own.
One night, Bennett said.
But men like Sebastian York don't send intermediaries for one night. They don't personally inspect merchandise for a single evening's entertainment. Whatever he wants from me, it's not one night.
It's something else entirely.
"Chloe, please." Bennett is crying now, actually crying, tears streaming down his face. "I didn't have a choice. They were going to kill me. I didn't know what else to do."
You had choices. You had choices at every turn for years, and you made the wrong one every single time?—
I don't say it. I've never said it. Eight years of silence, eight years of fixing and saving and sacrificing, and I have never once told Bennett the truth about what his choices have cost me.
"I need to think."
"There's no time to think." His voice cracks, pitches toward hysteria. "The guy said York needs an answer by morning. If I don't—if you don't?—"
"Get out."
"Chloe—"
"Get out." The words tear from my throat, more growl than speech. "Get out of here before someone sees you, before I lose my job too, before you take the only thing I have left. Go wait in the parking lot. I'll find you when my shift ends."
He stares at me. For a long moment, I think he's going to argue. Then something in his face crumbles, whatever was left of the brother I used to know, and he turns.
The door swings shut behind him.
I stand alone in the fluorescent light.
Sebastian York wants me. That's what this means. He watched me on the floor. He came to see the merchandise in person before closing the deal. And now he's waiting for my answer.
One night, Bennett said.
But the way York looked at me wasn't the way a man looks at a one-night stand. It was the way a man looks at something he intends to keep.
I press my palm to my mouth, and I don't know if the sound that escapes is a sob or a laugh.
My parents are dead. My brother has sold me. And somewhere in this building, a king is waiting for his prize.
I already know what my answer will be.
I've never been able to let Bennett fall.
Even when the fall might save us both.