I Thee Take: To Have and To Hold Duet Book Two by Knight, Natasha (books to read in your 20s txt) 📕

his enemy? Or is it to hold onto after these men leave. Material to blackmail them when it suits him.

Not that it matters one way or the other for me. My ending doesn’t change, camera or no camera.

The soldiers pull me forward making me bend all the way over. I fight but it’s no use. I can see them now, the men in the room. The spotlight is on another part of my anatomy and now I can see their faces. There’s more than a dozen of them.

The auctioneer describes my attributes as I’m held down. One of the soldiers twists his hand in my hair when I try to move, forcing my gaze into the room. I close my eyes, feel hot tears burn my face.

This is my end? Attacked by these men then murdered? Diego and Angel were lucky then.

I think about Cristiano. Dead already. I think about Noah out there. God, please let him be safe. Please don’t let him be waiting for me. Searching for me.

I think about Mara with that man.

The things she has seen. The things she has yet to see.

I think about those other girls already sold tonight. And the barn the woman mentioned.

I steel myself, open my eyes just as I’m straightened, lifted, turned so quickly I stumble, dizzy with the rush of blood.

For a brief instant, my mind plays a trick on me. Because what I’m seeing can’t be real. It can’t be him. But there, for the briefest instant before the spotlight shines in my eyes, I see Cristiano.

I’d recognize his eyes in a crowd of a hundred. A thousand.

Cristiano.

I blink, try to see him again, but I’m blinded once more. All I can do is stand there and listen to the monsters call out numbers. Hear them buy parts of my body, my soul. Hear the gavel slam down as those sales are recorded.

And just as I’m lifted off the pedestal and carried off the stage, as if on cue, lightning crashes overhead and the lights go out.

43

Cristiano

The room goes sideways, my brain rattling against my skull.

Dante’s hand closes swiftly over my shoulder. “Steady.”

I fist my hands, clenching and unclenching, my blood boiling. I reach blindly for my gun.

“Hey.” Dante steps in front of me, voice firm as he takes my arms and shakes me hard.

I blink. Focus my eyes.

The lights have gone out. The room is lit only by candles now. More are being lit around us.

My vision adjusts after a moment. When it does, I see the table in the far corner that had been unoccupied before, busy now. A man sits behind it punching numbers into a machine while another man dictates to him. One of the attendees.

“Good,” Dante says. “Focus. You take your pistol out here and she’s as good as dead.”

I nod, my eyes on the back of the man paying for his turn at Scarlett.

“First. Lucky bastard,” the accountant says, standing to shake the man’s hand once the transaction is complete. “I hope there will be something left when I take a turn.”

The man laughs, pats the accountant on the shoulder with a big, meaty hand. He must weigh four-hundred pounds.

“Carlos,” the accountant calls. “If you’ll show our guest the way.”

Carlos steps forward, nods. He’s a big guy and armed. He walks ahead of the fat man and they slip through a door at the far corner. Another solider promptly steps in front of the door to block anyone else from passing through.

I take another step toward it. Meet the soldier’s eyes.

“Cris,” Dante says, voice low but firm. “Focus.”

I nod, turn to look around the room again. A door opens at the far end and one of the men reenters as he zips his pants.

“Let’s go,” I say as we move toward that unguarded door. We walk through and step into a corridor lit only by candles and the occasional flash of lightning from the window. Several doors line the corridor and I know the one I’m looking for is the one where a soldier stands guard.

“Bathroom,” my brother says to him.

The man points to the opposite end of the hall and we walk in that direction. The door he’s blocking is glass, so I can see the fat man when we pass. He’s climbing some stairs at the far end.

“Gentlemen,” the soldier says. “Move on.”

I didn’t realize I’d stopped. I shift my gaze to meet his. He’s my height. My build.

“My brother drank a little too much,” Dante says, coming to put an arm around me.

I wonder if I appear drunk. I’m not fully myself, that’s for sure. My heartbeat is strong, loud in my ears, blood rushing. I have tunnel vision. I see one thing. Getting to that man. Getting to Scarlett.

The soldier nods, expression unchanging. He holds my gaze and folds his arms across himself.

I reach into my back pocket, using something out of Marcus Rinaldi’s playbook, push the button on the switchblade and, without a moment’s hesitation, push the blade into his gut.

He doesn’t have time to blink before it happens. Before the knife is forced so deep in his stomach, I feel the soft, mushy insides against my hand.

I thrust deeper, getting close enough to hold him upright, one hand around his arm, my body pressing his to the door.

His eyes have gone wide, his hand frozen on its way to reaching for his weapon.

I twist once more, feel his full weight on me as his knees buckle. A choked sound comes from his throat before a trail of blood seeps from the corner of his mouth.

“Fuck,” Dante says from behind me.

I pull the blade out, wipe it on the man’s shirt as Dante catches his other arm.

“What about getting in, getting Scarlett and getting out?” he asks as we drag the man’s heavy body to the bathroom.

“Fuck that.”

“Oh yeah? And why is that? Because you want an army coming after us?”

“Because I’m going to kill every mother fucker in this place before I walk out tonight.”

We