Chapter Thirty Six

  Vangelis passed the time waiting with Ornette by having dinner with her. He fed her mushroom soup with garlic toast. It was a meal that put heat in her body and calmed her soul. Then he put a guard on her and let her watch the last episode of Goldilocks Zone. He left her to watch TV while he ducked in on the meeting between Silver Ashley and Desmond. Ornette watched the show on the screen with unfeigned interest. She watched as Orpah won immunity for the next round and Starling was eliminated. That was too bad for Varner, who should have done everything in his power to make the only member of the Church of Voynich his Goldilocks. Well, it had been proven that he didn’t control how the designers and businessmen voted. He didn’t have a hand in it.

  The next challenge was one where the designers each got a model and their goal was to design a bathing suit. Ornette was assigned a designer even though she was absent.

  When Vangelis finally emerged from the throne room, he came back announcing that it was time to put Ornette to bed.

  She gave him a funny look. “You’re going to put me to bed?”

  The look on Vangelis’ face said that nothing could bore him more. “Apparently, I’m putting you in Desmond’s bedroom and setting his bracelet to a setting so cruel that if he lays a hand on you in the wrong place, he’ll be zapped within an inch of his life. You’ll be shocked too, but it appears your settings are set too low for a significant electrocution.”

  “Are you going to change that?” she asked, more than a little concerned.

  “No, Precious,” he said like she was the least precious thing in the world. “I do not have authorization to do that, but I can do whatever I like to your boyfriend. I’m telling you this so you don’t get any funny ideas. If you do anything to him beyond having a little cuddle, he’ll get zapped. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to burn him to a crisp.”

  Ornette laughed. “Fine. I won’t screw him. Twist my arm already.”

  It was Vangelis's turn to give Ornette a funny look. “Did I misinterpret the scene I walked in on earlier? It seemed like you were as raring to go as he was.”

  Ornette stood up and stretched. “I don’t actually remember what happened just then. We were kissing and you came in? He picked me up and you came in? We were going to go somewhere and you came in? Sorry, I really can’t remember that long ago. I’m programmed to forget everything as soon as it happens.”

  Vangelis stared at her, perplexity written on his face. “There is something about you. It’s dangerous and intoxicating at once.”

  Ornette had heard that kind of thing from potential owners before. Granted, Ornette didn’t have that many conversations with men who were not owners or potential owners. She didn’t know what any of them were talking about. She had scratched it up to mean that they wanted to compliment her, but they didn’t want to say that they found her beautiful because she was not as beautiful as the other women. They wanted to say something nice, but they were at a loss for words. How did a man compliment a woman he wanted to buy?

  Vangelis snapped his fingers. “That’s it.”

  “What’s it?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at him.

  He explained, “Though I don't have the power to shock you with your bracelet, I have near-complete power over you while you are here and you don’t acknowledge it. You change the power dynamic with a flick of your hair.”

  “What are you talking about?” she asked, turning the rest of the way around and resisting the powerful urge to flick her hair because he mentioned it.

  He pressed a button that closed and locked the doors, locking them inside.

  That made Ornette’s skin crawl. She placed her arms across her chest and tapped her toe impatiently. “What are you doing?”

  “I don’t want anyone to overhear us,” he said, coming closer.

  Ornette did not take a step back. There was nowhere to run or hide. The guard who had been assigned to her was mysteriously missing and all the doors surrounding them were locked based on Vangelis’s order. If he was going to throw her against a wall, she wasn’t going to race him to it, so she stood her ground and held her left arm with her right to stop it from shaking.

  “The most effective aphrodisiac in the universe is power. Who has it? In the case of the sort of men who buy women to do their bidding, the power balance is simple. They’re in charge and they’ll put an electric charge through you if you don’t obey. In your case, you don’t care if they shock you. Your black hand proves it. They’re not in charge. You are. It shouldn’t be sexy. It shouldn’t turn them on because it’s the exact opposite of what they’re paying for. But it does.”

  “Are you turned on right now?” she asked with a morbidly curious twist of her tongue.

  He didn’t say any words, but the look on his face, in the veins throbbing in his neck, it was obvious he was. That was the reason he had locked the doors.

  “Won’t you get shocked?” Ornette asked, still holding her left arm in a vice grip.

  “Silver Ashley does not allow me to keep other lovers,” he answered in dark measured tones. “It’s not that I want to drag you to my room and undo you. I want to understand what Desmond is saying about you in his meeting with Ashley. I’m afraid a bit of his hunger for you is wearing off on me. It’s notable because he’s never outright said he was hungry before. I’m worried Ashley is going to give him her permission to do something crazy tonight and I’ll have to stitch him back up in the morning. If she does, I sure hope you’re as good a lay as he thinks you will be.”

  Finished with the conversation, Vangelis unlocked the doors, motioned for her to follow him, and led Ornette to a different part of the panel to a bedroom.

  “This isn’t Desmond’s bedroom,” she said as she went in. From the entry, it looked as plain as a hotel room with no personal possessions anywhere.

  “It’s his room when he stays with us. Have a good night.” Vangelis snapped the door shut with himself on the other side.

  Ornette exhaled, shook off her housecoat, and got directly into Desmond’s bed. She should have had a neat little thrill about being where the man she liked slept, but it felt about as personal as staying in his favorite hotel. The bedding had been put down clean an hour beforehand. She got comfortable and closed her eyes.

  From there, she didn’t know if Desmond came in a minute later or several hours later, but eventually, his soft touch was on her bare shoulder.

  She rolled over, suddenly aching from the structured undergarments she hadn’t removed when she got into bed. She cracked her eyelids open and saw him. He wasn’t in the wheelchair anymore but was sitting in a chair placidly by the bed.

  She turned to him drowsily, “Is it time to talk? Did you and Silver Ashley figure out a plan?”

  “Uh… I got permission to talk to you. We might have to return to have a word with the Queen together,” he affirmed. “But let me ask you your thoughts on a few things.”

  “Okay,” Ornette said, sitting up.

  “Our first question is if you would mind joining the show again?”

  “I’m your slave and if you tell me to join the show and behave a certain way, I will do it,” she said without hesitation.

  “What about Varner? Aren’t you scared of him?” Desmond pressed.

  “He’s not allowed to own me according to Sleeping Beauty Inc. regulations. I’m not allowed to be afraid. I’ll go back and do whatever is asked of me that’s in line with the contract I signed,” she reminded him.

  Desmond paused. “You have no personal preference?”

  “Have you never owned a slave before?” she said in a shallow growl. “My opinion is not important. My job is to do what you say and get paid for it.”

  “That’s what Silver Ashley says, that you’re a professional and you’ll do as you’re told,” he sighed in something like resignation.

  “What a compliment,” Ornette said blankly.

  Desmond blinked and in that time, he got wind of what Ornette was saying. “Silver Ashley wants to send you back to the show. In exchange for not filing a lawsuit against Varner for stabbing me until after the show has aired, she wants to make him organize the remainder of the show so that you are nowhere near him and make him promise not to bid on you. She wants you to go back with the goal of being purchased by Uncle Bear or Brother Bear. Have you had anything to do with either one of those guys?”

  “Neither,” she admitted.

  “Silver Ashley thinks they are looser cannons than Varner and she thinks you would do very well breaking down Brother Bear. He’s lighter weight and he’s more sensitive about his lack of girth. She wants you to get bought by him, go home with him, and find out all you can about their fake charity.”

  “So she can impress Beckett Beltrose with the horrors of Venus?” Ornette supplied.

  “Yes,” he said without apology.

  “And what do you want?” she asked, turning her full charm on Desmond. “Silver Ashley is not my owner. You are. What do you want?”

  He fell onto the bed with a sigh. “I want this to be over.”

  “The show?” she asked, lying down next to him so she faced him.

  “No. All of this,” he said, indicating the whole room around them. “I’m exhausted. You don’t know it, but I have been playing my own elimination game all my life. The other contestants are all my relatives: my siblings, my parents, my cousins... anyone I'm related to. Who can do what Silver Ashley wants the longest?”

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  “Are you winning?” Ornette asked.

  “I have been, but I’m getting very tired of this game. She keeps her last will and testament a secret, so I don’t know if I’m the frontrunner, but I am the one who has done what he was told the longest. My other relatives bowed out, saying they would rather have their independence than her money. Most of my relatives do not even live on Venus anymore. I don’t know where they live or how they live.”

  “What about your father?” Ornette asked, running her fingers up the length of his arm until they rested on his trio of slave bracelets.

  “He never activates it,” Desmond explained. “He’s more interested in his other children.”

  “Is no one else playing her game anymore?” Ornette wondered.

  “There are some relatives that are still doing what they’re told. I’m the only male left. The others are girl cousins who are having babies. Ashley approves of that… heartily.”

  “Are you bad because you haven’t fathered a child… Or have you?” she asked in a squeak.

  He shook his head. “I haven’t. I haven’t had a lot of free time to get a girlfriend, let alone romance her well enough that she’d want to stick around.”

  “Have you had a slave before me?”

  He looked away. “I’ve had five. They were all sent back to Sleeping Beauty Inc. before the first month was out.”

  “Why?”

  “They don’t train Sleeping Beauty Inc. models for corporate espionage and that’s all I do. I’d own one I could use as a plus one for a vacation and that was all.”

  “I didn’t think they normally let models be sent out for that short of a time period.”

  “They don’t. They were paid for nine months and only used them for one.”

  Ornette gulped. She hadn’t been lucky enough to have a buyer with that philosophy. “Did you ever have the same model more than once?”

  His head snapped to attention. “Listen, Ornette, you seem like you’re looking for sordid details. They were models who were not chosen by me. They were chosen by Silver Ashley and sent in a package to my hotel where I was vacationing, pretending to be a playboy. Of course, I wasn’t actually doing anything of the sort. I was greasing wheels and doing that with a beautiful female friend is easier than doing it on my own. It was supposed to be entertaining because it was on a Starline cruise ship or something, but it wasn’t my idea of fun. I just needed her to make me look desirable for a month or so while I gathered a collection of women vacationers who were interested in me, and I could send her back. It looked like we quarreled and she left me. Before she left, I'd have her visit any woman I particularly wanted an in with to tell her she was leaving so she could have me. It wasn't fun. It was work like everything else I do. I haven’t had a break in seventeen years.”

  He was exhausted. She looked at his white hair. His story checked out.

  “What color was your hair originally?” she asked softly.

  “Black,” he replied like he was bored with answering that question. “It was gray by the time I was twenty-five and white by the time I was thirty. I didn’t try to keep it black. Blue eyes pop next to black hair, but not like they pop next to white hair. It would have been more trouble to keep it dyed than it would have been worth.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” she agreed.

  “The thing is, Ornette, I didn’t like any of those women. They were shockingly young and used to being spoiled in exchange for their very presence. I have never had it easy and I was born into a family that is richer than god. It didn’t seem like those women had anything in common with me. If they had hard lives, they hid it because it wasn’t something they could share with an owner they’d had for a month. By then, I was bored and ready to move on. The other women were women I was using to get corporate secrets. I couldn't get attached.”

  “What did you want?” she asked.

  “I wanted someone who was like me, who had had it rough, rough enough that she couldn’t hide it. Silver Ashley didn’t choose you. Goldilocks Zone was something I decided to stick my nose in and I got myself on the show without her help. She’s interested now because it suits her purposes, but I chose you.”

  Ornette laughed. “You chose me because I’m short?”

  “I did,” he admitted, obviously not wanting to hide it. “When I went to the head office, I had the client coordinator make a pile of all the blondes who were just a little too tall to be in the Thumbelina category. I chose you for your burned hand and your history of violence against your masters.”

  Ornette swallowed. “How did you know about that?”

  He clarified, “The client coordinator who worked with me did not want me to buy you. She had someone else in mind that she thought would fit the bill much better and cost a lot more. I think she cost more than Claudia. She was pushing her on me because she knew I could easily pay a higher price than most of the other men who were there purchasing that day. One of the bullets she used to dissuade me from buying you was telling me in a tight whisper about your past violent actions against masters.”

  “And you thought…” she began with her mouth agape.

  “Honestly, I was impressed you’d gotten away with it. None of that stuff was on your permanent record. I’m still impressed. If we weren’t trying to find Varner’s honey trail, I’d have had you slip him a lethal dose of poison the same way I had you give Albert a heart attack and rob Rowan of his DNA.”

  Ornette let her mouth fall the rest of the way open.

  “Varner is a violent person,” Desmond continued. “He stabbed me because he wanted you and he was explosively angry that I had set it up so he couldn’t have you. Have you ever seen white-hot jealousy before?”

  “Not over me,” Ornette confessed. “Listen, Varner gives me the creeps because he reminds me of the kind of man who used to buy me when I was a teenager. If he’s doing what Vangelis says he is and his charity is forcing children younger into involuntary slavery here on Venus, I want to help you stop him.”

  Desmond rested his cheek against his fist. “I won’t let you go back to the show if Silver Ashley doesn’t get you the working conditions I mentioned,” he promised. “If you can get purchased by Rolf or Tommy, they’ll take you home with them and it will be the perfect opportunity to snoop. Naturally, if that happens, I won’t be allowed to win you when you go up for auction.”

  “That’s a shame,” Ornette moaned and she really meant it.

  Desmond stuck his tongue in his cheek and groaned. Desire was all over his face, in every straight and every bent limb of his body. It seemed like he really couldn’t wait another minute for them to be together.

  She put out a finger and pushed on his temple lightly, but he fell over at the slightest touch. She laughed at the sight of him sprawled on the bed. “Other than the obvious, what, praytell, were you going to do with me?”

  “What do you think? Play dress up,” he admitted with a grin.

  She looked at him quizzically. “Really? Why dress up? Haven’t you seen enough of that with the show?”

  Desmond looked at her with a facial expression she’d never seen before. Usually, her owners got this sick little grin on their faces before an activity like dress up. Was she going to get dressed up like Goldilocks? Little Bo Peep? Little Red Riding Hood? The look on Desmond’s face was so different. That meant he wanted something different. What?

  “I don’t mean for you to try on a collection of clothes or costumes for me,” he said, seeing that he needed to spell out his intention for her. “I am wildly disinterested in turning you into a Barbie doll. Not that something like that wouldn’t have its charm, but I agree. I think both of us have had more than enough of that with your interim owners.”

  She eyed him suspiciously. “Then what did you have in mind?”

  “Designing clothes, what else?” he answered, suddenly pressing bracelet buttons on the inside of his wrist. “Isn’t this one of your designs?”

  Ornette frowned at the dress design worn in the hologram he projected. It was one of her favorites. It was a dress that was hardly there, but it was meant to cover a bathing suit. The lines of the suit were visible through the loose weave while still maintaining a particum of mystery.

  Ornette blew a raspberry in Desmond’s face. “I don’t own the copyright for that. Croix does.”

  Desmond cocked a white eyebrow. “Not anymore 'cause I bought it off him.”

  Ornette straightened. “You did what?”

  “I didn’t spend that much money for you compared to how much was shelled out for the other models, but I… decided to gamble on you a bit,” he confessed rather cryptically.

  “What does that mean?”

  He shut off the hologram and reached to take her hand in his. “It means I researched you thoroughly before I bought you. I wasn’t going to get the cost of you back. There’s no way for me, or any of the financial backers, to recoup the costs of our models. I decided that you were resourceful enough that you could be my partner in my overall mission to uncover examples of involuntary slavery on Venus. That is what Silver Ashley wants from me. The show wasn’t her idea. She doesn’t believe in micromanagement. She left me to do it my way. I got involved with the show, I researched you, I bought you, and then I cleverly bought the patents for as many of your clothing designs as I could before you were delivered on Venus for the start of the show.”

  Ornette stared. She couldn’t speak. What was he planning to do with the rights to her designs?

  “They were cheap,” he explained further. “They wouldn’t be cheap by the end of filming. Already, they’re worth much more than what I paid for them. You’re so popular,” he said admiringly as he touched the side of her face.

  “What are you going to do with them?” she asked hesitantly, not entirely sure if she could trust him.

  “I promised you money if you did well on the show... if you impressed the businessmen,” Desmond replied smoothly. “My idea was that if you did well, I could gift you your own designs and you could sell them to those old boots without having to sell yourself. The better you did on the show, the more money you could earn with each sale.”

  Ornette sucked in her breath. No one had ever offered her anything so grand in her life… Not even close. It wasn’t just giving her her designs, it was also arranging a situation so that they would be worth something to someone, maybe everyone who watched the show. She was overwhelmed. “Why would you do something like that for me?”

  He shrugged. “It was nothing. I was in the right place at the right time.”

  For a moment, Ornette’s brain zipped down an old neuropathway. He was lying. He had to be lying. If he was like any of her old owners, he was lying.

  Some of them promised her big things before. She hadn’t believed them. Why was she on the verge of believing Desmond? Had she become so desperate to escape her life that she didn’t see a lie for a lie?

  He yawned. “Look it up.”

  “What?” she floundered.

  “You don’t believe me,” he accused gently. “I can’t say I blame you, but if you access your Sleeping Beauty Inc. profit statements, you’ll see that although your money didn’t change, there have been changes under your ‘other assets’ tab.”

  Ornette fiddled with her bracelet. “I can’t access banking info with my bracelet.”

  “I know. It’s a locked vault because bracelets are too easy to hack. All the same, they have a computer at the front desk of the studio dorms that was installed by Sleeping Beauty Inc. You can see for yourself… if you go back. I sent you the rights for a hundred of your designs after you gave Albert a heart attack and another fifty when you got one of Rowan’s hairs for me.”

  Ornette gaped. She had been labeling her designs with her own serial code for years. There were over seven hundred. A lot of them were crap, but there were also a lot of gems. Which ones had he given back to her?

  He stroked the palm of her blackened hand with the tips of his fingers. She had so much nerve damage in that hand she barely felt it, although he would occasionally touch a sensitive spot and her hand would flinch.

  “Since you’ve done so well, I am going to turn the rest over to you when we finish, regardless of the outcome of the show. After that, if you are able to turn your designs into millions of dollars, it will be a direct result of how well you did on the show, and what a great designer you are. You will earn whatever you get… So it won’t be like a gift from me. It will be more like I set things right than that I gave you a gift or a reward. You deserve the credit for the work you did.”

  At that moment, all of Ornette’s doubts took a dive.

  Ornette kissed him. Someone had done something like that for her? If she forgot everything at the end of every day, she wanted to enjoy the day that was still playing.

  She kissed him.

  She kissed him with her mouth closed.

  She kissed him with her mouth open.

  She kissed him and felt his breath.

  She kissed him and tasted him.

  She kissed him and wound her arms around him until he was dropped to the ground with an electric shock. Her bracelet went off too, but the shock was more like a mild vibration. Desmond was shaking like he was in an executioner's chair.

  She really should have taken Vangelis’s warning more seriously.