Her mouth twisted around the word.
“Obedient.Defiant.Quiet.Loud.Virgin—if they think it’ll sell.Fertile—if they’re into that.Exotic.Mild.Wild.‘Trainable.’”
My stomach lurched.I tasted bile.I swallowed it down until my throat burned.
The blonde watched me with cold patience.“You don’t get to be a person in here.You’re inventory.”
“And what happens if you don’t… sell?”
The dark-haired girl’s face hardened.“You sell.One way or another.”
The rocking girl finally looked at me properly.Her eyes were wet but empty at the same time.
“When you reach your use-by date, they get rid of you.”
The words made my skin go ice-cold.
“Get rid of you how?”My voice came out rough.
The blonde exhaled through her nose like she hated even having to say it.“Sometimes they move you down the chain.Cheaper buyers.Dirtier rooms.Men who don’t pay for privacy because they don’t care who hears you scream.”
The dark-haired girl added, “Sometimes they drug you and drop you somewhere so you look like you ran away.So the cops call you a junkie and stop looking.”
The rocking girl’s fingers dug into her own arms.“Sometimes you don’t leave.”
The strip light buzzed overhead, and suddenly it felt louder than it should’ve been.Like the building itself was listening.
I stared at them, trying to make my brain accept it.It wouldn’t.It kept bouncing off the truth like a ball off a wall, refusing to stick.
“Have you been… here before?”I asked, voice low.
The blonde’s eyes didn’t move.“Three times.”
My chest tightened.
The dark-haired girl shrugged, like it was a weather report.“Five.”
My stomach turned.“How are you still?—”
“Alive?”the dark-haired girl finished, and something cruel flickered in her eyes.“Luck.And learning.”
The blonde lifted her chin toward me.“You’re not like the others.”
I stiffened.“You don’t know me.”
“I know that look,” she said.“The one that says you’d rather die than let them break you.”
The dark-haired girl’s lips twitched.“That’s cute.”
I glared.“It’s not cute.”
“No,” she agreed.
I didn’t understand.
She leaned forward, elbows on her knees.“The ones who fight get made into examples.The handlers can’t have trouble.Trouble makes the product look risky.”
Product.