CHAPTER 15

"Take him down!" Gio yelled.

A guard to Janri's side pulled a foot-long rod from a holster. Flicking his wrist, he elongated it into a three-foot-long gleaming stick. The other guard did the same, advancing quickly, Donal still holding on. Their blows were fast and brutal, hitting Janri's sides and back, avoiding his head.

He cried out, quickly shrinking to get away.

"That's enough," Gio said, pushing me to the right to give them some room.

A last blow landed, and Donal let go, dropping Janri to the floor. Janri groaned and shuddered, shaking with barely held-in sobs.

"He is definitely not a dragon," Donal said, crossing his arms over his chest before giving Janri a prod with the toe of his boot.

Janri cried out and scooted away, shaking.

My chest constricted, pity washing away my dislike of him.

"He doesn't need all that," I said. "Don't react to him the way you would to me. He doesn't pose the same sort of threat. You know he doesn't."

"This is how we react to everyone," Gio said. "With dragons, it often escalates." He paused, his hands still tight on my arms. "Is this going to escalate?"

"I don't know." It was an honest answer.

******

"Donal."

Donal uncrossed his arms and stepped behind me to take Gio's place. His fingers curled delicately around my elbows, suggesting he wasn't a total idiot.

Gio stepped in front of me, his dusky gray stare digging into my eyes.

"Is that not a very dangerous place for you to be?" I couldn't help but ask, watching his hands.

He held them up and out, fingers spread. "Usually, yes. Very." His head tilted to the side. "But you're not like most dragons, are you? You're hard, and you're fierce, but you're not a trained warrior. You're a survivor. And survivors don't fight just to fight. Survivors aren't worried about ego. They're worried about seeing their next sunrise. Right?" He paused for a beat. "I know about surviving, Fino. It's why I'm still in this job. Tell me. What are you reacting to?"

I could feel my eyebrows pinch, wondering why he was asking the question again. Wondering if this was a trick of some sort.

"My clothes," I said, watching his reaction closely. "I want to keep my clothes intact."

"Your clothes are a mess. Your shirt is shredded in places and crusted with your blood. It won't last much longer."

I thought of the note, and my heart sped up. "My pants. They're leather. They're fine."

His eyes narrowed just slightly. He pulled back and glanced down at my pants, fine other than a few score marks from where stray whips had snapped them. As he looked back at my face, his brows pinched like mine were probably doing.

"Fine. I'll have them sent to your cell. Anything else?"

I shrugged. "Sure. Let me go."

He continued to stare for a moment before taking a step back. "Step out of your clothes. If you give us any trouble, we'll beat you and destroy your pants."

"I can entice her to behave." Sandy leaned in a little to catch my attention, her magic crawling across my skin like it had when I'd arrived.

"Entice the possum." Gio gestured her away. "This dragon has a powerful true mate. She won't succumb to your power."

"No?" Her eyes glimmered. "Are we sure?"

Her magic flowed across my flesh like a whisper of satin. It curled around my nipples, tightening them, before slipping down to my core. I sucked in a breath at the blast of ecstasy, before my stomach flipped and then clenched. A feeling like acid dribbled through me, corroding the magic. Bile rose in my throat, and my head swam.

"No, thank you," I managed, trying to hold my stomach down. "That's a nope on my end."

"See?" Gio said. "Go use your talents on the man. He's not handling this well, and he needs to be presentable."

Sandy frowned at me, her gaze roaming my body now. "If she can't be enticed, how will she be brought to heel at the parties?"

"Not my problem." Gio stared her down, and I faintly heard Donal say behind me, "We hope."

When Sandy hit Janri with her magic, he loosened up immediately, becoming pliant with a dopey smile on his face. "Ah, yes, that's more like it. I cooperated…"

She undressed him herself, allowing him to put his hand on top of her head and push her head down his body. Her eyes were on me the whole time, her smile cunning as she lowered to her knees.

"Yeah," Janri muttered, his head falling back. "That's right. I cooperated. This is more like it."

This wasn't shame fucking for Janri. That much was clear. This was just fucking. He'd been with the demons in the village often enough that he was clearly happy for this brand of distraction.

I turned my back, disgusted, to finish undressing, but Sandy called out, "Make her watch."

"That wasn't in my brief," Gio said, holding out his hand for me to take so that I could get in the tub.

Her slurping teamed with Janri's loud moans made my skin crawl. She was clearly being noisy on purpose, and he liked her all the more for it. Once he was in the water, she must've switched to a hand job, because the sloshing of water accompanied his groans and grunts...at one point, the guy fucking whinnied. Whinnied! What in the actual fuck?

"Does she have to keep it up through the whole thing?" I asked at one point, the attendants scrubbing suds through my hair. The bath might have actually been pleasant if not for the soundtrack. It wasn't the actual act that disgusted me....I'd been in the Tokyo, after all; I knew how those things went....it was that the guy thought he fucking deserved it.

Gio stood beside me with his arms crossed over his chest, facing their way. His expression was dark. He didn't reply, but he didn't seem overly fond of the situation himself.