Double the Price (SeXlection #2) (11 page)

“Yes. We’ve not tried hydrating yet because we figured out the green tea versus soda just now.”

“Right? You heard that. Good.” Anatoliy walked into the other room and I returned to Cecil, Craig already cooling the tea for him to drink.

“What was the fight about, Neil?” Craig asked quietly after Cecil drank the first mug. “I think we’re going to need to know that. This is really severe for
just a fight
.”

I bobbed my head and stared at Cecil. “He said he loved me. I didn’t handle it well. I’d been so confused after everything that day with helping match the shifters from the brothel with our clients, and seeing a
part
of what they had to go through, finding out Bob was screwing Jasmine even if it’s forbidden. I didn’t like I was helping to basically sell slaves when I don’t believe they should be
en
slaved. I keep having this comparison in my head between the humane society and the brothels.

“It’s almost how they treat them. You pay the fee, sign the adoption papers, get the info packet, and done. You own them. I was a part of that and it’s so screwed up I couldn’t get over any of them would ever be normal then you throw in that they’re used for
sex
not just work like other shifters and—I don’t know. It just seems like some shrink’s field day of mental crap.”

“Plus the reality of your own dysfunctions and growing up around one of the most fucked up marriages as an example of ‘love’ on the planet.” Craig rolled his eyes. He’d never hid what my parents had wasn’t love by any meaning of the term. I always found it endearing he didn’t bullshit me.

“Plus that,” I sighed, scrubbing my hands over my face. “And the next thing I knew, I was asking him if he knew what love really was. Was he mistaking having a master that kissed him and asked him what he wanted for love.”

“That would have gone over famously with a smart man like Cecil,” Craig groaned, plopping on the floor next to me and leaning his back against the counter island. “You’re a turd.”

“I know that, but it gets worse. I forgot to read the packet from the brothel with all that’s been going on. He told me a bunch of stuff and I thought that was it. Do you know what they’ve been doing to these ocelots?”

“I’m not going to like this, am I?” he muttered under his breath.

I shook my head, knowing he’d see it out of the corner of his eye. “Him imprinting on me is part of their
mating
. He basically married me. Or I married him really so he obeys me as my husband. That’s what it is. If I ever fell in love and took a human partner, it would cause him physical
pain
after bonding with me.”

“Holy
shit
, Neil.”

“I won’t do it,” I whispered, my eyes filling with tears. “I won’t ever do that to him. I didn’t know before I bought him and signed everything, but I promised him I’d never be with another shifter when he asked me. He’s enough. I don’t need a goddamn plus one to parties. I won’t hurt him like that.”

“I want to see that paperwork as soon as Cecil is better,” Craig informed, his tone going dark. “I’m done.”

“What do you mean?” I hedged, glancing at my friend.

“They were a threat or some shit that went down before we were born, I can’t say. So we had to control them. I don’t agree, but I wasn’t alive then. Maybe they were dangerous, living among us, but I doubt it. Sex slaves is crude but most of the ones I’ve been around seem to enjoy it for the most part though I want the brothels to be cleaned up and people like Bob out. There’s no reason they can’t have more of a choice in who they play with or whatever. But this? This is torture. They’re living beings even if we don’t give them the rights of people.

“If you were to marry or whatever, that would be torture to Cecil and they hid that. That breaks your civil rights and his. Animal testing has more rules than this shit. I’m done and I will take this all the fucking way up to the top if I have to. This has gone too far. How can we call ourselves humans and not be the least bit
humane
with other species of intelligent life under our care that in most every way surpass us?”

“I will help you in any way I can in your quest, Craig,” Anatoliy said from the other side of the kitchen. We both glanced at him and it was obvious he’d been there a long time. Well, at least we had help, because I was right there with Craig, and at least I didn’t have to repeat what I’d done to Cecil because to make him get better everyone would have to know—and Anatoliy had heard all my darkest secrets.

6 Cecil

From the moment I left Neil’s room after declaring my love for him and my life fell apart, something inside me snapped and it was like walking into a haze. Maybe more a bubble? Everything outside me sounded faint as if hearing it from underwater, and I didn’t see it clearly. I was far from it all.

I remembered him talking to me and vaguely my answers sometime the next day but what I said wasn’t something I could repeat. I was too deep into my bubble, moving further and further away from the surface of what was around me. The only thing that seemed to register to me and made me float closer to the surface was when Neil activated the imprint and ordered me to do something.

But I was also
aware
. I’d heard him spazzing out and calling people. I could feel his fear crawling all over my skin when he plucked me out of the bed and washed me. Then in the kitchen when he was commanding me to eat, I heard enough of his conversation with Craig to know there was more to the story of why he’d reacted to what I’d said than I’d thought. Plus Anatoliy was there, and I was
shocked
Neil had called him, risking that relationship because we fought.

Then I worried how bad off I must have been for him to do that.

The three of them were so scared about something, and I was pretty sure it was me, which didn’t help my own fear… And that made me keep drifting below the surface of whatever haze I was dealing with. They fussed about me, Neil getting his velvet robe I thought was the softest thing in the world and trying to switch it out for the towel I was wearing.

I shrank away from him. He didn’t love me. He would
never
love me and I gave him my heart. Not only that, he threw it back in my face as if I was nothing and I was half
mated
to him.

“Can you please do it?” he choked out, handing the robe to Craig. “The wet towel will dry out his skin worse and he likes this. Cecil’s tactile and loves soft. It’s the softest thing I have. Unless he hates it now because it smells like me.”

“I’m sure it’s great,” Craig assured him and took the clothing from his friend. He glanced at me with sad eyes as he picked me up. “Come on, buddy. Let’s get you situated in the living room. Nice and comfy there.” He walked us over there away from Neil and Anatoliy. I heard soft crying in the kitchen and I wondered what was making Anatoliy cry? But it didn’t sound like his deep voice.

It almost sounded like
Neil
.

“Please come back to him, Cecil,” Craig begged me quietly. “Give him a chance to fix this. If you only
knew
what hell he’s been through, you’d understand and forgive him. You didn’t give him a chance to open up more. Getting close to Neil is like hopping around a mine field. His parents screwed him up so badly—it’s really not his fault. You’ve gotten closer, faster, than anyone I’ve ever known. He loves you.
He’s
the one who doesn’t know what love is and didn’t see that. So just come back because losing you would kill him.”

I blinked at him as he set me on my feet and took off the towel I was bundled up in. Craig hissed and tears filled his eyes. I looked down and started shaking when I took in my body. I was nothing but bones and wrinkled, dying skin. How had this happened and so fast?

“Cecil? Are you there? Do you understand what’s going on?” Craig asked, knowing I comprehended what I was seeing before slipping the robe on me. I gave the barest of nods and swayed on my feet. He caught me and tied the belt before tucking me in the corner of the couch. “Have you ever seen this before? Do you know why this is happening and how we can help?”

My eyes darted to the entrance between the living room and the kitchen as Neil and Anatoliy came racing in to join us. Then I looked back to Craig and gave a slight shake of my head.

“Okay, okay. Don’t worry. Help’s coming and we’re gonna figure this out,” he promised.

“Here, eat this,” Anatoliy offered, handing me a plate of my favorite grilled tuna and some green tea. I stared at it and didn’t even take it from him. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want anything.

“Cecil, eat it and drink your tea,” Neil ordered me. My gaze flickered to his and I saw tears running down his cheeks.

He doesn’t want to be ordering me to do this.
Why? Does he want me to get worse?
Either way I had to do what he wanted. I took the plate and mug.

“The eating and hydration is working,” Anatoliy comforted Neil. “He’s more responsive and holding the plate on his own. That’s better than when I arrived a few hours ago.”

“I can’t order him to eat forever so he keeps improving or stays better!” Neil grabbed his hair and tugged it, pacing the living room.

Oh, that makes more sense. He’s using the imprint so I’ll do as I should. Duh.

“The ocelot specialist from London will be here by morning,” Craig assured him. “The more Cecil improves until then, the more I’m sure this guy can do for him.” He turned to Anatoliy. “Who is he again? I mean, ocelot specialist can’t be his title.”

“No, Samuel Patterson is—”

There was a loud thunk as I dropped my plate. They turned toward me, my mouth hanging open and at least my mug of green tea had been on the table.

“Is someone Cecil has apparently heard of,” Craig drawled.

“He is like Santa Claus to an ocelot shifter,” Anatoliy murmured, studying me closely. “They are cat shifters but with their special abilities and being the only ones who imprint when they mate as they do, they have different needs and go in another category. Samuel Patterson is the ocelot’s diplomatic envoy. Think of him as the UN’s human rights ambassador who travels issuing UN sanctions for violations found.”

“That’s great in theory, but there aren’t any sanctions that can be given on behalf of the shifters in this country. They’re
slaves
here,” Craig reminded him.

“There can be, but your country is too pompous to acknowledge them,” Anatoliy corrected. “That does not mean they haven’t been piling up. And other countries are tired of it. The United States has the least amount of rights for their shifters. I filed the necessary paperwork to have Samuel come in through Russia’s diplomatic immunity because he is not a guest in America anymore. He starts—I think the phrase is—
massive shit storms
when he visits.”

“I like this guy already,” Craig chuckled. “But that also means he draws attention and people will want him detained. So he’s taking a big risk in coming and we need to get him back out quickly.”

“Yes, but he has been trying to get into one of these brothels for ages. I believe this will be his chance if Neil is willing to sneak him in as a potential buyer with his new connections to Bob. Bob does not strike me as a man who pays attention to world news and shifter politics.”

“No, not even close,” Neil agreed, bobbing his head. “The only problem would be if Cecil knew who he was, others would.”

“His name but certainly not what the man looks like with their limited internet caps.” They looked at me as one and I nodded. I had no idea what Samuel Patterson looked like. “Good. So Cecil is the priority, and if we can get Samuel into the brothel and help him further his battle with the treatment of ocelots in this country and others, that much the better.”

“Agreed.” Neil glanced at me then, his eyes filled with worry as his shoulders sagged under the mounting stress he was feeling. I looked away, reaching for my tea he ordered. Once I was done, I glanced down at the tuna and went to slide off the couch.

“Neil, I think Cecil is still going to eat it,” Craig hissed. I glanced up in time to see Neil jump up from the chair he’d been leaning against as he stared out the windows.

“Cecil, no, don’t. Stop!” he demanded and hurried to me, squatting down by the plate. “Shit, sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I should have been thinking. The minute you dropped it, I guess I thought that changed the order. I wasn’t thinking. Of course you would do whatever I ordered. Right. Don’t ever eat off the floor. I won’t make you eat off the floor, Cecil. I’m not that mean.” He was choking out the last rambling thoughts as he scooped up the tuna onto the plate with his hand.

“Shhh, Neil, it’s okay,” Craig soothed as he knelt next to his friend and helped him. They stood and Anatoliy came over with some wet paper towels for their sticky hands.

“
None
of this is okay!” Neil exploded as he set the plate on the table before turning and punching the wall. I winced as I heard something snap in his hand. “They said
obedient
. I have obedient employees! So do you, Craig. That doesn’t mean they’ll have fucking tuna off the floor even when it falls because I ordered them to eat it! This is some kind of
compulsion
.”