Chapter 75: The Recruiter's Pitch
The cigarette had burned down to the filter.
Emma stubbed it out in the crystal ashtray and reached for the pack again before she realized her hands were shaking. Not from the heroin—that had worn off hours ago, leaving behind a bone-deep ache that vodka couldn't touch. Not from fear, either. Something else. Something that felt like standing at the edge of a cliff and knowing you were about to jump.
Allison Mack, who had been flown up to Vancouver, watched her from across the desk.
She hadn't changed much since the trial. Still a beautiful 32 year old blonde with a beautiful body and C-cup breasts. Same sharp jaw, same calculating eyes, same way of sitting perfectly still while her mind raced behind her face. The cheap blazer was new—polyester, off the rack, the kind of thing you bought at a Walmart after seven years of prison-issued khakis. It didn't fit right. The shoulders were too wide. The sleeves were too short.
But her eyes.
Her eyes fit just fine.
"You're beautiful," Allison said.
Emma lit the cigarette.
"Thank you ." Emma smiled
"I see you like your vodka and cigarettes. And you keep looking at that photo."
Emma's gaze flicked to the framed picture on the corner of her desk.Jim. Maggie. Caron.
They were laughing. All three of them—laughing at something she couldn't remember, some joke that had died with them. Jim's arm was around Maggie's shoulder. Caron was flipping off the camera. The sun was setting behind them, painting the sky orange and pink and gold.
She didn't know when the photo had been taken. Didn't know who'd shot it. Didn't know how it had ended up in Hector's things, or why Anna had placed it on her desk this morning with a look that said you'll want this.
She picked it up.
Ran her thumb over the glass.
"I knew them," she said. "Before."
Allison leaned forward.
"Before what?"
Emma set the photo down.
"Before all of this."
She took a long drag off the cigarette and let the smoke curl toward the ceiling. The office was large—larger than she'd expected when Hector had given it to her. Rough-hewn oak desk. Leather-bound bookshelves stuffed with ledgers and files and things she hadn't had time to read yet. A window that looked out over the city of Vancouver. and the ocean beyond.
It smelled like old paper and expensive cigars and something underneath—dust and decay and the ghost of whoever had used this room before her.
"Let me tell you about the operation," Emma said.
Allison sat back.
She didn't blink.
"Every week," Emma said, "five white European women are auctioned to ten billionaire bidders. The bidders are men. Women. Families. They come from everywhere—Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, the States. They pay a hundred grand just for the privilege of attending."
She tapped ash into the tray.
"The night before the auction, they're entertained. Alcohol. Cocaine. Heroin. Whatever they want. The women are brought out and the bidders get to sample the merchandise. Touch. Taste. Fuck. Whatever they want, however they want it."
Allison's expression didn't change.
"The women are between eighteen and fifty-five," Emma continued. "Some are volunteers. Some are trafficked. Some are sold by their families for drug debts or gambling debts or because they were born with a cunt and that's all anyone ever saw in them."
She took another drag.
"The bidders take whores, that you will offer to them, to their rooms for the night. They fuck them. They hurt them. They do whatever they paid for. And the next morning, the auction begins."
She exhaled smoke.
"The successful buyers fly their new property out on private jets from the airstrip. Some of them keep the women. Some of them sell them again. Some of them kill them."
Allison's lips curved.
"Some of them?"
"That's the other auction," Emma said. "The kill auction."
She opened the ledger to a page marked with a black ribbon. Names.Numbers. Times. Locations.
"That night—after the first auction, after the jets have taken off—ten buyers bid on something else. They bid on another five beautiful women to watch the woman they successfuly bid on be killed by John Adams as they watch."
Allison's eyes glittered.
"John Adams," Emma said. "Former cartel executioner. He's been doing this for Hector for six years. He's creative. He's patient. He takes his time."
She closed the ledger.
"The buyers choose the method. Some of them want it quick. Some of them want it slow. Some of them want to watch the woman beg. Some of them want to watch her fight. Some of them just want to see the light go out of her eyes. There is an observation bedroom with a one way mirror looking onto the kill chamber and you will fuck the client as he wants as he watches the woman be killed."
Allison reached for her mug.
Took a long sip of vodka.
"How much?" she said.
"The kill auction?"
"Yes."
"Two million minimum. Sometimes more. Depends on the woman. Depends on the method. Depends on the buyer."
Allison set the mug down.
"I want twenty percent."
Emma's cigarette paused halfway to her lips.
"Twenty?"
"Twenty percent of the kill auction proceeds. And full control of the women's training."
Emma stared at her.
"Full control."
"Yes." Allison leaned forward. "You said there are volunteers. There are trafficked women. There are women who are sold by their families. There are women who are married. But there are also women who fight. There are women who run. There are women who spit and claw and bite and have to be broken before they can be sold."
She lit her own cigarette.
"I know how to break them. I spent seven years in prison watching women break. I know where to push. I know where to cut. I know how to make a woman beg for death and then make her beg for life again."
Emma watched the smoke curl from Allison's lips.
"How?"
Allison smiled.
"Pain is easy," she said. "Anyone can hurt someone. But breaking a woman isn't about pain. It's about humiliation. It's about stripping away everything she thinks she is and leaving her with nothing but the knowledge that she's property."
She tapped ash.
"You take her name. You take her clothes. You take her hair. You make her eat from a bowl on the floor. You make her sleep in a cage. You make her fuck anyone who asks. You make her grateful for every scrap of kindness—every drop of water, every crust of bread, every minute she doesn't spend chained to a wall."
She took a slow drag.
"Then you give her back her name. Her clothes. Her hair. You let her eat at a table. You let her sleep in a bed. You let her choose who she fucks and who she doesn't."
She exhaled.
"And she'll love you for it. She'll worship you. She'll do anything you ask—anything—because you gave her back the illusion of being human."
Emma stubbed out her cigarette.
Silence stretched between them. The clock on the wall ticked. The ocean crashed against the cliffs below. Somewhere in the house, a door opened and closed.
"You've done this before," Emma said.
Allison's smile didn't waver.
"I've done a lot of things."
Emma reached for the bottle of vodka.
She poured two fresh glasses—generous pours, the kind that sloshed over the rim when she set the bottle down. She slid one across the desk.
Allison caught it without looking.
" Five percent and all the alcohol and drugs you want as well as the use of all the staff and complete control and we expect increased revenues each year. You will also be owned by Hector and the cartel. And if you don't live up to expectations you will end up like Caron and Maggie in the landfill. Understand? Deal?”
"Yes. A deal." Allison says.
Welcome aboard," Emma said.
They drank.
The vodka burned going down—clean and cold and sharp. Emma felt it hit her stomach and spread outward, loosening the tightness in her chest, quieting the voice in the back of her head that kept whispering what are you doing, what are you doing, what are you doing.
She ignored it.
She'd been ignoring it for months.
Allison set her glass down and leaned back in her chair. Her blazer fell open, revealing the white t-shirt underneath—thin, cheap, the kind of thing you bought in packs of five. Her nipples pressed against the fabric.
She didn't try to hide them.
"The training part," she said. "I want to start tonight."
Emma raised an eyebrow.
"Tonight?"
"There's a shipment coming in tomorrow, isn't there? Five women. Three volunteers.Two trafficked. One who's going to fight."
Emma didn't ask how she knew.
She'd been Hector's second for less than a day and already she understood that information moved through this house like blood through veins. You didn't ask where it came from. You just used it.
"Yes," she said. "They arrive at midnight."
"Then I'll take the fighter. I'll take her tonight. By morning, she'll be docile as a kitten."
Emma took another sip of vodka.
"And if she's not?"
Allison laughed.
It was a strange sound—sharp and brittle, like glass breaking underwater.
"Then I'll kill her," she said. "And we'll find another one."
She stood up.
Her blazer hung open. Her t-shirt clung to her tits. Her legs were long and pale and bare beneath her skirt—a black pencil skirt that was too tight, too short, too obviously borrowed from someone else's closet.
She walked around the desk.
Emma didn't move.
Allison stopped behind her chair. Close enough that Emma could smell her—cigarettes and cheap soap and something underneath, a musky sweetness that clung to her skin.
"When I was in prison," Allison said, "I had a girlfriend."
Her hands settled on Emma's shoulders.
"She was beautiful. Brown eyes. Soft hair. A mouth that could make you come just by looking at it. She was serving fifteen years for killing her husband. She'd stabbed him forty-seven times."
Her fingers tightened.
"She taught me things. Things I'd never known before. About women. About power. About how to make someone want you so badly that they'd do anything—anything—just to feel your tongue between their legs."
Emma's breath caught.
"Im here to use that knowledge to give you all the pleasure I can,” Allison said .
"I want to fuck you."
Allison's hands slid down—over Emma's collarbone, over her chest, cupping her breasts through her shirt. Her thumbs found Emma's nipples and pressed.
"I want to please you so much."
Emma smiled.
She pulled her hands away.
"Good," Emma said. " I like women who know that their place in the world is to please and pleasure .”
She stepped back.
Emma turned in her chair.
They faced each other—two women in a sunlit office, the ledger open between them, the photo of the dead looking on from the corner of the desk.
Allison unbuttoned her blazer.
She let it fall to the floor.
Her t-shirt came next—pulled over her head and tossed aside. Her C-cup tits were high and perfect, her nipples pink and hard. There was a scar beneath her left breast—old, white, puckered.
"How'd you get that?"Emma asked.
Allison looked down.
"Knife fight. Kitchen detail. Another inmate didn't like the way I looked at her."
She unbuckled her skirt.
"I killed her three days later."
The skirt pooled at her feet.
She wore no underwear. Her cunt was bare, shaved smooth, glistening in the lamplight. Her thighs were strong. Her belly was flat. Her hips curved outward like the neck of a violin.
She stepped out of her skirt and stood naked in the middle of the room.
"My turn. “ Emma said.
Emma didn't move.
"Come here."
Allison smiled.
She crossed the room in four steps. Then she knelt in front of Emma's chair, her knees hitting the hardwood with a crack that made Emma wince.
She didn't seem to notice.
She reached for the hem of Emma's shirt and pulled it up.
Emma lifted her arms.
The shirt came off.
Allison's eyes moved over her—tits, stomach, scars. The new track marks on her inner elbow. The old cigarette burns on her hip. The faint white lines on her thighs where she'd cut herself as a teenager.
"You're a mess," Allison said.
"So are you."
Allison laughed.
Then she leaned forward and took Emma's nipple in her mouth.
Emma gasped.
Allison's tongue was hot and wet and demanding. She sucked hard—harder than anyone had ever sucked—and the pain shot through Emma's body like electricity. She arched her back. She tangled her fingers in Allison's hair.
"Fuck—"
Allison bit down.
Emma cried out.
Allison pulled back and looked up at her, lips wet, eyes bright.
"You like it rough," she said. "Don't you."
Emma's chest heaved.
"Yes."
"How rough?"
Emma's voice was hoarse.
"As rough as you want."
Allison smiled.
She stood up.
Then she grabbed Emma by the hair and yanked her out of the chair.
Emma stumbled. Her knees hit the floor. Her palms slapped against the hardwood. She was on all fours now—naked except for her jeans, which Allison was already unbuttoning, already pulling down her hips.
"Lift your knees."
Emma obeyed.
The jeans came off. Then her underwear—a plain black thong that Allison tossed aside with a grunt of disgust.
"You should wear something prettier," she said. "Pretty girls deserve pretty things."
Emma opened her mouth to respond.
Allison pushed her face down into the floor.
"Shut up."
She pressed her hand against the back of Emma's head, holding her down, her cheek grinding against the wood. Then she used her other hand to spread Emma's legs apart—wide, wider, until Emma's knees ached and her cunt was fully exposed.
She could feel the air on her skin. Cold and sharp and electric.
Allison knelt behind her.
Her fingers found Emma's cunt—wet, dripping, shamefully wet—and pushed inside without warning.
Three fingers.
Emma screamed.
"Shut up," Allison said again.
She pulled her fingers out and shoved them back in—harder this time, rougher. Emma's whole body jerked forward. Her hands scrabbled for purchase. Her cheek burned against the wood.
"You're so fucking wet," Allison said. "You're dripping down your thighs. You're a desperate little whore, aren't you?"
Emma couldn't speak.
She could only feel.
Allison's fingers moved inside her—curling, twisting, hitting that spot that made stars explode behind her eyes. Over and over. Relentless. Ruthless.
"You're going to come for me," Allison said. "And you're going to do it now."
Emma tried to hold back.
She couldn't.
The orgasm ripped through her—violent and sudden and devastating. Her body convulsed. Her mouth opened in a silent scream. Her cunt clenched around Allison's fingers like a fist.
Allison didn't stop.
She kept moving—kept pushing, kept curling, kept fucking—until Emma was shaking and sobbing and begging her to stop.
"Please—please—I can't—"
"You can," Allison said. "And you will."
She pulled her fingers out.
Emma collapsed.
She lay on the floor, chest heaving, sweat pooling in the hollow of her throat, tears leaking from her eyes. Her cunt throbbed. Her legs were shaking. Her mind was blank.
Emma told Allison to sit on her face. It was her turn. Allison moved over her.
She straddled Emma's face—one knee on each side of Emma's head—and lowered her cunt to Emma's mouth.
Emma licked.
Allison's cunt was wet and hot and tasted like salt and iron and something underneath—something dark and musky and primal. Emma ran her tongue up the length of her slit and Allison moaned.
"That feels so Good," she said.
Emma sucked.
Allison moved her hips—grinding against Emma's face, pushing her cunt against Emma's tongue, using her like a toy. Her hands found Emma's tits and squeezed them hard.
"Do You like this?” Allison said. "I love you eating my cunt. I hope like the taste. I hope like the smell. I want you to like knowing that I'm fucking your face with my pussy and I love it."
Emma moaned against her.
"Yes," Emma gasped. "Yes—I like it—"
"I like eating your cunt—"
"I like it—I like the way you taste—I like—"
Allison's hips bucked.
"Cum with me," Emma said.
Emma's hand found her clit.
The orgasm hit them both at the same time—Powerful. Paralyzing. Emma's body convulsed beneath Allison's weight. Allison's thighs clamped around Emma's head. Her cunt flooded Emma's mouth with fluid.
She came and came and came.
When it was over, Allison rolled off her.
They lay side by side on the cold floor—two naked women in a cluttered office, breathing hard, staring at the ceiling. The clock ticked. The ocean crashed. The lamp flickered, casting strange shadows across their bodies.
Allison’s voice was barely a whisper.
"What now?"
Allison turned her head.
She smiled.
"Now you sign the papers," Emma said. "Make it official. Five percent. Full control. You belong to Hector and the Cartel. And when the shipment arrives at midnight, you will start breaking the fighter."
Emma closed her eyes.
She could still taste Allison on her tongue.
She could still feel the burn of her fingers.
She could still hear the voice in the back of her mind—the one that sounded like Jim, like Maggie, like Caron—screaming at her to stop.
She ignored it.
"Fine," Allison said.
Allison sat up.
She reached for her cigarettes—they were on the desk, next to the photo of the dead—and lit one with steady hands.
"I knew you'd see it my way," Emma said.
She took a drag.
Then she looked down at Emma.
"One more thing."
Emma opened her eyes.
"What?"
Allison's smile widened.
"The photo," she said. "The one of your friends. I recognized the man."
Emma's blood went cold.
Allison blew smoke toward the ceiling.
"Jim," she said. "Jim Mill. The billionaire."
Emma's heart stopped.
"I don't—"
"He was there when I was arrested," Allison said. "He was the one who testified against me. He was the one who put me in prison."
She took another drag.
"I've been waiting seven years to find out who killed him."
She looked down at Emma.
"Now I know it was Hector's men and they found you and Caron and Maggie when you got away and became property of Hector and the Cartel.."
Emma couldn't breathe.
The room was spinning. The floor was falling away. The photo on the desk—Jim laughing, Maggie smiling, Caron flipping off the camera—swam before her eyes.
Allison stubbed out her cigarette.
"And now i want to be yours and Hector's," she said. "I want to please and pleasure you and make the Vancouver operation even more successful.. "
She stood up and reached for her clothes.
She pulled on her t-shirt.
The mention of the photo, the revelation about Jim—these things hung in the air like smoke.
She buttoned her skirt.
She pulled on her blazer.
Emma said. "I will Send the fighter to your room."
She walked to the door.
Emma lay on the floor, naked and shaking, watching her go.
Allison paused with her hand on the knob and lookes back as Emma said,
"Oh," And Allison?" Allison swallowed.
"What?"
Emma looked over her shoulder.
"You should clean up. You look like a whore."
Allison opened the door and said," Yes Ma'am and walked out.
The door clicked shut behind her.
Emma lay on the floor for a long time. Minutes. Hours. She didn't know. The sunlight moved across the room. The cigarette burned out in the ashtray. The vodka sat untouched on the desk.
Finally, she sat up.
She looked at the photo.
Jim. Maggie. Caron. They were laughing.
She reached for the bottle of vodka and drank straight from the neck.
Then she lit another cigarette and opened the ledger to the page marked with the black ribbon.
Names.Numbers.Times.
Locations.
She'd learn them all.
She'd memorize them all.