Insurmountable (Serpentine #1) Read online

  INSURMOUNTABLE

  By Skye Callahan

  Copyright 2016 Skye Callahan

  Originally published in the Hearts & Daggers Anthology

  Version Updated April 10, 2016

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and events are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events and locations is entirely coincidental.

  Published: SKYE CALLAHAN

  April 19, 2016

  United States of America

  [email protected]

  Cover art by Fel Wetzig

  Copyright 2016

  Stock Images used acquired Bigstock Photos

  The Fractured Legacy Series

  (Paranormal Urban Fantasy)

  Fractured Legacy

  Beyond the Divide

  Grave Absolution

  Additional titles TBA

  The Irrevocable Duet

  (Dark Romantic Suspense)

  Irrevocable

  Bend, Don’t Break

  The Redline Series

  (Dark Romantic Suspense Serial)

  Ignition (Free on all retailers)

  Torque

  Brake

  Exhaust

  Clutch

  Out of Bounds Series

  (BDSM Romance)

  Bound and Unbroken

  Bound and Collared

  Additional titles TBA

  See the back of this book for more information and sneak peeks!

  In Memory of Cameron and Bueller.

  RIP my furry friends

  Scar Tissue

  Miles

  I never stood a chance.

  Not once in my entire life did I ever know anything other than this.

  Sex. Slaves. Drugs. Trafficking. Parties. Alcohol. Money. Extortion. Beatings. Blackmail. Pain.

  And exquisite pleasure. Every fantasy at the snap of a finger.

  “Miles,” Gabe grunted my name as he pounded on my apartment door. I wanted to punch him in the face every time I heard his voice. Unfortunately, he worked for my security team—the most experienced dickhead I had. In more ways than one.

  “New girls are here,” he yelled.

  New girls, or fresh meat as many of the men around the Retreat liked to call them. Everyone loves when the new girls show up. Clients, employees, especially the boss, Ross. I, however, dreaded the days when they showed up. The men went wild, and depending on where the girls came from, I could have a near crisis on my hands.

  Our organization was made up of multiple sex trafficking rings and brothels around the world. Some were high-class establishments with money to throw around on the girls. Expensive costumes, elaborate facilities, and medical treatment for the women. Others were more questionable, using drugs and violence to subdue the women.

  Punishments. Rewards. The scales could tip drastically in either direction.

  I snapped my keys onto my belt loop and opened my apartment door, walking past Gabe without so much as a word. He was an asshole. Pure and simple. An asshole who didn’t listen to jack shit. And I was the poor, unlucky fool strapped with being his boss.

  Most days he was lucky I let him live.

  We climbed aboard the elevator and I punched the button for the fifth floor—The Commons—where we processed all the new girls.

  “You’re in a mood today,” Gabe said.

  I didn’t look at him. If I did, I might have punched his smug face in. I straightened the collar and cuffs of my shirt instead. “I’m not in a mood.”

  When we stepped off the elevator, twelve new girls were standing in the middle of the room; blondes, brunettes, redheads, and everything in between. I assessed them all within seconds of laying eyes on them. The bold girls, the timid girls, experienced, and unexperienced. It’s always in their eyes, their posture, and their nervous twitches. They were all dressed in street clothes to make their transportation less suspicious.

  “Take off your clothes,” I said.

  Some of the girls grinned as they pulled their shirts over their heads and dropped their bras to the floor. Others simply did as told, keeping their eyelids lowered. They all obeyed without hesitation.

  Major perk of the job—looking at all the beautiful women.

  “You’ll all be examined by our doctor.” I strolled past the line of women, checking them each out from head to foot. “He’ll make sure your birth control is up to date and you’re in good physical condition.”

  I circled around the last girl and walked up the backside, checking out their other assets. The redhead on the end arched her back pressing her ass toward me as I passed. Then, she peeked over her shoulder and winked.

  I knew she’d be trouble, but the patrons would fucking love her. A lot of the girls did anything they could to get their five seconds of recognition. They needed attention, Yearned for it. After all, attention was quite possibly the only thing they lived for.

  But, it wasn’t that cheeky redhead that caught my attention. It was the willowy blonde in the middle. The girl with her hair falling over her face, struggling not to make eye contact. Struggling not to stand out. Not to be pulled aside or singled out. But everything about her made her stand out to me.

  “You’re first, Little Dove.” I pulled her forward. “What’s your name?”

  “Alley.” She lifted her blue-green eyes, peeking out from her long, bright lashes.

  “Follow me to the infirmary.” In this case, being chosen first was not the worst thing. We all knew what would happen as soon as I turned my back.

  The guards and men lining the back wall smirked at us as we passed, waiting for their opportunity to pounce. You’d think that eventually they’d get enough. They’d get bored. Obviously, they hadn’t seen as much as me. Done as much as me.

  Even new girls were boring.

  But then, I’d been involved in this world for as long as I could remember. That’s a long time to develop tastes and get your fill.

  * * *

  It seemed like my days never ended, and, unfortunately, they blurred into weeks that also went on forever. I spent all day Monday processing the new girls and getting them settled with only a few minor incidents from my men. Tuesday through Thursday however, I’d spent twenty-four hours a day merely keeping my team out of trouble. An impossible feat without new girls floating around. And Friday only meant it’d get worse. We had a hundred and six girls and ninety customers booked in for the night, starting at seven when we opened the girls. New girls, new visitors, and a security team with libidos of sixteen-year-olds meant my life would be a living hell until morning.

  And then I’d start the process all over again.

  At eight thirty—after having already dealt with enough crises to last an entire week, I pushed open the security room door, hoping for a quick update assuring me that all was under control. “Dig, what’s the…”

  The room was empty. The room was never supposed to be empty, especially on a packed night.

  Damn incom
petent fools. Lazy bastards.

  All they cared about was getting their rocks off. Having their cocks fluffed. If replacing a single person didn’t involve jumping through so many damn hoops, I’d replace them all in a fucking heartbeat.

  I scanned the cameras. The lobby looked good. The grounds were fine. Every room. Every nook and cranny and foot of the yard. They’re all monitored—at all times. More than two hundred cameras in the place that the security team are trusted to watch to protect our assets and our reputation.

  In theory anyhow. Obviously, a flaw had developed in the system.

  Some dipshits just couldn’t take it. They got all hot and bothered and wander off to find an available girl for a quickie.

  I scanned the third-floor rooms.

  “Fuck,” I yelled, slamming my hand down on the keyboard. The chair soared across the room, thumping against the back wall just as the door opened.

  “Miles, I—” Dig stuttered. “I uh—”

  “Shut up and call the team to room 329.”

  I bypassed the elevators—where any of the current customers would see me, and inevitably slow things up—and sprinted up three flights of stairs, ran down the hallway, and busted through the door of room 329.

  The patron—a man I hadn’t encountered directly before—was standing over Alley with his shoe in his hand wailing on her. He was so busy with the beating that he hadn’t even noticed that I’d entered the room until I had my arm around his neck. I twisted, throwing him off balance, and slamming him face first into the opposite wall.

  “What?” he growled through his clenched teeth. “You stick me with a useless piece of shit then come in here to fuck me over?”

  His shoulder jerked, but he didn’t stand a chance of throwing off a two-hundred-forty-pound, six-foot-nine man. “Don’t even give me that. You don’t rough up our girls and expect not to pay the price.”

  Finally, backup arrived and I shoved the bastard toward Dig and Keith. “Take him to see Ross. I’m sure he’ll have some ideas for getting a handle on the situation. Probably by kicking the shit out of him and sending him back to town with a one-of-a-kind warning. Ross kept enough shit to blackmail anyone, and if he couldn’t find anything legit, he created it. “And Dig, be sure to account for your whereabouts when Ross is done with him.”

  “Yes, sir,” he mumbled.

  Alley laid curled up on the floor.

  “Little dove.” I brushed back her hair to check her injuries. Her lip was busted and her right eyebrow bruised. The injuries I couldn’t see were the most troubling. “Come on.”

  I lifted her up, but she kept her hands fisted tightly over her stomach and her eyes squeezed closed. “You’ll be fine, Little dove.”

  When I laid her out on the exam table, her eyes opened, but she stared blankly across the room. “What happened?”

  She narrowed her eyes and shook her head.

  “Tell me,” I coaxed, gently brushing her hair back. We only had a matter of time before Ross would finish up with the others and come in to pass judgment on her. “Just tell me.”

  “I don’t know,” she whispered.

  Too many of our “partners” discouraged the girls from ever talking about the patrons, blaming anything that went wrong on the girl—no questions asked. “What did he ask you to do?”

  “Nothing.” Her voice shook. “He didn’t ask for anything. Nothing. Nothing.”

  She cried, drawing her knees to her chest, and rolling to her side. “I’m sorry.”

  “Easy, Alley. Just tell me what happened. We have it on video, but I want your account.”

  “Why?”

  If everyone else didn’t get their jollies by fucking up the girls, my job would have been so much easier. They showed up thinking that everything I did or said was a fucking trap, and sometimes it took me months to get them to a point where I could work with them. I wasn’t a softie, I just understood after years of experience that it was much easier for everyone if the girls worked with me, and for that, I needed some level of trust.

  Unlike Ross, I didn’t subscribe to the wasteful idea that every girl was replaceable. Technically it might have been true, but every replacement cost time and money. It didn’t make business sense.

  “I want to know what set him off,” I whispered, squeezing her wrist. She shook but didn’t pull away.

  “He took me to the room. I looked up waiting for him to tell me what he wanted, and he hit me. He said I was useless. That I couldn’t give him what he needed, but he never….”

  “Okay,” I gently brushed back her long blonde hair to reveal her injured cheekbone. “I’m going to take off your nightgown so we can check your injuries. Can you sit up?”

  She nodded, and with a little help, pulled herself up, so I could lift the nightie over her head. Her right hip and ribs were red, and she had a stripe across her collarbone.

  “What hurts?”

  Alley touched her side, then closed her eyes. “It’s not that bad.”

  “We’ll let the doctor make sure of that.”

  Her back straightened like I’d scolded her. “I don’t need the doctor”—she swung her legs off the side of the bed—“I can go back to work.”

  I pushed her legs back onto the bed. She was holding on, but far too close to being broken. I wondered if it was already too late to pull her back. “No, Little Dove, that’s not how we do things here. You’ll get looked at and make sure you’re all right.”

  She fidgeted and squirmed, so I helped her lie back down. “Sir, I feel dizzy.”

  “Lie back, Alley.”

  If I Tremble

  Alley

  I woke up in a strange bed. The strangest of all beds. A large, comfortable, soft, and warm bed. In a private bedroom. All alone.

  For a moment, I was horrified.

  What’d I miss?

  I remembered falling asleep in the infirmary waiting for the doctor, and then, nothing.

  What had they done to me?

  It had to be a trick. I waited for the punchline. For a group of men to walk in the room and take me.

  I didn’t move. Every breath was terrifying.

  But the only thing that greeted me was silence. Utter silence.

  No one to tell me what to do. No one to force me into sex. No one.

  I had to wait until someone came to get me. Until someone came and told me what to do.

  But then again, I had to pee. I had to pee so bad it hurt. So bad, I couldn’t stand it.

  I pushed the blanket back, careful to be as quiet as possible. Then, I swung my legs over the side of the bed and slowly stood up. Still utter silence around me.

  I tiptoed toward the open doorway, holding my breath.

  “Well, hello, Little Dove,” the man who’d taken me to the infirmary said.

  I gasped and dropped to my knees. “I’m sorry, Sir. I didn’t—”

  The next thing I knew his hands were on my arms, pulling me to my feet. “No need to apologize. How are you feeling?”

  “I have to pee, Sir.”

  “Well, you can’t do that on your knees. And I’d greatly appreciate if you didn’t do it in my living room. Come on.” He wrapped his arm around my waist and guided me to the next door. “Feeling better, Little dove?”

  Why did he always have so many questions? Worse yet. Why’d he always act like he cared? I knew he didn’t. No one did. Follow orders and fuck. That’s all we were good for. “Yes, Sir.”

  “Then I’ll leave you to do what you need to do.”

  He left me in the middle of the bright bedroom and closed the door behind him.

  Odd. So odd.

  I stared at the door for the longest time. Solitude. A private bathroom. More confusing than wonderland. I snapped myself out of my thoughts, finished my business, then faced the door down again. What could be waiting this time?

  “Thank you, Sir,” I said, lowering my head as I reentered the living room.

  “Come here,” he patted the seat next to him, and I
obediently sat where he’d gestured. “Are you hungry?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  He nodded, pulling a blanket off the back of the couch and wrapping it around my shoulders. I stayed, frozen right where he left me, clutching the soft, warm blanket, but the warmth wouldn’t penetrate my skin.

  When he returned, he sat a bottle of water on the table and handed me a plate with two sandwiches.

  Two sandwiches.

  I wasn’t sure I was capable of eating that much anymore.

  It had been so long since I’d had more than nibbles here and there.

  “Thank you, Sir.”

  As I ate, he dragged his fingers through my hair, gently separating the tangles and knots. It all played out like a strange dream. A twisted fantasy that couldn’t possibly be my reality. No one had touched me with such softness in years—not without an ulterior motive.

  I made it through a sandwich and a half before I felt so full that I couldn’t possibly swallow another bite. Before I could apologize for not finishing the food, a knock on the door sent me to my knees. I curled up on the floor, clutching my hands in my lap and lowering my head.

  I pissed off a client and now I’d pay the price. This was all just a ploy to make the punishment worse. To make me feel more guilty.

  He put his hand on my shoulder, but the door still opened and a set of footsteps approached.

  “Miles, how is she?” I recognized the voice as the leader of this building. When you spend your time on your hands and knees, voices are as good as fingerprints. Sometimes I never saw their faces. I saw plenty of everything else, but I didn’t want to see faces. I didn’t want to associate their faces with my nightmares. And I definitely didn’t want to see their eyes. Eyes are the worst. Dreaded, never-ending voids that only make false promises.

  “You’re interrupting lunch,” Miles said with an air of disregard I’d never heard used toward the head of a house. They were gods—feared, revered, untouchable.

  “I don’t give a damn about lunch. I give a damn about accounts, income, the state of my affairs.”

  Miles snorted. “Well, this asset needs to eat and heal.”