C5 - Soul-ed Mate

In ancient mythology the Minotaur was a creature with the head of a bull and the body of a man. He lived at the centre of a maze. Athens had to send seven young men and seven unwed girls as a sacrifice on a ship. In my case the maze is the Inferna, which looms high in the dusky sky, orange rays of sunset split by the intricate turrets.

There’s only one sacrifice this Saturday night. Someone waits at the curb to take my keys. I wobble on my feet for only a moment before catching myself. The last thing I need are skinned knees as I go in front of the wealthiest men in the city.

Then I’m standing in the foyer, marvelling as people bustle around. I hadn’t quite realized how much of a production this would be, but with that much money on the line, it makes sense. My stomach pitches with nerves because I’m going to be at the centre of this hurricane.

Taehyung emerges from a door, looking sharp in a three-piece suit. He’s one of many turns I’ll take tonight, going deeper into the maze. Only at the end will I find out who’s won the auction. Only then will I meet the Minotaur.

“The boy of the evening,” he says warmly.

A shiver runs through me. That sounds ominous. I force myself to smile.

“I’m not sure it will take me two hours to get ready, though.”

He laughs. “Jihyo asked for the whole day. I told her she’d have to make do.”

“Jihyo?”

“Daniel’s girl. She’ll be the one taking care of you.”

Kang Daniel?

I’ve heard his name spoken, but only in whispers. And didn’t his wife, Park Jihyo used to strip at one of his clubs? I guess I couldn’t ask for a better guide in the art of selling sex to dangerous men, but I’m almost more afraid of her than the men.

This is a different world, requiring a different set of skills than the ones I’ve been building my whole life. He directs me up the stairs and into the room where the photographs were taken.

A woman tinkers with makeup brushes on a small table against the window. I have the impression of beautiful blonde hair, long and flowing enough to make her a fairy-tale princess. Her hair might seem innocent, but her body is pure sin.

The dress she wears clings to her body, accentuating her perfect curves.

Good Lord.

She won’t be at the auction, will she? As soon as a man sees her, they won’t want me. Of course, I doubt the crime boss Kang Daniel would be willing to share his wife. She turns, and I’m struck breathless by her face—by the perfect heart- shaped prettiness, by the wide blue eyes.

Based on the piles of makeup on the table, I had expected something over-the-top, but hers is perfectly placed to emphasize her features.

“Jimin,” she says, smiling. “Come in. I won’t bite, I promise.”

I relax by the smallest inch because she does seem genuine. In the hallowed halls I usually walk, many men will tear you down if they can get away with it. I’m so used to it that it’s a shock to see someone I don’t know with sympathy in their eyes.

“Thank you. I’m kind of freaking out on the inside.”

She reaches around me to shut the door.

“We’ll make those bad old Alpha wait until you’re good and ready to see them. In the meantime we’ll get you cleaned up.”

I flush because she makes it sound like I’m something the cat dragged in. I can’t even disagree with that assessment. Next to her I feel completely unsophisticated.

“What are you going to do to me?”

Her laugh sprinkles over me like fairy dust. God, no wonder the scary mobster fell for her.

“That depends on what you need, of course. Let’s get that dress off and see what we’re working with.”

I pulled a designer evening sparkly dress out of the back of my closet, one I first wore to a senator’s inaugural dinner with Namjoon at my side. It shows off a bit of chest and collarbones and has a thread to tuck the two flaps. Namjoon was in awe of me that night—but maybe that was manufactured, just like he pretended to care about me.

My stomach clenches for an entirely different reason than when I took my dress off in front of Yoongi. I know that she isn’t looking at me like something she wants to devour, but she’ll still see my insecurities.

She hands me a fur robe to wrap around my naked torso. How can a woman like her understand what it’s like to be too small in some places, too big in others, forever the wrong thing?

How can she understand and the shame I always feel in my body? I’m frozen with my hands clenched in fabric, my mind in a panic. How will I get through this?

She’s just another turn, and I need to make it all the way to the centre of the labyrinth. Her hands grasp my shoulders and shake gently. “Jimin, look at me.”

After a deep breath I meet her blue gaze. “You’re beautiful, and you’re brave, and you’re unspeakably strong. Nothing those out there can change that. Got it?”

And somehow I realize she does know what it’s like—the shame and the fear. That knowledge allows me to pull the dress away and reveal myself.

She nods in satisfaction. She helps me slip the robe around me.

“We’ll have them eating out of your hand.” Her gaze drops between my legs.

I feel exposed. Too much exposed. I never was naked even in my own bedroom. And here I’m standing in front of a women almost naked.

“But first things first, that has to go.”

“My panties?”

…And she wants my panties gone too.

“Your hair. We are going to make you hairless.”

I glance down, at my legs, part horrified, part curious. The navy-blue panties I’m wearing cover the neatly trimmed hair underneath.

“How did you—”

“How did I know? Oh honey, I’ve been doing this a long time.” Her eyes study me as if they can read every secret that way. “You’ve never been completely bare, have you?”

It always felt unnecessary—and okay, a little scary. I shake my head. She smiles, turning to a small pot that’s plugged into the wall. Something’s melting inside there.

Wax.

“It’s freeing, I promise. And it only hurts for a few minutes.”

“Are you going to do it?”

“I had done many and trust me it will give you the courage you need, to face what awaits.”

!~~~~!

An hour later I’ve been waxed and primped all over my body, whimpers escaping me while she murmurs sympathetically. Now I’m wearing a robe while she does my makeup, a natural look that’s somehow using more makeup than I’ve ever seen.

Contouring, she calls it.

I can’t deny the effect is stunning on my cheekbones. My eyes almost look bare, even though there’s shadow to make them wider. More like a cat. On my lips she paints a pale pink, like cotton candy.

“How are you feeling?” she asks.

“Relieved. The torture called waxing is over,” I say honestly.

I’m still feeling tender.

“It’s not my favourite part of the process, but the extra sensitivity you get will help your nerves ease. And the alpha, they go crazy for smooth like butter skin.”

I’m not sure I’ve made any alpha go crazy for anything.

“What if no one bids on me?”

She laughs softly. “Do you really think that will happen?”

“No,” I admit, but it doesn’t have anything to do with confidence.

I had been to enough charity auctions to know that rich old men would buy anything—broken furniture that was owned by the Queen of England, the golf ball that lost a crucial championship.

“I know someone will buy me. I just don’t know whether it will be enough.”

There isn’t an insurance policy on something like this. If someone buys me for less than the balance of that real estate bill, I’ll lose the house. And I’ll still have to sleep with the bidder. For a month.

“Stand up,” Jihyo says, her command so effortless—and so kind.

When I stand, the silk robe falls open. I gave up on modesty around the time she ripped hardened wax off my most private places, but it will be very different with a roomful of alphas.

She picks up a small pot of pale pink shimmer. She sweeps the brush into the powder, every move almost sensual. I’m already wearing blush, and I didn’t have to stand up to apply it.

“turn around.”

“are you—”

“Yes, you need to look sexy and your tattoo over the spine almost makes you look like Greek goddess.”

“is it necessary?”

“It might seem over-the-top, but those men are used to over-the-top. And those lights will wash you right out. This is the palest colour that will work.”

Her hands are gentle as they push the silk aside. The cool air brushes over my nipples, turning them into hard points.

I’m shocked—in part because I was sure the men would see me bare chested during the auction. And in part because my body responds to her gaze almost with arousal.

As if I’m a work of art, she applies the brush to my nipples. She’s right that it’s not a drastic effect. They actually look kind of pretty like that, something I never imagined I could think.

Then she turns me around to do the same on my bare back.

“Is I-Daniel your…” I trail off.

“Soulmate?” She completes my sentence by asking a counter question then replying her own, “Soulmates are over-rated for me. I would rather choose Daniel again and again over anyone.”

“Daniel? Why?”

Her blue eyes find mine as she smiles like she is reminiscing something, “I love him. He saved me from me.”

“How?”

She chuckles, “My soulmate sold me to Inferna for five grands.”

I look at her serene face. How can someone do this to her?

“Alpha are very complicated creatures, Jimin,” she says brushing around my hips. “They like to feel important, to feel smart. They like to feel strong.”

I wasn’t sure women were so different either when she put it that way. Those things sounded great to me, especially after feeling so inordinately weak.

“How do you make them feel that way?”

“Not by giving in. That would be too easy.”

The caress of the brush sends strange arcs of energy through my body—my chest puffing. Even my dick seem to tingle.

Every careful stroke echoes across my skin as if I’m hollow. As if there’s nothing inside me but air.

“So, I should fight him?”

She bites her lip, concentrating. Then she turns me around, examining her work. My nipple looks perfectly pink, perfectly circular. Definitely more plump than before. My cock glittering, my v-shape is prominently visible.

One nod, then she sits down to apply shimmer to my thighs. My cock in front of her face, I don’t feel shame now but I force myself to not think about it too much, I dont want to walk out with a boner. Not that I'm aroused by Jihyu but the thought of seeing alphas outside excites and makes me nervous at the same time.

“Not fight, either. I like to think of it as a dance. He steps forward, you step back. Then you step forward, and he must step back. There’s a symmetry to it, a rhythm.”

I blink, feeling out of my depth. “Do you mean sex?”

“That has a rhythm, but I’m talking about something more. Anyone can fcuk him, anyone can spread their legs. There’s nothing special with that.”

“I’m a virgin.”

My voice comes out flat. I’m not bragging. What I so carefully protected has actually come to mean more to me than I would have expected—saving my family home. Saving my father. I would have preferred a safe marriage.

A safe life.

If I could magically change fate, I’d never want to know this desperation.

“They aren’t paying for your virginity,” she says. “They’re paying to teach you things. They’re paying so much money because the push will be greater—but so will the pull.”

The rhythm.

I hear what she’s saying, but I’m missing it too. She’s trying to explain something to me, something important. And I know that she understands it—I know because she has a very dangerous man wrapped around her finger. I know because of the age-old wisdom in her blue eyes.

“I’m afraid,” I whisper.

She gives a half smile. “That’s part of the pull.”

And the greater the pull, the greater the push.

“The more afraid I am, the more money I’m worth?”

“It’s not just fear that pulls them. Innocence and inexperience and fragility and grace.”

I picture the old men, smoking cigars and drinking whiskey. “Everything they’re not.”

Her expression turns sly. “Don’t fight him, oppose him. Make him desperate for more.”

I’m staring at her, wondering if she’s taking her own advice—because I’m the one desperate for more. I want something concrete, some trick I can do with my hand or my tongue to make this work.

Some universal safe word that will make sure I don’t get hurt. Instead she’s giving me philosophy. And I’m so focused on it, so deep in it, that I don’t hear footsteps in the hallway.

Don’t hear the turn of the doorknob. Then Min Yoongi is standing in the room, his golden gaze on me. On the eyes that Jihyo made large and cat-like. On my pink nipples in hard little nubs.

On the sensitive place between my legs, stripped bare of any covering. The low sound he makes, almost a growl, snaps me out of the trance. I pull the fabric over me, feeling exposed, abraded. I wasn’t willing to examine the idea of Min Yoongi at the auction, even though I knew he would come.

He enjoys seeing me humiliated, the descendant of his enemy. It isn’t enough to watch my father’s fall. He wants to see mine too.

“Taehyung is downstairs, holding court,” he says. “Is he ready?”

Jihyo glances back at him, looking amused. “Of course, Yoongi-ah. I was just telling him how to control whoever buys him.”

His voice is bland. “Do you think he’ll swing that way?”

She laughs. “Control isn’t kink, darling. It’s a way of life.”

The way Yoongi looks at her isn’t sexual, though. There’s something like respect in his eyes. Maybe it’s only there because she’s with Kang Daniel, but I don’t think so. Moreover, She has a way of earning it herself.

The way she leans close to me is almost regal. Her lips by my ear, she whispers, “All you have to give them is your body. Your mind, your soul— that’s your leverage.”

That’s my ball of string, I realize. A lifeline, so I can find my way out of the maze at the end. She was playful before but dead serious at the end. Because this is life or death, my ability to move on from this.

It could devastate me.

It could break me.

Then she’s sweeping out of the room with a little wave for Yoongi.

We’re alone. I’m insanely focused on the fact that there’s only a piece of cloth protecting my body from him.

So thin, so vital.

He doesn’t stare at my body. His gaze meets mine, but I feel more vulnerable this way. He sees every doubt, every fear.

“Did you touch yourself?” he asks, almost mildly.

Heat rushes to my face, and I know I’ll be bright red. “That’s none of your business.”

He studies me, thoughtful. “I think you did, Virgin lily. I think you touched your hard on and made yourself cum, fingered yourself to ecstasy, your eyes squeezed shut in the dark.”

I hate how well he can read me.

“You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know I could make you cum in two minutes.”

A step back, my calves bumping the small chair where I sat. “You wouldn’t.”

“No, but you wish I would.”

“I hate you.”

A low laugh. “Do you really think you can control the alphas?”

My fists tighten in the silk, covering myself. “Better than the other way around.”

“Would it be so bad?” he asks thoughtfully. “Giving up control for a month? Letting someone else guide you? Letting someone teach you?”

Part of me yearns for that, but not with a stranger. Not for money.

“I don’t care what happens to me at night. They can touch me, teach me, whatever they want. That won’t really be me.”

He walks to the window, looking at the city’s skyline. There are people working late in those offices, climbing the corporate ladder, sleeves rolled up for the paycheck. A few of those penthouses are empty, their occupants downstairs, waiting to bid on me.

Without turning he murmurs, “What makes you think it’s only at night?”

I stare at him, unaccountably surprised. I hadn’t really reasoned it out loud or I might have guessed the obvious. My knowledge of sex is so limited that I only imagine it at night.

That goes doubly so for a strange old man.

Uncertainty vibrates through me. “He’d want me during the day?”

Yoongi turns back, his eyes fierce. “The auction is for a month, Jimin. Your days, your nights, your everything. He will own you.”

A shudder squeezes my body. I’m starting to understand what Jihyo meant about the push. His intensity, his demands.

And what would be the pull? My acquiescence.

No, she told me not to give in. Innocence and inexperience and fragility and grace.

I lift my chin, meeting his eyes. “I have to take care of my father. Someone has to feed him, to wash him. Several times a day.”

Yoongi turns back to the window. “The buyer will pay for his care.”

“I can’t—” My voice breaks, and I suck in a steadying breath.

I can’t afford to pay for a full-time nurse for a month, not after paying the tax bill and Taehyung’s percentage. What will we eat when it’s over?

“He’ll pay for his care,” he says, his tone hard. “On top of the auction amount.”

I take a step forward, strangely drawn to him. “Why would he do that?”

A shoulder lifts.

“The men down there have more money than they know what to do with. Whoever buys you, use him. Take what you need from him.”

In the window I can see his reflection, the bold features of his face. But I can’t read him.

I could never read him.

Is that part of the push Jihyo told me about?

Or is that just the impenetrable mystery of Min Yoongi?

“Why are you helping me?”

“I’m not your friend,” he says gently.

He’s my enemy. When we’re alone, it’s easy to forget that. In a few minutes we’ll be downstairs with the wealthiest men in the city, maybe even the state. Men who would purchase me like an object. Men who Yoongi taught a lesson by ruining my father.

“Fifteen minutes,” he says before leaving the room.

!~~~~!!!!~~~~!