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months. She’s extremely easy to control.”
    “Really? What works? What is she afraid of?” Asher steeled himself for the list. If he was going to have her, he needed to know exactly what would trigger her, so he’d know what to avoid. Building trust would be hard enough after what she’d been through.
    A laugh. “You sadistic bastard. I knew I picked the right buyer.”
    “I haven’t said I’m buying,” Asher corrected.
    “Of course, but I think you will.” Lucas’s voice dripped like pond sludge over the phone. “Let’s see . . . the girl has almost no pain threshold. It doesn’t take much to make her scream. And yet, it all turns her on, on some level. I’ve never been inside a woman so wet. She’s afraid of isolation, darkness, cramped spaces, bondage if you leave her alone, hunger, any of the heavier implements such as whips and canes . . .”
    If she was actively terrified of all of those things, it was only because Lucas had used them to torture her.
    “. . . She’s afraid of dogs. So if you have one, I’m just saying.”
    “Dogs?”
    “What can I say, my puppy really likes pussy.” He laughed again.
    Asher’s knuckles turned white as he gripped the edge of the table. Bile rose in his throat.
    “Of course she acts afraid of dogs, but she seems to enjoy it once he gets going,” Lucas continued, unaware of how much Asher wanted to kill him.
    “Hmmmm. I still think a million is too high. I might offer half a million. You know that’s the going rate.” He held this breath, wondering if he’d pushed his feigned disinterest too far.
    “Three quarters, and I’ll send the paperwork over for you to sign tomorrow evening.”
    “Done.”
    He snorted with disgust as he disconnected the call. His skin crawled just thinking of that girl with Lucas for so long. When he looked up, William was standing in the doorway holding a cup of coffee, an excuse to stand there and eavesdrop.
    “How much did you hear?”
    He crossed the floor quickly and placed the mug of steaming liquid on Asher’s desk. “Most of it. I apologize, sir.”
    There was a look in William’s eyes that said he had a strong opinion but wasn’t going to be stupid enough to share it.
    “You may as well just say it.”
    “Well . . .” William hesitated only a moment before plowing through his prepared commentary. “If you’ll excuse me for saying it, are you sure you’re ready to bring a pet into the house? And one so . . . damaged?”
    Asher stared hard at him, and William looked away, pretending his interest had been drawn to a vase of lilies.
    “Is that all?”
    “Perhaps you could take her off the island. Set her free.”
    William always did have such a soft spot for pets, be they animal or human. He’d worked for Asher before they came to Eleu, and it had become clearer over the years that he only barely tolerated his employer’s perversions. The fact that he’d kept the secret of what had happened to Darcy that night spoke of his loyalty in the face of his distaste.
    “Absolutely not,” Asher said. “In the first place, she’s costing me a lot of money. No way in hell am I parting with that kind of cash only to set her free. This isn’t Thailand, where you pay to release birds for sport. And those birds are never truly set free, are they? They’re trained to fly back to repeat the process all over again.”
    William looked at the floor.
    “She’s wired for this. As I am. If she wasn’t, she wouldn’t have come here. Setting her free won’t change who she is. If this wasn’t in her, she wouldn’t have made it past the scrutiny of the customs agents––”
    “––But if she’s broken––”
    “If she’s broken, she’s in far greater danger out there in the free world than she is in here with me. She’ll only end up with someone else who will hurt her. She no longer has the tools to pick well, and even if she did, she’ll never trust herself again. She’ll get desperate and lonely someday and