Chapter 7

• Harper POV
• I turn to the window instead, sipping my coffee and watching as a pigeon lands awkwardly on the fire escape, fluffing its wings like it owns the world.
• “You looked through their stuff again?” he asks, voice low now.
• I nod without turning. “Yeah.”
• “What’d you think?”
• What did I think? I think I felt sick and excited all at once. I think I imagined their hands on me and then hated myself for it. I think I wanted something I don’t have a name for. I think I wondered what it might feel like to be adored and used in equal measure, but only because I said yes.
• “They’re intense,” I say instead.
• Mark chuckles softly. “That’s how you make real money, Harper. The ones with tame profiles? They want tame things. Tame things don’t pay the bills.”
• He walks past me and kisses the top of my head like he’s proud of himself, like this is love, like any of this has anything to do with care.
• “You always were the kind of girl who could go far,” he says, pouring the last of the coffee into his mug. “You just needed someone to push you there.”
• I nod again because it’s easier than disagreeing. Because I’ve learned that even silence can be twisted into agreement if he decides it should be.
• He sits at the table and opens his laptop. For a while, we’re quiet, just the sound of the keys tapping and the fridge humming and my heart beating too fast.
• Then he speaks again, too casual. “Oh, and I paid the electric bill with the cash from last night. Just so you know.”
• I blink. I almost ask how much was left, if any. But I already know. He’s telling me without telling me that there’s nothing. That what I brought in wasn’t enough again. That I owe more.
• Still, I manage a smile. “Thanks.”
• He looks up at me, and for a moment, something in his eyes sharpens. “You’re welcome,” he says, his voice soft but pointed. “See? I take care of things. Like I always do.”
• I want to scream. I want to throw the mug across the room and ask him how the hell he gets to play hero when I’m the one selling myself to keep the lights on. But instead, I just nod again. I add another layer to the armor I wear in his presence.
• “Yeah,” I say, my voice quiet. “You do.”
• And just like that, the sharpness vanishes. He smiles again, relaxed, victorious. He thinks I believe it. Maybe some part of me still does.
• I go back to the living room and curl up on the couch, phone in hand. I don’t open the app right away. I sit there for a long time, just staring at the blank screen, listening to Mark type behind me.
• His presence feels like a net around my ribs, invisible but constant.
• Even when he’s being nice.
• Especially then.
• Because that’s when it’s hardest to remember that kindness can be a tool of control. That sometimes it’s the leash you don’t see that holds you the tightest.
• My phone vibrates against my thigh, a subtle tremor that slices through the stillness like a whisper turned threat. I glance down with slow reluctance, already knowing what I’ll see, though still hoping, foolishly, maybe, that I’m wrong.
• The screen lights up.
• Your chat has been accepted by The_Triumvirate.
• There it is.
• For a moment, I don’t move. I don’t breathe. Fear floods through my chest like ice water poured straight into my lungs, but somehow, it burns. The sensation rides my spine like a second heartbeat, sharp and cold and utterly consuming. I stare at the message as though the phone has transformed into something alive and volatile, a grenade with its pin already halfway pulled.
• Behind me, I hear the creak of worn floorboards and then his voice, too close, too knowing.
• “Talk like you would to anyone. Pretend this is for you.”
• Mark’s breath brushes the shell of my ear as he speaks, and I know, without turning, without asking, that he’s looked. That he’s seen. That he’s watching me now, just waiting to see what I do.
• But how do I pretend this is for me, when it isn’t? When none of this has been mine from the start? Talking like I would to anyone isn’t possible anymore. That girl, whoever she was is gone. Her voice is buried under too many silences, too many bargains, too many nights like this.
• There's another vibration, and I see that a message has arrived.
• I tap the notification with fingers that feel slow and unfamiliar, like they’ve forgotten how to belong to me.
• The_Triumvirate: Morning, BruisedLace.
• I blink.
• BruisedLace.
• Of course. That’s the name Mark chose for the profile. I hadn’t even thought to look until now. It hits me like a slap, soft and sudden and strange. A joke? A brand? I don’t know what it means to him, but I know what it means to me.
• Lace is something delicate. Pretty. Meant to be seen, admired.
• Bruised... well. That part doesn’t need explaining.
• Another message arrives before I can process the first.
• The_Triumvirate: Firstly, thank you for the wink. We all hope you’re having an amazing morning. Could you tell us about you? So we know more about who you are?
• Tell them about me.
• It sounds simple. But my heart thuds louder in my chest as the question settles there, heavy and suffocating.
• Do they mean what I’ve done? Who I’ve been with? Or are they asking about preferences, desires, the kind of girl I imagine myself to be when I close my eyes and forget what real life looks like? I don’t know where to begin. I barely remember what it’s like to speak about myself as if I’m a person, and not a product.