I never liked the whole selling people to other people thing. It sat wrong with me, always had. That’s why I usually turned a blind eye—kept walking, kept my head down—whenever I saw men and women in cages, lined up like livestock for whatever twisted purpose someone could dream up.

I had money. Too much of it, maybe. Retired at twenty-three, if you can call walking away from a fortune “retirement.” So I walked a lot—gave myself the illusion of normalcy, of simplicity. Just a man strolling through the city.

But that day, I saw her.

The cage was small. Rusted iron bars, shoved to the side of the square like garbage someone hadn’t gotten around to tossing. A sign hung above it: easy pickings. Classy.

And inside—she sat there like she’d already accepted her fate. Legs folded, back straight, eyes… hollow, but not broken. Not yet.

She was beautiful. Wore barely anything, just enough fabric to pretend someone cared about modesty. But that wasn’t what stopped me.

It was the way no one else did.

People walked by like she was furniture.

I couldn’t.

So I stepped closer. My voice came out before I even thought about it.

“How much?”