They Sold Me to Hell and Called It Love Novel – Chapter 1 After being trafficked to Nueva Sangre and surviving five years there, my husband, who was a arms smuggler, now cleaned his gun barrel and said to me in a casual tone: “The man who trafficked you is my guy. The moment you were blindfolded and dragged into that black van, I was sitting in my Maybach at the curb.” I went rigid. Then my uncle, Silas Cross, the godfather of Ironvale’s underworld, exhaled a ring of smoke and spoke slowly: “The Nueva Sangre compound where you were held? I arranged it.” “The plan was to punish you for three years and then bring you back. But Darius Voss was worried you still hadn’t learned your lesson and would bully Lila again.” “So he paid extra to leave you there two more years.” Darius Voss, now the most powerful mafia boss in Southeast America, was an orphan I had rescued from a drug lord’s stronghold years ago.
After I was trafficked to Nueva Sangre, I became the most popular outlet for rage in the compound. Every night, countless men lined up. In five years, my belly swelled nine times only to shrink again I couldn’t die even when I wanted to. Every time I tried to escape, my legs were crushed, and I was fitted with cheap prosthetics. I had fought like hell to survive just to see those three men again—only to find out they were the ones who had put me there. I gripped my tattered sleeve, my voice trembling like the last withered blade of grass in a storm. “Why? Why would you do this to me?” My uncle and Darius averted their eyes, refusing to look at me. Kael finally spoke, his tone cold enough to crush a bug beneath his boot. “You took advantage of our affection and bullied Lila again and again. We just wanted to teach you a lesson, make you grow up a little.” “Lila is carrying my child. If you can’t accept that, we can get a divorce.” A rush of metallic taste flooded my throat.
Then, out of nowhere, a long-silent electronic chime sounded in my mind. [Host, do you wish to abandon the redemption of the three antagonists and exit this world immediately?] The system, gone for years, had suddenly returned. I froze for a moment. I looked at Kael’s expressionless face, then at my uncle and Darius, who were quietly instructing the servants to prepare caviar for Lila. My heart felt like it had been shot clean through. The pain was suffocating. Back then, they had lied to me. They said Kael had been ambushed near the border during a deal and was critically wounded with a gunshot. I was terrified. I didn’t think twice—I took the shortcut straight toward the border. That was when I was ambushed, hooded, and dragged away into an abyss of suffering. Now that I had finally survived and they had come to “rescue” me, they were telling me the whole thing had been a setup from the start—all to get back at me for Lila. Leave. I answered the system in my mind, one word at a time. [Acknowledged.
Countdown to departure: ten hours. Due to sudden circumstances, all three antagonists must be present at the time of departure.] When they saw me sitting there, laughing and crying at the same time, Kael reached out and wiped the tears from my eyes. The gun calluses on his fingertips scraped against my cheek. His voice was as tender as I had once craved to my dying day, but the words he spoke were pure venom. “You don’t have to divorce me if you don’t want to.” “It’s just that Lila has gotten used to being spoiled over the years. You can’t lay a hand on her anymore.” “You can’t have children now anyway, and Lila said she’s willing to let you raise the child under your name.” I had once been pregnant with Kael’s child. At six and a half months, Lila pushed me off a second-floor terrace at a private club. I lost the baby, and my uterus was severely damaged. When I woke up, I was out of my mind with rage and went after Lila. I slapped her once, just once, before Kael grabbed me and locked me in the villa.
I hadn’t even finished recovering from the miscarriage when they tricked me and sent me to Nueva Sangre. My throat felt clogged with blood-soaked cotton. Every word I forced out was agony. “All because I slapped Lila once? That was your punishment?” “Yes.” Kael showed no trace of guilt. “You couldn’t even protect your own child and tried to blame Lila for it. Where was the dignity of a Mrs. Rourke?” “If you behave yourself from now on, I promise I’ll never send you away again.” My face was ice cold. I couldn’t help asking, “Since you were willing to lie to me for so long, why tell me the truth now?” My uncle sighed. Darius, however, looked unconcerned. “You and Lila are sisters, after all. We wanted you to remember this lesson so that in the future, you’ll protect her just like we do.” Protect her? I couldn’t hold back any longer. I swept an entire set of crystal glassware off the table. Then I rolled up my sleeve to show the festering, suppurating scars left by cigarette burns. “The people you hired tortured me day and night. They even—” “Enough!” Kael cut me off sharply, his eyes filled with undisguised disgust and contempt. “You even paint your wounds so real.
It’s clear you haven’t learned a thing.” My uncle and Darius looked at me with the same disappointment, as if I were some hopeless madwoman. Kael grabbed my arm roughly and, like a piece of trash, threw me into the dark storage room of the villa. “When Lila comes back, if you haven’t learned to be humble, I’ll personally send you back to that compound in Nueva Sangre.” He spat out the threat, slammed the door, and locked it. That threat instantly triggered a deep-seated reaction in me. I could almost feel the chains around my limbs, the electric prods about to strike. My voice was hoarse as I pounded on the door like a madwoman. “I’ll sign the divorce papers! I’ll sign the disownment paper! Just don’t send me back to Nueva Sangre!”