Read Online Trafficked: The Terrifying True Story of a British Girl Forced into the Sex Trade by Sophie Hayes - Free Book Online Page A

that embarrassed him – but his face remained completely serious as he continued, ‘If I don’t pay the money back, it will cause problems for my family. So that’s why I need you to make this sacrifice for love.’ And that’s when my heart began to race and the palms of my hands became damp with sweat.
    For a few seconds, I just looked at him, my mind totally blank and uncomprehending, and then I shrugged and said, ‘I don’t know what you mean. How can I help you? You know I want to, but it would take me a lifetime to earn that sort of money.’
    â€˜I don’t expect you to earn it in your pathetic job in England.’ His sneer was cold and dismissive. ‘You will earn it here. I will find you a place to work – on the streets.’
    Again a wave of relief washed over me and I laughed as I said, ‘Don’t be ridiculous! Work on the streets doing what?’ And then I added hastily, ‘But don’t worry, Kas. I will help you. We’ll think of something, I promise.’
    â€˜ We don’t need to think of anything,’ he snapped, and the unmistakable sound of anger and dislike in his voicefilled me with dread. ‘ I have already thought of something, and that is why you are here.’
    He took a step towards me and, instinctively, I cowered away from him.
    â€˜What’s your problem?’ he shouted, leaning down so that his face was just a couple of inches away from mine. ‘Why are you looking at me like that? How dare you disrespect me in this way?’
    It was as though the temper he’d only just been managing to control had finally erupted, and his face was contorted unrecognisably as he demanded, ‘How dare you answer me back? Do you not know that if you love someone, you have to make sacrifices for them? Are you so selfish that you can’t do this thing for me?’
    I felt like an actor who’d walked on to the stage to speak my lines and realised I’d learned the wrong part in the wrong play, so that everything going on around me was completely incomprehensible. And then it suddenly struck me, almost like a physical blow, that the ‘work on the streets’ he was talking about was prostitution.
    A wave of nausea washed over me, followed swiftly by embarrassment at the thought that I must have misunderstood. He doesn’t mean it , I told myself. Just keep calm. This sort of thing doesn’t happen in real life . But Kas was clearly in deadly earnest and as I rested my elbows on the kitchen table, holding my head in my hands with tears streaming down my face, I was afraid. The last man I’d ever been afraid of was my father, and as I looked at Kas, all the oldfeelings of dread and helpless vulnerability that I’d been so determined never to experience again threatened to overwhelm me once more.
    Kas strode backwards and forwards in front of me, sometimes shouting, sometimes speaking in a quiet voice that was even more menacing and frightening than his anger. Then, suddenly, he leaned down towards me again and screamed, ‘Who do you think you are, woman? Do you think that after I’ve waited for you all these years I’m just going to let you go? Well, you’re wrong. I’m not letting you go. Do you understand? I will never let you go. You are mine now. Your life belongs to me, and you will never get away from me.’
    And that’s when the thought struck me that perhaps he was actually crazy. No one who was sane could possibly say the things he was saying: men like Kas aren’t pimps – or drug dealers – and girls like me don’t work on the streets. The idea was absurd and, in any case, how could anyone actually make someone else do that? But, whether he was crazy or not, the fact remained that Kas was in a rage – apparently with me, although I didn’t understand why – and I was very frightened.
    I kept telling myself he’d be all right again