Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 56021 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 280(@200wpm)___ 224(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56021 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 280(@200wpm)___ 224(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
I know I should resist him. He is not a friend, or an ally. He is not a true protector. He is the enemy of my people. But his hug is so warm, and his body is so strong. He is the embodiment of comfort, even though he is also the cause of my fear. It is perverted that he should be both.
I’ve lived a long time. Well, long for me. Long as I have ever lived, really. And what I’m starting to realize is that there’s really no such thing as a good person of any species. The closer you get to someone, the more you realize that they’re fucked up, and that they’ll probably fuck you up in some way.
The crew used to talk about healthy relationships, but I have never seen one. I’ve seen people who looked happy sometimes, but admitted they were miserable other times. I’ve seen people who didn’t even look happy who said they were happy. And then I’ve seen people who outright said they weren’t even a little happy but were in the relationship anyway.
I liked that Captain Sullivan banned relationships on the Mare. No boys allowed. Made things easier. Of course, some of the crew were in relationships with each other, but that was different, because reasons. That’s how Captain Sullivan explained it to me right back at the beginning when I first asked, and I accepted that reasoning because Sullivan always had a way of making whatever she said sound very reasonable.
When I was on her ship I didn’t have to think about men, or mating, or anything. Being on the Mare kept me safe for years. Now I am in the arms of a virile male with a reputation for taking what he wants, and I have the feeling I am going to be taken whether I like it or not.
“Put me down, please.” I don’t even want him to put me down. I just want to have said it so I don’t have to feel like I’m completely weak by giving into him.
He ignores me, just as I suspected he would. I’m a thing to him, something to claim. I’ve been a thing before, so I know how to be one. All I have to do is sit back and let things happen. It’s easy. It’s a lot easier than fighting, that’s for sure.
He takes me into a chamber where a hot pool in the floor steams gently and indeed, invitingly. There’s something cozy about this subterranean world of his, lit by recessed lights that must be tucked away behind rocky outcroppings. He’s quite literally the underworld and the underground all wrapped up into one large, dangerous package.
“The springs here contain minerals and a heat that is quite invigorating. Taking that filthy, unworthy scrap of material from your body and immersing yourself in the water would be a good idea, don’t you think?”
He puts me down as he makes the suggestion. He must sense my resistance. What he doesn’t know is how far I have to be pushed in order to so much as ask to be treated like a person. He also has no idea how rare it is for anybody to respect me the way he has. He’s put me down like I asked. Not right away, but he’s done it. And he’s made the water a choice.
Lettie, my crewmate, she didn’t make anything a choice. She forced this role of bait upon me, and she expected me to go along with it.
Now I get to choose if I bathe or not.
“Would you leave me alone, please?” I try the request for privacy, testing Wrath’s reaction as much as trying to claim some privacy for myself.
“Yes, and I will get you some clothing. It will be at the door when you are ready. Feel free to use any of the lotions and creams and soaps.”
Ihave not had a bath in three years. I have not been off the Mare in three years. I have washed myself occasionally in remnants of my water allowance, but for the most part I have used the reverbatory shower that disintegrates filth from the skin in a sort of fuzzy feeling fashion.
Looking at this subterranean oasis, and knowing that I will have privacy, I cannot resist.
“Yes, please,” I say.
“Good girl.”
Those two words, delivered in a rough saurian growl, detonate somewhere low in my belly. I turn from him to hide my face because I know I just went bright red, and my lips have parted in a smile, and I think there might even be tears in my eyes because it has been such a long time since anybody said anything so nice to me. I haven’t been a good girl for almost two decades. I never thought I would be one again.