Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 51862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 51862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
“Yes!” she says. “Yes. That suits you! And you should tie your hair up with…” She pulls out a little pink bandanna and knots it in my hair.
This next time I look, I see a reflection I like a lot better. I don't look like a knock-off version of Jennifer anymore. I look like a badass version of myself.
“I think we’re done,” she says. “Just a little lipstick and mascara, and you’re going to be the hottest thing in your village.”
I grin at my reflection. I cannot wait for Zain to see me.
“Zain, come and get your pet,” Jen says, using the ship’s intercom. “She’s gotten really, really hot and needs you right now.”
It takes Zain about a minute and a half to get to me.
“She’s hot? What’s wrong? Fever?” Questions tumble out of his mouth as he opens the door to Jen’s room. They stop when he sees me.
“Oh. That kind of hot,” he grins. “Look at you, pet.”
“Do you like it?”
I am basking in his approval even before he answers me. I can see how much he likes what I look like now. These clothes hug my body in a way my others never did. These are clothes that cover me but also somehow expose me.
“I need to take you to my room,” he growls lustfully. “Now.”
I giggle as he sweeps me up and carries me off. Jen’s grin and little wave as we depart make me think she could actually be a very strong ally on this ship. She just made me feel so much better, and now Zain is going to make me feel all the way better.
He carries me to his room and throws me down on the bed.
“Those clothes are nice,” he says. “But I want them off you, pet. Now.”
“Just be careful with them! I don’t have any others like them!”
It is not easy for Zain to be careful when he is in his lustful rut, so I made sure to disrobe relatively carefully before he can rip them off me. That’s probably what made my other clothes look so tatty, come to think of it. They were never made to withstand the forces of being roughly removed by an amorous alien.
Zain stands over me, having discarded his clothing already. He is holding his cock, fisting it with slow strokes as he watches my naked curves come back into his view. He…
“Zain! Have you been letting the humans eat us?”
Zain’s brothers have burst into his room without asking. I let out a shriek of embarrassment and dive beneath the covers, hiding myself but not quickly enough to hide my shame. They’ve already seen everything.
They don’t care. This isn’t about me. I’m irrelevant. I’m…
What are they talking about? Eating them?
“It’s quite common for human tribes to eat their enemies. I suggest we don’t become their enemies.”
“They are our pets, Zain. They are animals we trade and…”
That must be Kahn speaking. I didn’t see the warmth in his eyes that Arkan had when we first met. Kahn thinks of us like animals. He fears us as much as he wants to use us.
For the first time, I am understanding precisely who my lover, rescuer, master and mate is: a human trafficker.
“What did he mean when he called us animals to be traded?”
Zain makes his confession in a tone that makes it clear he has no understanding of why that is a problem. “We own a human pet shop. We take humans from Earth…”
“Like Wrathelder?”
“We take a small number, carefully selected, and we train them to live happily as pets on our world.”
“So you sell people, humans, like me to others of your kind?”
“Yes.”
I take in a deep breath as everything I thought I knew about Zain crumbles before me. I thought he came to save us from the evil aliens who wanted to steal us away from our planet and use us for their own evil ends. But he’s just a different kind of evil alien, and if we had met under different circumstances, he might have sold me.
“The others,” I say. “The villagers. Are you planning on selling them?”
“Yes.” Kahn answers, and Zain does not contradict him. “The ones who are marketable will be sold. We need to recoup some of the costs associated with these operations.”
A sense of betrayal more deep than any I have ever felt before fills my body. It feels like anger and sadness all mixed up into one awful, horrible emotion. I’m not used to feeling like this. I don’t know what to do with it, so I feel myself shutting down and going quiet.
Kahn, Zain, and Arkan continue to discuss the behavior and fate of the rest of the people I have lived with my entire life as if I am not there. They treat me like wallpaper, or part of the furniture, far too concerned with their little petty squabbles to notice that I am now making plans of my own.