Why was this killing her? “You said it yourself. Everyone has to pay.”
The verbal gauntlet was lifted, the captain brushing her lips with his fingertips. “And I’ll gladly pay. I’ll take liberties, because I can. I will force you to stay safe on this ship, Eugenia.” Firm, softness turning to iron. Even the quality of his voice became sinister. “I’m not asking anymore. From this point forward, I take.”
And he drove home his point with a fiery kiss.
One that hurt when her torn lip was mashed against her teeth. A searing kiss that set her body aching when his arms squeezed too hard.
And he knew it hurt her.
The captain’s statement was loud and clear; he would hurt her if he had to.
He was the glass in her food she was expected to eat with gratitude. An internal injury that would grow more painful as time passed until the pain in her guts inevitably killed her.
Pulling away, he left her lying on his rumple
d sheets, Eugenia a pile of bruising and aches. He pulled away and went to fetch her aspirin and a glass of water to wash the pills down.
Helped her sit up. Apologized when she touched her stinging lip.
When the glass was drained, she set it on the bedside table. Such a normal thing to do in the most abnormal of situations. “Do you ever miss the howl of wild dogs?”
“No.” He produced a wide-tooth comb and began working the snarls at the ends of her hair.
Testing the swelling around her eye with careful fingers, she let him groom her. “The cracking sound the wind made when it rushed through dead tree branches—I miss that too.”
The comb’s teeth catching on a snarl, he sighed. “There is nothing but death out there, Eugenia.”
That could not be true, not on an intellectual level. Somehow, he had created life here. Someone else out there must have done the same. “Where do you get the meat to feed three-hundred-plus people? The vegetables? Farmland? Pastures? Steak doesn’t magically show up on a boat in the middle of a lake that stinks in the summer and is cold as fuck in the winter.”
The relief in his smile, it made the skin crinkle beside his eyes. “Nets for fish upstream. We rotate crops; men work the fields where we cleared forest to till. The good cuts of meat are only served to the men who earn passage to Level 15. Offal for the women who work there.”
“Because it’s more nutrient dense…” Which explained the mush and the metallic flavor.
“Children and mothers are given a balanced diet. Families are supplied with the best meat and harvest. Not every year is this bountiful. Wild dogs get at our chickens. Levees break or irrigation fails.”
“You have communities off ship?” He’d have to. Otherwise, all their supplies would come from City, and the slave ship wouldn’t be a secret anymore.
Nodding, he explained, “The men leave on rotation. No women. It’s not safe. Believe me when I tell you that. Men in mass, when they find a lady outside the rules and structure… it can get ugly. The woman seldom survives it. And then we have to put down the men involved. There has to be tickets to urge them toward a prize more fun than a few nights raping a stranger to death.”
Ice trickled down her spine. “Oh my God.”
Softly, he pulled at a springy curl, observing the light and the fire. “But you’ve seen that, haven’t you?”
Over and over and over. Been caught a time or two, or three, or four. Whether in a cage or outside it, she’d seen the remains of women who hadn’t been so lucky.
Taking her hair from his fingers, tucking it behind her ear, Eugenia made a mental note to avoid farms. Which put a bit of a damper on her original strategy. Farm labor seemed like decent work, and a time or two she had found families working the land on their own. Living on their term and not friendly with strangers.
Bereft of her hair, the captain swept up her fingers as a replacement, weaving them with his own. “Shall we get dressed?”
Her attention left their entwined grip, landing on hazel eyes in an unfairly handsome face. “I’m not going down to Level 9. Sure, you can drag me. But you’ll have to break at least one of my bones to get me there. You’re not locking me in whether it’s just for the day or for forever. You’re not breeding me for tickets. I want to hear the wild dogs, even if they send me running from a bed of sticks and mud. I want to watch the trees rot. I will find a good place.”
“I see.”
But she wasn’t done. “Give me back to Level 15. Put me on the rotating schedule. I give you my word I will do my best to satisfy—even face-to-face—the few times a year I’m called to service you. I’ll lie to the rest of the women and tell them...”
“What will you tell them?” Spoken with the cold death of emotion.
“I’ll tell them that you fucked me too hard from behind. That I slept on the couch. That I blew you and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get you to look at me.”