To my surprise, sharp, strong fingers pinched my jaw, holding me in place even as both the hovercraft and A continued moving. “I am assuming you wish to live long enough to meet our healer, do you not?”
I swallowed the sour taste in my throat, holding his gaze and trying to show him I wasn’t afraid. If there was one thing I really couldn’t make up for, it was my size. I was a woman, and although I was tall for one, I had nothing on these strangely beautiful bug-people who also wanted to destroy anyone they didn’t like. I was stuck.
“Sir, the watch has spotted something—”
A growled at Squire the moment he appeared, which made Squire’s eyes dart to the ground, but he didn’t step back. “I do not wish to be disturbed.”
“We believe he might have spotted an intruder,” Squire said calmly.
A cursed, words said too quickly for my translator to really understand. It was just a fluid garble of sounds. “We are not done,” he told me ominously, stalking off and leaving me behind with Squire.
I didn’t lift my head, instead reflecting on just how close of a call that had been. Turned out there were things my period couldn’t protect me from. Sure, they could ogle my naked booty from afar. I just didn’t want them to.
“I am sorry,” Squire said quietly, after we had been walking a few minutes.
I stared at him in surprise, then quickly yanked my attention away so it didn’t seem conspicuous. To the others, he was just my guard, someone who dealt with me because they had to. “For what?” I didn’t whisper, but I tried to get as low as I could. I was worried the faint buzz of the hovercraft would drown out my words.
“For not being able to save you sooner.” Squire sounded matter-of-fact, like there was nothing to question in his statement. “Sir is bitter towards the higher-ranked warriors who keep all the females for themselves.”
I gulped. “So none of you have gotten any in the past few weeks?”
The look Squire gave me was perplexed. “Gotten any what?”
Right, Earth slang was not always a good idea. “Had sex with a woman. It’s been a while? A few weeks?”
He looked thoughtful now. “It has been many weeks,” he agreed. “Maybe a full rotation of the sun.”
A whole year? Dread pooled in my middle. In that case, I was even more grateful for my period. I may have hated my sanitary options, may have hated that I’d been kidnapped in the first place, but it was the only thing keeping me safe, surrounded by a mini army of horny alien men. Great. “Thanks for telling me.”
Squire merely shrugged, his attention ever-forward as he kept walking. “You are a female,” he said simply. “You are to be protected.”
I tilted my head at him, wondering if there were female Caterri and if there were, how they were treated. If Squire had been a chick, would he get the same treatment? Would he be reduced to his ability to reproduce, trapped somewhere and given to whomever pleased them? The thought made my stomach curdle. N’Ashtar may have been an arrogant prat, but at least he was a hot, thoughtful one. He wasn’t going to steamroll all over me just because he could.
Leaning forward, I closed my eyes, my forehead against the bar at the edge. I didn’t want to watch. No, that wasn’t true. I couldn’t watch. I didn’t want to see what was coming for me, what they were debating doing to my body. If I truly was still in their captivity by the time they made me see their healer, I was fucked, quite literally. Even worse, they would have known I lied.
I let out a long breath, trying to relax my body as much as I could. Relax, I told myself. I needed to relax and think up a plan. It was my only hope.
“I hear you accepted your offer at Johnson and Co.,” Professor Kent said warmly. “We are very proud of you.”
I stood there, dressed in the cap and gown I’d worn at my graduation from law school, and smiled at him. It’d been a rough three years, but I had managed. Even better, I’d excelled, and I was on my way to becoming the lawyer I wanted to be. “Come meet my mother.”
“Of course.”
I led the way, since Mom was standing talking to another classmate of mine. The moment Mom saw me, though, she came over at a normal, sedate pace and hugged me. Then she turned to my professor. “Who is this?”
“Mom, this is Professor Kent,” I said, explaining to her everything he had done to help me get my degree and my job.
“I’ve heard a lot about you,” my mother said with a smile. “I always knew Dana would achieve greatness.”
The warmth in my chest was threatening to flood throughout my body. My Mom had always pushed me hard, and now it was paying off, right? Then Professor Kent made his excuses and left to talk to another student, leaving me standing with my mother. The moment he turned away, her smile dropped and was replaced with a dark look I hadn’t seen for a while.
“You need to refuse that job,” Mom said sharply.
I stared at her, my mouth hanging open. “I already accepted—”
“Even if you get a job at a lesser firm, if you rely on the nepotism and favors of men, you’ll end up like me. Someone dependent on their man, a stay-at-home mother with nothing to offer the world but sticky-fingered children and wishes of what she could have been.” My Mom’s words were firm, although they cut me like a knife. Mom thought I was a burden? Maybe I hoped her tone would soften, that she would tell me it wasn’t really that bad, that she didn’t regret having me, but none of that
