by Helena Maeve
In the end, Finn had to spell it out for her. “Drifters take thralls because they can’t have children of their own. That’s how they survive.” He dithered a moment, then joined Alana on the edge of the bed. “It’s really rare for a woman to fall pregnant, but when it happens, it always ends in death. Something about the toxins in the water we drink or something…”
His shrug left Alana perplexed. “But… Why don’t you leave?”
“Where would we go? To New Eden?” Finn scoffed, chuckling with the same mirthless laugh Jackson had used when speaking of her hometown. “We’ve tried to find refuge before. The outcome is always the same—we’re usually chased off at gunpoint, or left to contend with mutts and walkers while our neighbors leer over their tall walls. The fringes of settlements up and down the coast are pitted with the remains of our kind.”
“I suspect pillaging and burning as you go has done a number on your reputation,” Alana advanced thinly.
“Our reputation,” Finn corrected. “You’re one of us now.”
It was a sobering thought, as uncomfortable as being told that she would one day have to join Jackson in sacking peaceful townships.
“Right,” she echoed, but in her heart, she knew that would never be the case. “I should get ready for Jackson…”
Finn’s company had never unsettled her before, but then he hadn’t told her until now that every time she drank the water in Haven, she was poisoning her womb.
He grinned, oblivious. “Oh, right. Make sure to wear the beads. I’m telling you, it’ll get him all hot and bothered.”
“You’re a very strange boy,” Alana said, ushering him out. “I’ll keep that in mind.” It was already getting plenty crowded up there, what was one more troubling thought?
* * * *
The bead curtain shifted with a familiar clinking sound.
“I hope you’re hungry,” Alana tossed over her shoulder, stirring the coals in the brazier, “I asked for a double portion for you.” It was meatballs and rice tonight and the spices almost had her looking forward to the shapeless, greasy clumps of dried beef in her bowl.
The thought fled her mind completely when she felt a pair of strong arms wrap around her waist. ”I’m famished,” Jackson whispered against her ear. His cheek was damp against her scalp. He must’ve showered before coming to her—a more attentive gesture than many men in New Eden would’ve considered.
Alana leaned back into his arms, gingerly setting the brass tongs aside. “Careful,” she drawled. “You don’t want to get burned, do you?”
She had no similar concern as she walked her fingertips over his veined hands and up his forearms. His flesh was always so warm to the touch, his body like a live furnace on the coldest nights. And yet Alana still shivered when he cupped her breasts in his hands, rolling his thumbs over her pebbled nipples.
A moan built in the back of her throat, threatening to spill out. She forced it down, willful and determined not to give in despite his efforts. “Don’t tell me you’ve been thinking about this all day?”
“And what if I have?” Jackson chuckled. He was a scoundrel for turning his mouth into the sensitive skin of her neck, knowing full well how it would make her shiver. Alana did not protest his ministrations.
“Then you’re very lucky you didn’t fall out of the rigging,” she said and canted her head to one shoulder. “I’m very flattered.”
Jackson pressed his lips behind her ear, nipping softly. “Is that all you are?” He sank a hand into the folds of her linen shirt, popping the buttons as he went.
Alana could pinpoint the precise moment he noticed the beads, because he paused, fingers locking around the necklace.
“What’s this?”
“Finn took me to the market.” Said I should buy these because you’d like me better in them. She kept that last for herself, still testing the waters of what Jackson allowed and what he enjoyed. Only twenty-four hours had passed since he’d seen fit to remind her of her place.
Alana felt him unbutton her shirt the rest of the way and loop his palm around the string of beads. “Turn around,” she heard him murmur against her ear.
Shivering, she hurried to obey. Her insides clenched like a fist gripping tight around her heart when she met his heated gaze.
Jackson was tracing his thumb over the ridges of the wooden beads, watching the contrast of lustrous spheres against her olive-dark skin. “You look lovely.”
“You think so?” Alana couldn’t conceal a smile. “What about now?” she asked, shaking the shirt from her shoulders. “Is that better or worse?”
So much for not giving in to lust.
The air left her in a rush as Jackson reeled her into a passionate, bone-melting kiss. His force had her scrabbling for balance with hands on his knees. She didn’t mind that the bed was a mere foot away, or that supper was getting cold. As long as Jackson kept kissing her, the whole world could fade into darkness for all she cared.
It was a selfish sentiment and it only lasted as long as Jackson deigned to heed her moans. He pulled away first, tightening his fingers in Alana’s hair to keep her from following. Somehow, he had wound up sprawled on his back, with Alana straddling his hips. Her skirt was pooled around her waist and her knees were digging painfully into the uncarpeted floors—neither of which stopped Jackson from tilting up his head to tongue the hardened peaks of her nipples.
Alana coiled a hand around his nape and arched her back, pleading wordlessly for more. She couldn’t help the forward tilt of her body or the way she ground down onto Jackson’s belly, seeking friction. She didn’t want to hold herself back from taking advantage of his many talents. She was owed this much, as his thrall—as his mistress, if that was what she was.
Jackson turned his head, grazing his teeth against the soft swell of her breast and Alana moaned, her pussy clenching with a flood of liquid heat.
Just when she thought she could take no more, Jackson painted a wet, slick trail between her breasts, all the way up the line of her beaded necklace to the shelf of her collarbones. “Touch me,” he gritted out.
“I am,” Alana protested coyly.
“Not there.” The back of his neck was slick with sweat, skin warm beneath her fingertips, but it wasn’t enough. He took one of her hands in a firm grip and guided it behind her back, to the bulge straining against the confines of his trousers. “Here.”
Alana bit back a gasp. He was already hard for her, his length stiff and hot beneath her fingertips. The sense of power that surged at the thought was almost enough to drive her over the edge. She had done that. She had aroused him with mere kisses, by her sheer presence in his quarters.
How much further could she push the envelope?
“Make me,” Alana drawled, rolling her hips back and forth over his straining cock.
Jackson’s gaze darkened. “Do you know what you’re asking?”
She didn’t, but she’d never wanted to challenge him more. “You’re my master,” she breathed against his lips, darting out of the way when he made to kiss her. “So take control.”
“Speaking of playing with fire,” Jackson growled. That he was the stronger had been obvious since the beginning, but Alana hadn’t realized how he’d been holding himself back until he drove her down into the bed and ripped off her skirt with a rough tug. The seams gave a protesting creak and Alana thought vaguely of having to buy needle and thread. She didn’t get much further with her fretting.
Jackson had her by the necklace and he was sinking two fingers into her without preamble. His rough grip should’ve frightened her, yet all Alana could think of was please and more. She tried to shift her hips into the motion of his fingers, to ride his hand as she had done time and time again in the past, but Jackson stopped her squirming by straddling her thighs and forcing her to stillness.
“Oh—” Alana choked out, feeling the necklace draw tighter around her throat. Jackson’s fist was pressed against her windpipe, not bearing down but not releasing her, eit
her.
The shadows in his eyes were the color of the roiling sea. He was gazing into her, as though intent on devouring her every moan. He didn’t have to try very hard. It never once occurred to Alana to try to conceal her pleasure, much less deny Jackson the ragged, husky groans that spilled from her lips when he curled his fingers just right into her cunt, grazing that place within that she’d never managed to reach with the jade toy she’d used back home.
“Oh, God, you’re going to make me come,” she panted, already on the verge as Jackson tightened the string of beads just a fraction, flirting with the edge of danger. “Please—” Alana couldn’t say what she was begging for, only that she didn’t want this to end.
Jackson took no notice of her pleas as he freed his fingers and held them up to her mouth. “Lick.” A single word, a command—even if she’d been thinking clearly, Alana still couldn’t have disobeyed.
Of course, if she’d been thinking clearly, she would’ve thought twice about letting Jackson nudge her thighs open with his knees and press into her in one brutal motion.
There was a real sting of pain this time, cutting her to the quick, but Alana found herself relishing the sensation. It was like scratching a scab that had only just begun to heal, or prodding a fresh bruise, things she’d done for as long as she could remember. She cried out, locking her thighs around Jackson’s hips and pulling him flush against her body.
“You like that,” she heard him grit out. “You fucking like that, Christ—”
“Shut your mouth.” She made to press a hand over his lips, but Jackson was faster, exchanging his hold on the beads to grab her wrist in a vise-tight grip.
“What did you say to me?”
Alana huffed out a laugh, giddy in the face of his disbelief. “Shut. Your. Mouth.”
“Oh, you’re in for it now,” he growled, throaty and dangerous, as he forced her other hand to the bed and renewed his efforts.
There was something primal and exciting in realizing her helplessness. Still no panic, although Alana kept waiting for the butterflies fluttering their wings in the pit of her stomach to mutate into that all too familiar dread that had kept her company in the early days.
She didn’t even see her orgasm coming before it was upon her. It crashed into her like a thunderclap, curling her toes and arching her back into a near-perfect curve. She felt her cunt spasm around Jackson’s cock as release claimed her and didn’t fully comprehend that the howl echoing against the barren walls of their chamber was her own doing until it was too late to bite it back.
Jackson pumped his hips twice, three times before collapsing over her, spent.
Alana nuzzled a flushed, sweat-damp patch of his neck with her lips, savoring the minute shivers that crept through his body. “Mm, is that the best you can do?”
“Are you serious?” Jackson choked.
“Dreadfully.”
He laughed, the sound muffled by the bedding and the tangle of Alana’s hair. “You’re going to be the death of me, aren’t you? Give me a minute,” he begged, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I’m not done with you yet.”
Alana grinned up at the ceiling, secure in the knowledge that Jackson wouldn’t let her down. There were far worse ways to spend an evening than pinned beneath his strong body, feeling desired.
Chapter Eleven
“Did it work?” Finn asked, elbowing his way beside her in the lunch queue. “Did you show him the beads?”
Maity turned with a scowl before Alana could answer. “Leave her be. She doesn’t like to talk about that.”
“What are you talking about? Sure she does—don’t you?” A small note of uncertainty seeped into Finn’s voice.
Alana felt as though caught between a rock and a hard place. “He liked the beads,” she said in the end, fighting to keep a smile off her face. Jackson had liked her choice of apparel last night and again this morning, before they had left the room.
“I knew it,” Finn gushed, his good mood restored. “It’s the collar thing, you know? They’ll tell you they’re not into that, but it’s Pavlovian, right? You give them a whiff of—”
Alana stopped him with a hand over his mouth. “What collar thing?”
It was Maity who answered, twisting around so her voice wouldn’t carry. “There was a big to-do a few years back. Thralls refused to wear collars. Folks came around to it, but not until after a short-lived war of attrition. Lot of bad blood since, so now it’s taboo to mention it to a thrall.”
“Personally, I think it’s bullshit,” Finn said brightly.
“You would.”
He bristled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” Maity shot back, “that Leona’s got you so wrapped up around her little finger that your chances of ever shaking off those shackles are pretty much nil. You’re meant to be a thrall, Finn, and not much else.”
Their attempts to keep this quiet had been for naught. Alana noticed a few heads whipping around at the sound of raised voices and tried to shush Finn. It was to no avail.
“So what’s wrong with that?” he cried. “Don’t tell me you think that makes me less of a man—you don’t even like men!”
“I like ’em fine,” Maity snorted. “But not when they’re big-mouthed busybodies who don’t know when to shut the fuck up. Get out of my face before I rearrange yours, little man.”
Somehow, in the space of a heartbeat, what had been a bit of harmless needling had turned dangerous. Alana tried to interject, but there was no getting between Finn and Maity.
“You’re not gonna lift a hand against me,” he scoffed.
“Don’t test me, boy.”
Finn would not be deterred. “You don’t have Siggy to cover your ass anymore. She had enough of you. That’s why she released you—and you still think it’s a sign you’re better than me? Don’t make me laugh—”
Alana didn’t see Maity move, but suddenly her fist was smacking into Finn’s cheek so hard it turned his head. He whirled around, momentarily disoriented, and quickly found his bearings.
A hand grabbed Alana’s shoulder and wrenched her back before she became collateral damage in Finn’s retaliatory efforts.
He wasted no time striking back with his fists. He was skinnier and clearly lacked Maity’s experience, but Alana remembered the grace with which he’d moved when they were traipsing through the badlands. He was like the jungle cats of old—light on his feet, quick with his strikes. He darted out of Maity’s reach twice before she could land a hit.
The trouble was that Maity had age and bulk on him. When she caught him in the solar plexus, Finn tumbled to his knees, gasping.
“Enough!” Alana shouted from the sidelines, but her voice went unheard.
She caught a flash of silver as Finn grasped at his boot and realized he’d armed himself. A warning caught in her throat—if she told Maity, would that be better or worse for Finn? As long as they were just pummeling each other with fists, the worst thing to dread was a bruise, a cracked rib. Daggers were a whole other level of lethal.
“You think that’s going to scare me, little man?” Maity cackled. “Put it away before you hurt yourself.”
Finn’s eyes flashed. “I’m not your little man, you old cow!”
It was like something out of a nightmare. Alana couldn’t speak and the hands tugging her back would not allow her to launch herself between Finn and Maity. She didn’t know that she would’ve had the guts to try it even if she hadn’t been so petrified.
In New Eden, there was only one rule when it came to violence—stay far and away from it or else pay the price. Haven functioned by a different set of tenets.
No one intervened as Maity spread her arms wide in invitation. No one, that was to say, save Finn.
He lunged, knife slashing in a clean arc at what should have been Maity’s throat. He didn’t count on her feinting at the last second, or the knife missing her by a hair. But it did. The dagger went wide and Maity caught his wrist easily, twisting un
til the crackle of bone rang out like the snapping of a tree branch.
Maity seized the knife in her free hand, kicked the inside of Finn’s knee and stopped him face-planting into the floor by winding her fingers into his curly hair. She snarled as she brought the knife down under his ear, a murderous expression in her eyes.
“Stop!” Alana shouted. “This is madness. He did nothing wrong—”
“Silence, thrall,” Maity hissed and it was as though she had become a different person. The woman who had been joking with Alana only yesterday was gone, erased.
“Someone find Leona,” Alana hissed at the stony-faced men and women around her. “Go! What are you all standing around for? She’s going to kill him!”
No one heeded her. Alana knew why. She was just a thrall, her word useless against the glint of a drifter’s blade. The horror in Finn’s eyes was real, though. He knew his hour had come.
“She’s not allowed,” a voice said, shattering the pregnant silence. It belonged to Siggy. Alana glimpsed sight of her short-cropped coppery hair and lowered lashes as Gideon’s haughty spawn leaned against the railing one floor above. “Taking a blade to a thrall who’s not your property… That’s poor form, Mai. I thought you knew better.”
You’re not helping, Alana wanted to shout.
Maity bared her blood-stained teeth in a snarl. One of Finn’s better fist-punches had split her lip. The wound only made her look more vicious. “And if his mistress knew better, she would’ve cut out his tongue when she had the chance. Where is she, hmm? Why is she not here to rescue you from my blade?”
Finn spat. “Fuck you.”
It was the wrong thing to say. Maity released him, allowing him to double forward over his wounded arm before planting a thoroughly cruel kick into the soft of his belly. “Since his mistress neglects him, let her come seek recompense from me. I claim him.”
“You can’t,” Alana choked out. You’ll kill him.
Maity flashed her a crazed grin. “Do you want a go, sweetheart?”
She couldn’t be serious. She was.
