“For thousands of years,” he repeats.
His voice is gravelly and his eyes are hooded as he stares at me. I shift on my feet. My whole body is tingling and I don’t know why.
“So what does this have to do with psychology?”
Jackal’s smile is faint.
“We’ve been on this planet for a very long time, and we keep making the same mistakes. It’s a cycle.”
“And now women are at the top of the food chain again,” I say slowly.
“But for how long? This time we’re going extinct as a race.”
I swallow. He’s right, of course. It’s the monster in every room, among every nation; the one we’re trying to ignore while simultaneously trying to find a solution.
“So you study human psychology to answer the greatest question we’ve ever been asked?”
“How do we survive?” he says quietly.
My tongue feels thick and useless in my mouth. I was expecting him to say something stupid, something I could pick apart and laugh about when I was alone. He’s just a man...a sex toy. I wanted him to make me dislike him even more. I didn’t expect to...respect his answer.
“So...how do we survive this?”
“We need harmony between the sexes. A true yin and yang.”
He walks toward me, his steps so sure, so fast I don’t have time to move, and then he’s right in front of me. He places a single finger on my jaw, lifting it up until I’m forced to meet his eyes, our lips only a breath apart.
“You’re familiar with harmony, aren’t you, Phoenix?”
I keep my face still, all but my nostrils, which are flaring out of control.
He wraps an arm around my waist, resting a hand on my lower back. With one firm pull, I’m crushed against him. This shouldn’t be a big deal, I’ve been touched on every square inch of my body, it’s my job to be touched. Dancers have no personal space.
“Agreement,” I whisper.
He cocks his head, pretending he didn’t hear me, though the look in his eyes says he’s toying with me. Bastard.
“Agreement,” I say louder.
“Do you not agree to this?” he asks.
He’s inching toward my face like he’s going to kiss me, both of his hands wrapped around my waist now. I lean slowly away from him, too fascinated by what he’s doing to pull myself out of his hands. I don’t want him to think he has any effect on me; I’d rather show him my power to withstand his advances. Lower...lower...my back is now a perfect arch, the top of my head pointing to the floor, and he still holds me, his hands hot on my waist. The thin material of my leotard does nothing to protect me from the feel of him. He slides one hand higher up my waist toward my rib cage, and one thumb moves in an arch and skims the underside of my breast. I keep my body stiff like we’re dancing, but my body has never burned like this for a dance. It’s there—the urge to allow him access to my feelings. It’s a good thing I’m a pro at controlling my urges. I lift myself upright and find myself in the exact position I was avoiding—face to face with Jackal.
My hair has fallen over my eyes. I leave it where it is to shield my eyes from his. But then he does the unexpected. He lifts a hand from my back to sweep it away. Instead of tucking it behind my ear, he leaves his hand there holding it away from my face. And he smiles at me, not a happy, toothy smile; it’s a wolfish grin.
My skin erupts in goose bumps. He’s baiting me like I’m his prey.
SEVEN
JACKAL
Female Topi antelopes are only fertile one day a year, and during that twenty-four-hour period they hound the male antelopes to the point of exhaustion.
My mother once told me that I had an unnatural taste for the forbidden. She said it casually as she folded a pair of my boxers into a neat little square. I was fourteen and watching her from the living room floor, recovering from a hangover after drinking two bottles of stolen communion wine. She’d already delivered her punishment by then, ten belt whips to the back of my knees. She was a religious woman, never missing a church service, and so I took her assessment of my personality as a curse. In a world where you’re given everything, the thing they tell you not to want is what you want the most.
Phoenix is at the party. I spot her in a crowd wearing a dress the color of lemons, so vivid against the hues of blues and greens around her that she looks like a misplaced splotch of paint. It’s impossible to see anything but her, or maybe that’s just me. I smile to myself, but the smile is short-lived. She is standing next to Sean, chatting with a group. The governor’s hand rests possessively on her lower back, an anchor of ownership. I bristle. I have a habit of thinking something is mine before it is. It’s not the first time I’ve seen them together. Before I can walk their way, the lady of the house approaches me with a fresh drink. It’s the fourth drink she’s hand-delivered tonight. An upper-crust party, there can be only one thing she wants. She’s trying to get me drunk; I’m at my best when drunk. Phoenix was right about one thing: I’m known for turning a respectable party into an orgy. They don’t outright tell me that’s what they want: get your dick out and swing it at anyone who’s bent over. But I have buttons, and if you push them, that’s what I’ll do. It’s been years of conditioning. I don’t stay, even though her mouth is opening to say something. I head for the stairs and for Phoenix, the ice rattling in my glass.
“Jackal.” She gives me a sidelong glance.
Sean hears my name and smiles in my direction before resuming his conversation. I take her arm, my fingers curling around her bicep.
“A moment?” I say into her ear.
Her lips tighten, but she allows me to lead her away. Up close, the yellow of her dress is so luscious against her skin I can see why she chose it.
“You look edible,” I say.
“And yet no one eats me…”
I look at her in surprise. “Not even Sean?”
Her face turns pink. “I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Of course not.” I smile. “Though I can arrange a room for us if you’d like to be—”
She stares at me, her mouth ajar. “You really feel like you have the right to everyone, don’t you?”
“On the contrary, little thief, everyone feels they have the right to me.”
I hook her arm through mine and steer her through the crowd.
“Everyone is watching us,” she says through her teeth. “If you single a woman out like this, people will think you have a special interest.”
“I do,” I say.
We’re on the dance floor. She gives me a cursory glance before stepping into my arms.
“So, you and Sean,” I say.
“Me and Sean what?”
“He wants you.”
“So do you,” she says, “and how well has that worked out for you?”
I laugh and she bites the insides of her cheeks to keep from laughing too.
“You won’t let yourself do anything you want to do, Phoenix. Why is that?”
She raises her eyebrows, surprised. “I don’t know what you mean. I’m living the exact life I want to live. In case you haven’t noticed, I do fairly well as the Region’s prima ballerina. I have everything I could ever want.”
“That’s right,” I say. “Because you certainly don’t want a baby like everyone else.”
“No, I don’t,” she says cautiously. “That’s not unheard of for a dancer.”
What she’s saying may be true, but there’s something else in the way she says it, something that makes me wonder if that’s the only reason.
“You’re a quiet rebel though, aren’t you. That’s why you steal from the rich and give to the poor. And all that interest in Gwen Allison…”
I feel her stiffen in my arms—a little rod of anger. Outwardly, she is pure talent and grit, a respected artist who keeps the world at arm’s length so no one can know her. We are all like that a little bit, putting on the mask that people like the most, hoping no one will ask us to take it off.
“You
know what you are?” she asks.
I wait for her to fill me in. I’m dying to know. “What?” I bite the inside of my lower lip. When she doesn’t answer, I scowl at her. “What were you going to say? What am I?”
“Why should I tell you?”
“You brought it up!”
She sighs. “I’m not a rebel. I was simply commenting on something in the news, curious about what’s happening in the Regions.”
“Maybe. But I don’t think so.”
She looks at the other couples dancing around us. They’re all watching us, but when Phoenix looks their way, they suddenly become distracted by their partners.
“You think that because you have a degree in psychology that you can—”
“A master’s,” I interrupt.
“—A master’s—that you can possibly know who I am?”
“The master’s is just a technicality; reading people is a gift.”
The song has changed. I pull her closer so she’s pressed against me. She blinks hard a few times but doesn’t complain.
“Okay then, read me,” she challenges. She has to dip her head back to look me in the eyes. I’m tempted to bend down and kiss the dip in her shoulder.
“There. What you just did. I make you uncomfortable, but you refuse to show it. Reacting is a weakness.”
She says nothing, but I see the effect of my words cross over her eyes.
“Is that because of your profession or upbringing?”
There’s a long pause, during which I watch her struggle with her answer. She doesn’t want me to be right, but I am. Finally she says— “Both.”
I can see the regret on her face as soon as the word is out of her mouth. Her lips make a little O shape as if she’s wanting to suck it back in.
“You don’t like anyone to know who you really are because you don’t want to get hurt.”
“Who’s going to hurt me?” she challenges. “No one has that power.”
“That’s sad.”
She draws back as if I’ve slapped her, and then she laughs, her eyebrows creasing together.
“Sad? That’s ridiculous. Who wants to get hurt?”
“Without the risk of getting hurt, there is no probability of falling in love,” I tell her. “Vulnerability and love go hand in hand.”
“That must be why all the men are gone.” She smirks. “With that sort of logic, it’s no wonder.”
I take her in—smooth, honey skin that smells like apples, the broad bridge of her nose and arched nostrils. I don’t know how to tell her that back then men were not the romantics. The things we had left of the past: the movies, and the books, and the stories, were things hoped for, not seen.
I lean close so that my mouth is next to her ear, my lips brushing her skin.
“There is no logic in love, little thief. It starts small and grows into something very big and endless. Something you’re willing to die for. Don’t you long to feel something like that? Instead of all the emptiness you’re so used to…”
She pulls back and stares me right in the face. I can’t help myself. The quirky little corner of her mouth is raised like she’s mocking me, probably not the best time to kiss a woman. But I drop my head anyway and kiss her, letting my tongue softly graze her bottom lip. She pauses, her breath sucking in, and then she pushes away from me. For a moment, it’s just the two of us facing each other on the dance floor, the cider lights speckling our faces, and then as abruptly as she pulled away, she turns on her heel and leaves. I smile as I watch her go, her steps unsure like she’s dizzy.
“Dancers don’t get dizzy,” I call after her.
I’m drunk. After Phoenix leaves me on the dance floor, I’m cornered by a pack of moms and have to dance my way through four songs before one of them takes pity on me and cuts me loose. Through the endless bodies swathed in color, I see only one yellow dress. Flashes of canary taunt me from across the room—a graceful shoulder, her raven hair. I find myself looking for her even when I am engaged in conversation with someone. Sean seeks her out as much as I do, only he gets to touch her. I notice that Phoenix never shies away from his hand on her arm or back. They’re comfortable together...familiar.
“Jackal.” Someone calls my name. The lady of the house. Her arm snakes through mine.
“You’re wanted in the library,” she says.
That can really only mean one thing. How untimely. I don’t have time to fuck a room full of women; I’m in the middle of pursuing Phoenix. I cast one more glance in Phoenix’s direction before following the woman out.
EIGHT
PHOENIX
Male anglerfish attach themselves to the lady anglerfish and proceed to atrophy until they are essentially a parasite with male reproductive organs, available to the female whenever fertilization is needed. If he doesn’t, he will die.
I back away from the room, heat rushing to my head, rage ticking like a live bomb. I didn’t mean to see that. I didn’t want to. After Jackal kissed me, right there in front of everyone, I fled like a frightened deer, his words a razor on tender flesh. I needed to gather myself, unfold my thoughts enough to understand them. I moved through Mrs. Mavey’s party in a trance, barely hearing what anyone said to me, my lips still tingling where his tongue had touched them. I wanted to find him, demand to know the real reason he wouldn’t leave me alone. When I asked Mrs. Mavey where she’d led him off to, she directed me to the library with a smirk. I didn’t know I’d see Jackal being Jackal upon walking through the door, his stellar reputation at play before my eyes.
I blink at the scene in front of me; it takes my brain a second to catch up to what I’m seeing, the lights so dim I have to squint. There is a woman on all fours, her chin thrust upward and her body rocking back and forth. Her breasts bounce beneath her, and out of her throat comes an animal sound so primal in nature that it sucks the breath out of my lungs. Jackal stands behind her, his naked body bronzed in the candlelight. With one hand, he holds a mass of her hair wrapped around his fist, and the other is gripping her buttocks in a hold so tight it looks painful. My eyes move to his face and my mouth goes dry. He hasn’t seen me, he can’t see anything—because his eyes are closed, head tilted back. Even in the dim light, I can see the cords in his neck straining against his flushed skin.
He likes what he’s doing. What Gwen Allison has been preaching around the Regions is wrong. His is not the face of a prisoner or even a forced man. My eyes move back to the woman, her cries sound like the braying of a donkey. The jealousy I feel is unexpected. It rushes at me like a hot wind, pushing me further out of the door where I stand, glued.
I tear my eyes from their fucking. There are other women in the room, all of them naked, lounging on chairs and leaning against walls as they watch. Some of them are touching each other, hands and mouths open, searching like they’re hungry. I want to look away, but I can’t. I realize with dismay that there is a humming between my legs. I’m soaked and also deeply ashamed. I clamp my thighs together and grind my teeth. What is wrong with me?
One of the women turns on the chaise she’s reclining on, her head pivoting toward me. When our gazes meet, I see the glaze that covers her eyes, her lips wet and parted. I’m of little interest; her attention returns to Jackal after a cursory glance. She’s waiting her turn. Well, so am I. I step back into the room, my shoulders squared. I can play games too.
It’s the sound of my heels on the marble floor that makes him open his eyes and see me. My footsteps crack like a whip through the air, rising above the woman’s keening. His face betrays nothing of surprise, but he’s buried to the hilt inside of some woman. It would be so easy for me to shove her aside, she’d fall right over like a tipped cow. I grapple with the decision and then forget my jealousy when I look at Jackal. His eyes are half open as he stares at me, a look of intense concentration on his face.
I stop a few feet away from them, aware that I’ve quickly become the center of attention in a room full of naked, sexually aroused women.
&nbs
p; “I’m next,” I say.
His rhythmic thrusting falters and I see him slide out of her, slick with her wetness.
“No,” he says.
The woman looks up in a daze, jarred to the present by the absence of Jackal’s cock, and sees me standing there. She clumsily climbs off of the ottoman, a look of disappointment on her face. He didn’t come inside of her. Boo fucking hoo, I think. She’d make a terrible mother anyway. I have no grounds for this, but it makes me feel better to think it. When she’s gone, I get a full view of Jackal. I’m grateful for the dim lighting in the room so he can’t see the rosy red mortification climbing to my cheeks.
Hard and lean, his penis fully erect, his body is lit only by the candles that flicker behind him on tables and shelves. I have a fleeting thought of fire. Who puts this many candles in a library? But then Jackal comes into focus again and all I feel is a burning in my lower belly.
“Yes,” I say.
In a score of bravery, I flick the straps of my dress off my shoulders and the silk collapses to my waist. His eyelids flutter, and suddenly, he’s over the ottoman and right in front of me.
“No,” he says again, softly this time so only I can hear.
Shame climbs my face as my eyes fill with tears. He’s rejected me and so publicly; it is all a game to him. He stands close to me, his fingers lift the silk of my dress, grazing my nipples as he covers my breasts. In spite of myself, I shiver at his touch and then curse my body for its response.
“Why not?” I spit out. “You can fuck an entire room of women without blinking an eye but not me?”
He casts a cursory glance around the room before leaning over me.
“You’re drunk,” he says softly. “And you’re a virgin…”
“So what?” I can’t keep the hurt from my voice. “So are most of them…” I jerk my head around the room, not caring who hears me. I can smell the sweetness of Jackal’s breath as he breathes into my face, his features contorting as he shakes his head.
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