I looked from the approaching guard to her and gave her a ‘what are you trying to say with that crazy face” look. She just shook her head and laughed, quickly quieting herself as the guard drew near.
“Is there a problem?” The guard stood at attention before me.
“No, no problem. I just needed to stretch for a minute.” I rubbed my stomach drawing his attention there.
“Oh, I see. Very well then.” He looked almost embarrassed behind the clear shield attached to his helmet. It covered half of his face and looked uncomfortable in the heat of the day. All of the guards did. Their uniforms were skin-tight. I couldn’t stand that for one minute.
So far, the Vesuvian guards had been stern but not overbearing. They had directed us without being cruel and forceful. But, after everyone in the village witnessed the executions and precision of their firing squads, it was clear that these were people you didn’t cross.
With Norris and even with the Olympian guards, we had known to expect cruelty. They had been aggressive, demeaning and had always sought to make examples of people. Vesuvius didn’t operate that way. They were quiet. For some reason, their silent oppression was more dangerous than the outright aggression we’d seen in the past. It scared me more than anything in the world. I was on edge constantly because I didn’t know what to expect from them.
Kyan paced the floor. Julia tracked his movements with her eyes. And Gray. Gray kept his eyes trained on me. I could feel his stare from his position standing with his back against the wall across the room.
Kyan spoke up. “They can’t stay here. They aren’t safe. The Vesuvians might kill them too, or lock them up. I don’t think either would survive any time in the prison. Their bodies are too weak.”
I inhaled deeply. “What do we do? There aren’t exactly trains to sneak onto right now.”
Gray cleared his throat and pushed off the wall behind him. “They haven’t taken me. I’m technically an Olympian guard and Vesuvius hasn’t bothered me in the least.”
My stomach plummeted and a great worry took root deep inside it. Would they take him away? The thought hadn’t occurred to me until then.
Julia’s outstretched hand stopped Kyan mid-stride. “We have no way of knowing what their plans for the Lessers or for this village are. But...since I have been here, and I know it has not been for very long, I have seen that the Lessers are not what the Greaters have made them out to be. Since childhood, it was taught to me that Lessers were foolish and dangerous, evil and untrustworthy. Lessers were made out to be dangerous, monstrous even. It was for those reasons I was afraid to come here. Being in Orchard, I have seen evil. And it has not come from the Lessers. You must find a way to free your village and her people from the Greaters. And I would be honored to help you.”
Kyan looked at her face like it was the first sunrise he’d ever seen. Or maybe the first steak. I snorted lightly and Gray smiled at me with mouth and eyes. He cocked his head to the side. I shook my head. I’d tell him later.
Kyan looked around to us and then back to Julia. “You’re right. But I don’t want to put you in danger. We need to come up with a plan.”
We agreed to think on it and get together the following day. Gray and I returned to our cabin. Our cabin. I realized then that I’d begun to think of it that way. Thoughts of him walking away from the cabin popped into my mind. That had hurt so bad. I didn’t know how he felt anymore. I mean, he came back. But where else would he go at this point? And aside from the kiss in the orchard, he’d been distant. Something had changed.
I left Gray, who was stoking the fire for the night, and went to dress for bed. I could have gone back out to talk to him, but decided against it. I was exhausted. It was late. Being pregnant was draining on my body. I hadn’t vomited in a while, which was great, but I was still very sleepy all the time.
I felt the covers pull away. The mattress dipped as Gray slid in beside me. He pulled the covers up to our waists.
“Hey.” I watched him lay down beside me.
He nuzzled my neck and rubbed my stomach. “Hey. Can I sleep with you?”
I giggled. “You didn’t ask permission before you lay down, why now?”
“Because I’m a gentleman, babe.”
“Babe?”
“Yeah. Babe.”
“Gray?”
“Yeah?”
“I didn’t know if you were coming back.”
He sighed. “I never left. I just needed a minute. I went to Ky’s and we drank apple wine, which is deliciously potent, by the way. I had a bit too much and fell asleep on his couch. He and Julia didn’t want to wake me up. So I stayed and slept on the couch there. I never left. I would never leave you, Abby. Sometimes, I just need a minute to think and process things.”
I giggled. “The apple wine helped you think?”
“Not really. But it did help me not think for a while.”
I exhaled and tried to inhale bravery for what I was about to tell him. “I went to talk to Crew.” I felt him tense behind me. “No, please listen. I wanted to tell him that I forgave him, to say goodbye. I didn’t love him.”
“At one time you did.”
I rubbed my fingertips over the hand he had on my bump. “At one time I thought I did. But you know what I realized?”
His orange eyes slid over my face before he asked, “What’s that?”
“Love is different for everyone at different times. I love Kyan but as my friend. I love Laney as my best girlfriend. And, I love you, Gray.”
His hot breath fanned my cheek and his chin nudged my hair away from my face. “You do?”
“I do.”
“Do you love me like Ky or Laney?” He smirked.
“Neither. I love you like Gray.”
“Like Gray.”
I nodded. “Yeah. I love you like Gray.”
His arms wrapped tight around me. I didn’t even have time to look up at him before his soft lips were parting mine, his tongue stroking my own. The palm of his hand pushed my back forward as we tried to get closer. But my bump. It seemed like an ever-growing mountain, one so huge that I couldn’t reach the summit of to save my life. I huffed in frustration.
Gray laughed, his raspy voice echoing into the empty room.
I let out a frustrated growl. “Shut up. It’s ruining my swagger.”
“You’re swagger?” he guffawed.
“Yes! I have swagger, Gray. I might be pregnant and have a bump the size of the earth’s circumference, but I definitely have swagger.” That sent him into hysterics and I honestly thought about shoving him out of the bed. Then the hormones made an appearance.
Tears streamed down my face, which was no doubt contorted and scrunched up. “You don’t like me anymore. You don’t like my bump!”
“No, babe. No! I love your bump,” he cooed. “Shhh. Abs, I’m so sorry. I think you’re beautiful, bump and all. And I love your swagger and... God, I’m such an ass. Abs, please. I love you, too.”
I sniffed and flinched. “You do?”
He kissed my closed eyelids one at a time. “Yeah. I do. I love you like Abs.”
My heart melted a little. It felt quivery and goopy all at the same time. He propped himself up on his elbow and pulled his t-shirt over his head. That sent the hormones raging in an entirely different direction and I suddenly felt hot all over. All over. I tried to move backward, but his hand stopped my retreat.
Gray licked his lips. “Where are you going, Abs?”
“Nowhere.” Why did I sound so breathless?
“No?”
“No. Nowhere. I’m...”
He smirked. “What are you, Abby?”
“Hot.”
My eyes fluttered between his burnt orange ones and his delectable lips. I raised my hand and brushed his lips with my fingers. So soft.
When I was in the middle of swiping them again, he opened his mouth and captured them, rolling his tongue over them. Warm and hot and delicious. I felt hot and, oh my gosh, I needed to walk.<
br />
He released my fingers and smirked at me. He knew how I’d been affected. His voice soft, he asked, “Can I see your bump?”
“Why?”
“Just want to see it.”
I lowered the covers a little.
He rubbed his hand over the white button-up shirt I was wearing. It felt wonderful, but strange. The muscles in my back were tense. His fingers deftly unbuttoned the bottom button and then the next one, the next and two more after that. Two buttons remained, covering only my breasts.
When his bare hands touched my stomach, I flinched.
“Shh. I’ve got you.”
I nodded and nuzzled into his neck. My fingers curled into his dark hair. It wasn’t long before my hands were moving. I wasn’t moving them, his head was. His lips touched the left side of my abdomen so reverently and sweetly that I wanted to cry. I bit my lip to stop the whimper that tried to escape.
“So beautiful,” he murmured against my skin.
Gray showered me with kisses, making me wonder what it would feel like to be with him-with him. He left burning trails of kisses across my body and ignited a fire deep inside me. Before I got too worked up, he kissed my lips possessively, covered us both with the blankets, and fell asleep rubbing his thumb across my stomach. I was pretty sure I went to sleep with a feeling of hope and a smile on my face for the first time in my life.
∞
The following morning, I woke up in bed alone. The sun was almost up. It was late and so was I. Where was Gray? He always woke me up. I threw open the blankets and stepped into the cold air, regretting it almost instantly. But I had to get moving. Vesuvius had put us back to work. Winter was slowly loosening its grip on the Village. The first signs that spring was just around the corner began to show.
I rushed to layer my clothes and tugged my hair back into a knot on the back of my neck. Pulling on my coat and gloves, I sat to lace my boots. It was getting more difficult as my bump got bigger. I smiled thinking about last night with Gray. He loved me like Abby and he loved my bump even more, I thought.
I grabbed some bread, cheese and a jar of water before rushing out the door. We were to report to the Main Hall to get our assignments each day. I was among the last to show up, so I quickly found my name. Beside it were the words, “Report to Kaia Kelley.”
I entered the Main Hall in search of my mother. I found her in a very familiar place. Just thoughts of Councilman Preston behind the same desk sent a chill up my spine.
“Abigail!” A bright white smile flashed in my direction. She seemed genuinely happy to see me. “You’ve been assigned to me.”
I returned her smile. “Yes. For today, anyway.”
She winked. “We’ll see about that. We have much work to do.”
“What sort of work?”
My mother stood from behind the desk and shuffled through a stack of papers. “You know the Village and its people. You can help me.”
The smile slid from my face. “Help you with what?”
“We need to schedule work teams for the remainder of the Winter to begin with. Then, we must get started on spring planting, and continue the pruning and general care of the orchards. With the double harvest planned, we must work diligently when spring does arrive. I saw the first Jonquil stems rising from the earth this morning!”
As she basked in her excitement, a thought occurred to me. “Kaia, when did Vesuvius develop such a growth method?”
She stood taller, more proud. “It has been in development for many years now, but we have perfected it in the last three.”
“Is it apple-specific, or will it work on all crops? Will all crops have a double yield?”
“We are working on making similar serums for the other crops, but for now, it is specific to the apple crop.”
She asked me to be seated across from her. She began asking questions about who the strongest young men in the Village were, who the past team leaders had been and who might not physically be able to work in the orchards themselves.
We worked down a list of individuals. But it kept bothering me. And, like most things, what was in my mind, slid through my lips.
“Mother, when did Cole poison the other Greater cities?”
“Earlier this year. It was so horrible, Abigail.” She lowered her papers, stood and moved to close the door. “When we got word of the illnesses, there was nothing we could do. If we sent people in to help, our own would have been infected. The virus had been engineered to specifically effect Greaters. We could do nothing but sit, wait, and hope that some would develop a natural immunity to the disease. None did. And our hope was soon extinguished. It was tragic.”
“Kaia, if Olympus only earlier in the year poisoned the cities with the virus, why had Vesuvius been developing the growth serum? Olympus was given charge over Orchard. Why didn’t they develop the serum?”
Her eyebrows scrunched together. “We have been working on this for years. I am not sure how it came to Vesuvius. Perhaps Olympus asked for our assistance.”
I snorted. “No way. Cole would never ask for outside help. His ego was too big.” Lowering my voice, I asked, “Do you think it’s at least possible that Vesuvius had planned to take control of the Lesser Villages? To get rid of Olympus’s hold on so many of them? How many did Vesuvius control before the virus and fall of Olympus?”
She whispered. “Two. We controlled only two. Olympus controlled the most, at twenty-four. Several others were divided between the other Greater cities who were closest to them.”
“You understand what I’m asking, right?”
“You are asking if it is possible that Vesuvius is responsible for the virus and for destroying Olympus? You wonder if it was all a ploy to gain power and the trust of the Lessers?”
“Yeah. Basically.”
She swallowed. “I honestly do not know, Abigail. And if you are smart, you will not speak of this to anyone again. If your theory has any merit at all, you would become a target for such rhetoric very quickly.”
I nodded. We went back to work. It was the longest and most awkward day of my life. In my heart, I knew exactly who had engineered the Greater virus and why.
After I was dismissed by my mother, I walked home along the same trail that had carried me to the Main Hall. Kyan yelled behind me.
“Abby Blue!”
“Hey!” I smiled. He rushed to me, a stern look on his face, and grabbed my upper arms. Something was wrong.
“Have you seen Gretchen or Marian?”
“No. I’ve been working in the Main Hall today. I haven’t been home yet.”
He blew out a breath. “I came home and they’re not in the cabin. It looks like they haven’t been all day.”
“Do you think they were put to work?”
His eyes looked off in the distance. “What about Gray?”
“He was gone when I got up, so I’m not sure. I’ll go check.” I started toward the cabin. Kyan fell into step beside me. A feeling of dread settled in and my feet instinctively moved faster.
I was almost running when we crested the small hill from which I could see the tiny wooden cabin. No smoke curled from the chimney and I knew before I even stepped inside that Gray wasn’t there. No one was.
“Where is he? Where are they?”
Kyan shook his head. “I don’t know. But, I’m damn sure gonna find out.”
I nodded. “Ky?”
“Yeah.”
We stepped inside and he started building a fire immediately. It was freezing and the embers left in the hearth this morning had long since burned themselves out.
“Kyan, I need to tell you something.”
He looked up at me. The tinder in his hand caught flame and I nodded toward it before it burned him. He didn’t panic. Kyan never did. He just eased it under the larger sticks and brushed his hands on the pantlegs of his jeans.
“What’s up?”
“I think Vesuvius is behind everything. I think they made the virus that took out the Greaters in the c
ities. Olympus took the fall. I know that Cole was evil and that he and Crew were the architects of the Harvest, but I think Vesuvius has been planning this for a long time.”
“What do you know, Abby Blue?”
I sat down on the couch with Kyan and told him everything. In the end, he agreed with me. The Vesuvians, like all Greaters, could not be trusted. They wanted power and control, and didn’t care who they had to eliminate to get it.
“This has to stop, Ky. We’re people. We aren’t slaves. No matter what they say, we are not lesser or beneath them. I can’t raise my baby like this.” Tears spilled down my cheeks and dripped off my jaw.
Kyan hugged me to him. “I know. I just don’t know how to stop them. We could probably find a way to get rid of the Vesuvians in the village. But, unless we take out the city itself, they’ll just keep coming back. And my bet is that they’d be pissed when they came and found out what we’d done. It would just make it worse on everyone.”
I nodded. He was right. Vesuvius had to be taken down. The city itself and all the Greaters in it. But how? And if we did this, would we be more evil than they were?
In the days that passed, there was nothing. Nothing from Gray. No information or news about Marian or Gretchen. It was as if they’d all three disappeared. Kyan had even walked to the prison at night. Lessers were now in charge of some security there, so he’d gotten inside easily. They weren’t there. They weren’t anywhere.
Julia had tried to help locate them using her comm and computer. No luck. Not even a trace of them was found. Kyan begged her to stop looking. Someone was sure to notice eventually. She reluctantly agreed to stop her search.
It was over a week later in the middle of the night that I learned what was happening and began to formulate a plan to end this, once and for all. Tapping at my window woke me up. It was Laney. I’d recognize that pattern anywhere. Knock-knock-tap-tap-tap.
I rushed to the front door and unlocked it, letting her inside. She pulled me toward the fire. Her skin was red, chapped and freezing to the touch. “Laney? What in the world?”
Resist (The Harvest Saga Book 2) Page 17
