Ruthless (Lawless Saga Book 3)

by Tarah Benner

  “Tighter control how?” asked Lark. “And who’s putting pressure on her?”

  “Who do you think?”

  “The prison administrators?”

  “Mmhmm.” Kira lowered her voice even more. “Her being here isn’t an accident, Lark. Mercy Peters and her sons are the most lethal crime family San Judas has ever seen. They were brought here to run the colonies years ago . . . after GreenSeed took over the prison.”

  “Took over the —” Lark broke off, overwhelmed by Kira’s barrage of information. “What are you talking about?”

  “A few years after it was built, San Judas was written off as a failed experiment. Inmates were dyin’ left and right, and staff turnover was unbelievable. The prison sat vacant for a year before GreenSeed came in and put their mark on it.”

  Lark shook her head. She hadn’t known any of this, but Kira had been in San Judas longer than almost anyone.

  “I don’t know what you did to Portia Wong,” said Kira, “but your escape is all anyone has been talkin’ about for days. You’ve shaken Mercy’s credibility . . . made people question her strength. It’s been anarchy for days, and the only antidote to anarchy is absolute tyranny.”

  Lark stared. What Kira was saying hardly seemed believable. Lark’s escape couldn’t have weakened Mercy’s authority that much. Mercy Peters had ruled San Judas for as long as anyone could remember. Even in the men’s colony, Mercy was known for her power and unmatched brutality. The men feared her sons, Hudson and Clarence, but the brothers’ reputations paled in comparison to their mother’s.

  “So what’s been going on?” asked Lark.

  “Mercy has been unbearable,” said Kira. “The colony is falling apart, and she’s grasping at straws. People have had their rations withdrawn . . . daily beatings in the square . . . She’s driving the field workers like slaves.”

  “So the seed finally came?”

  “Yes.”

  A tingle of excitement shot down Lark’s spine. If the seed was there, it meant that all of GreenSeed’s supercrops were well within reach.

  “And then yesterday . . .” Kira continued. She glanced over at the other kitchen workers, who looked angry and shaken. “Some of the girls tried to burn the seed. Said they were tired of working from dawn until dusk. They got it in their heads that if they went on strike, the prison administrators would have to meet their demands.” She lowered her voice to barely above a whisper, and Lark had to lean in to hear. “If Mercy doesn’t get these women under control soon, she’s gonna have a full-blown riot on her hands.”

  Lark sighed. She felt bad that her escape had made life harder on Kira and the other inmates, but she had bigger problems to deal with.

  “I have to tell you something,” she said after a moment. She glanced across the room at the other kitchen workers. They were staring at her with clear disapproval in their eyes, so Lark took Kira by the arm and pulled her into the supply closet.

  “Listen,” said Lark, closing the door behind her. “When I said I was captured, it wasn’t the guards who caught me. I was taken in by the Department of Homeland Security.”

  Kira’s eyebrows shot up, but she didn’t say a word.

  “You don’t know what it’s like out there,” said Lark, struggling to find the best way to tell Kira the truth about what was going on outside the prison. “It’s like the world has ended. Drought, floods, famine . . . The economy’s tanked. Millions of people have died because there isn’t enough food.”

  Lark trailed off, and Kira’s expression went blank. Lark knew that look. It was the expression a person wore when she’d been completely blindsided and felt the earth tremble beneath her feet.

  Lark stopped, waiting for Kira to speak. When she did, her voice was scratchy and empty.

  “Are you sayin’ . . .” She cleared her throat. “Are you tellin’ me that the prison administrators kept us locked up in here while people were dyin’?”

  A sudden realization hit Lark like a hammer, and she immediately wished that she hadn’t blurted out the truth.

  Kira had a son. He was her entire world. And since the mail had stopped, she had no way of knowing whether he was alive or dead.

  “Yes,” she said finally.

  Kira was trembling with fury.

  “The only reason GreenSeed’s still going is because they have these supercrops that can survive the drought,” Lark continued. “The government wants those seeds, and they’ll do anything to get them. They think those crops could save us.”

  “So why haven’t they done anything?” pressed Kira, her voice low and full of rage.

  “The seeds are patented . . . They’re GreenSeed’s intellectual property.”

  “And I’ll bet they want to make sure they don’t lose a dime when it’s time to take those crops to market, right?” Kira growled, her voice shaking with silent anger.

  “That’s my guess,” said Lark.

  “So how did you get dragged into this?”

  Lark raised both eyebrows. “Until we escaped, we were GreenSeed’s intellectual property — their test subjects.”

  “You gotta be shittin’ me.”

  Lark shook her head, perversely satisfied to talk to someone who was just as enraged as she was. “Nope. And the Department of Homeland Security’s willing to do just about anything to get their hands on those seeds. They offered me a deal to get back inside GreenSeed’s facility and steal their records. I got the files, but now I have to get those seeds. If I can collect the samples —”

  At that moment, a loud bang from the kitchen cut off Lark’s train of thought. There was a flurry of murmurs from inside the kitchen, followed by a low growl that Lark knew belonged to Daya — one of Mercy’s most trusted confidants.

  “WHERE — IS — SHE, KIRA?”

  twenty-one

  Lark

  At the sound of Daya’s voice, Lark’s insides turned to ice.

  “I know she’s back,” Daya yelled. “Clarence saw her.”

  So that was how they knew she was there. Clarence must have been in the fields when she’d come through the corridor, and he’d rushed to the river to get a message to his mother.

  News traveled quickly in San Judas, although it didn’t explain why one of Mercy’s daughters had been down by the river in the first place. Maybe Clarence was having an affair with one of them, or maybe Mercy still had her daughters guarding the river in shifts.

  “I know she’s here, Kira,” said Daya. “Kimmy told me she saw her headin’ this way.”

  Lark let out a shaky breath and tried to brace herself for the worst. She’d known this was coming, but she didn’t feel ready for a confrontation.

  The last time Lark had spoken to Mercy, she’d banished Lark from the colony. She’d caught Lark stealing from her compound, and Lark had exposed Portia’s betrayal. Mercy had forbade anyone from helping Lark, and if one of her daughters caught her conspiring with Kira . . .

  Seized by sudden inspiration, Lark grabbed Kira by the arm. “Turn me in,” she whispered.

  Kira stiffened. “You can’t be serious.”

  Lark tightened her grip and gave her a firm shake. “You can’t get caught helping me. Turn — me — in.”

  Kira hesitated, her better nature warring with her self-preservational instincts. Lark didn’t take it personally. Kira had a life outside that she was desperate to get back to. Unlike most of them, she had a lot to lose by standing up to Mercy.

  “This isn’t over,” Kira murmured, shoving past Lark and pushing the door wide open. “She’s right here,” said Kira, yanking Lark out behind her. “I caught her tryin’ to steal some food.”

  Lark looked around. Daya was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, flanked by Mercy’s goons, Amber-Lee and Bianca.

  Daya was a robust biracial woman with curly brown hair and cruel, calculating eyes. Bianca was loud, chunky, and slow, and Amber-Lee was a pale, overzealous white girl with thin blond hair.

  At the sight of Lark, Daya’s eyes lit
with a predatory sparkle. She didn’t seem to wonder why Kira hadn’t turned Lark in immediately. She was so focused on enacting her revenge that logic didn’t enter her mind.

  Kira shoved Lark forward. “I was gonna rough her up a bit for stealin’, but that’s not really my thing.”

  “Oh, don’t worry,” growled Amber-Lee. “We’ll teach her a lesson.” Amber-Lee’s yellow teeth glowed against her pale skin, and Lark had the sudden urge to deck her.

  “You do that,” said Kira. “I won’t stop you.”

  Kira turned to the other kitchen workers. “Out,” she said, pointing to the door. “This isn’t our fight.”

  With a flurry of reluctant grumbles, the other women filed out the front door while Daya, Bianca, and Amber-Lee surrounded Lark.

  Lark just glared. She wasn’t sure which of them she hated the most. Bianca was the girl who’d gotten her sent to the pit, but all of Mercy’s daughters had contributed to her suffering over the years.

  Amber-Lee lunged forward to grab Lark, but Lark sprung out of reach. Deep down she knew she couldn’t fight off all three of them, but she didn’t plan to make it easy for them either.

  Bianca was the next to try. She charged at Lark like a flabby, overconfident bull, and Lark ducked right under her arms. A second later, Daya grabbed Lark by the hair, and Lark swung around to hit her with an elbow.

  Daya let out a cry of pain but didn’t let go. Bianca rushed forward to help her, and Lark threw up an arm just in time to block her crazy right hook. She threw out a cross that caught Bianca squarely in the nose, but then Amber-Lee decided to get back in the game.

  She slapped Lark with an open palm, and Lark returned with a slice of nails across the face. Amber-Lee screamed, and Lark aimed a front kick that caught Bianca in the sternum.

  Daya still had her by the hair, and Lark could feel her struggling to get a better grip. Her tree trunk of an arm was winding around Lark’s neck, but Lark tucked her chin and bit down until she tasted blood.

  Daya growled but didn’t let go, and Lark had to stop fighting the others to concentrate on the arm that was cutting off her airways. Her chin was tucked so low that it was nearly touching her chest, but Daya was strong.

  Lark dropped her hips to lower her center of gravity, and the sudden movement caught Daya by surprise. With a burst of effort, Lark popped her butt under Daya’s hips and hoisted the girl onto her back. They hovered there for a moment, Lark straining with the effort of holding her, and then Lark heaved Daya over her head with a grunt.

  She slammed Daya onto the ground, and Bianca launched herself at Lark. Lark dug in her heels to slow her momentum, but Bianca was too big.

  Lark’s ass hit the adobe wall a second before her head bounced off the hard clay. For the first time, she felt real panic. She had her back against the wall — literally — and Bianca was drunk on her own rage.

  She struck Lark with a hard overhand right, and the pain from the blow reverberated from Lark’s eye socket to the base of her skull. She threw up her hands to protect her face, but Bianca went for the body.

  Each of her punches felt like a sledgehammer to the ribs, and it was only after the fourth or fifth strike that Lark managed to close the distance between them and regain some control.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Amber-Lee move to help, but Bianca spat, “She’s mine!”

  Daya was still getting to her feet, stunned and humiliated by her pathetic showing.

  Once it was just her and Bianca, Lark couldn’t help but grin. Bianca was strong enough to be lethal, but Lark was the better fighter. In extremely close quarters, Bianca couldn’t wind up for a punch or charge her opponent. She was frustrated, and it showed.

  After a few minutes of scuffling, Lark managed to gain control of Bianca’s body. She captured her arm in an underhook and pressed the blade of her forearm into Bianca’s neck. It was both painful and effective in limiting her movement.

  Lark swung Bianca around like a rag doll, and as soon as she cleared a path around her, Lark lunged for the door. She yanked it open and rushed outside, and Bianca chased after her.

  Lark ran. She didn’t know where she was going, but it didn’t matter. She just had to get away.

  But as soon as Lark emerged from the narrow passageway between the kitchen and the mess hall, her heart dropped to her knees. Apparently, Amber-Lee, Daya, and Bianca weren’t the only ones who’d heard the news of Lark’s return.

  Mercy was standing just outside the mess hall, surrounded by half a dozen of her daughters. She looked as imposing as ever with her wild mane of black curls and fierce, predatory eyes. A small crowd had gathered behind her, all of them anxious to see if the rumors were true.

  “Well, well, well,” said Mercy, crossing her arms over her enormous bosom. “If it isn’t Lark the sneak.”

  There was a flurry of hisses from the crowd. In that moment, it didn’t matter that two-thirds of them hated Mercy’s guts. The inmates were starved for entertainment, and any action made for a good day.

  Mercy’s eyes smoldered. “Did you really think that you could come back into my colony without my noticing?”

  “I just got back,” said Lark. “I wasn’t hiding.”

  The crowd hissed louder, and Mercy shook her head. “Nobody hides from me, Lark. I have eyes everywhere . . . There is nothing that happens in this place that I don’t know about.”

  Lark clenched her jaw to hold back all the retorts that were burning on her tongue. Mouthing off would only make things worse.

  “From the looks of things, you haven’t been giving my daughters the respect they deserve,” said Mercy, nodding at Bianca, Daya, and Amber-Lee, who had just emerged from the kitchens looking much worse for the wear.

  “They attacked me,” Lark retorted.

  Mercy raised her voice and opened her body to address the crowd. “You have shown little regard for our community or the good women who live in it,” she continued. “Like it or not, we all have to contribute if we want to survive.”

  Lark rolled her eyes. Great, she thought. Mercy was grandstanding.

  Mercy narrowed her eyes and took a step closer to Lark. “But you decided you didn’t want to be a member of this community, didn’t you? You decided that you would rather run away than help your sisters at a time when they needed you the most.”

  “You banished me,” said Lark, annoyed that Mercy was trying to turn this around and make her look like the asshole.

  “Because you have demonstrated again and again that you cannot be trusted, Lark,” Mercy hissed. “You’ve lied to me. You’ve stolen from me, and you have hurt my family again and again.” Mercy puffed up her chest in a big show of indignation. “This. Stops. Now.”

  Lark rolled her eyes. The whole thing was absurd. Mercy was acting as though Lark was some scheming bitch who’d gone out of her way to sabotage the colony.

  Fists balled at her sides, Lark took a few steps toward Mercy until they were only a couple feet apart. “Your daughters are bullies,” she snarled. “You all sit around on your fat asses thinking up ways to make the rest of our lives a living hell. You’re just scared because I’m not the only one who’s seen through your bullshit.”

  At Lark’s words, Mercy’s face turned to stone. Her nostrils flared, her eyes grew cold, and her mouth went rigid. The crowd fell silent.

  Lark’s face was flushed with fury. She kept thinking of Bernie, who’d done nothing to warrant the hostility she’d received from everyone in the colony at Mercy’s behest. Bernie had done nothing wrong except befriend Lark.

  “Take her in,” Mercy growled. “She needs to be taught a lesson.”

  Lark narrowed her gaze as two strong sets of hands clamped down on her arms and started dragging her toward Mercy’s compound. She’d expected to face Mercy’s wrath at some point; she just hadn’t expected it so soon.

  Dread settled over her as Amber-Lee and Daya dragged her into Mercy’s den. She could hear the rise of whispers behind her and knew the other w
orkers would be talking about her public lambasting all day.

  “What are you waiting for?” Mercy shouted from the square. “Get back to work!”

  Outside, Lark heard the shuffle of women returning to the fields or crossing the square to get back to their shops. Mercy swept inside with a flurry of skirts and stood just inside the doorway, glowering at Lark.

  “Leave us!” she bellowed, not even looking at Amber-Lee and Daya.

  “But Mother —” Amber-Lee stuttered, her long oval face falling into a pout. “She’s dangerous.”

  “You shouldn’t be in here alone,” Daya agreed.

  “What did I just say?” Mercy snapped, finally tearing her eyes away from Lark so that she could glare from one to the other.

  Amber-Lee nearly jumped out of her skin when Mercy raised her voice, and within seconds the two of them had left the room.

  Lark stood alone in the middle of the den as Mercy watched them go through the window. She didn’t understand what was about to happen. As far as she knew, Mercy had never punished anyone privately. She loved to have an audience for her cruelty because it served as insurance that no one else would want to cross her.

  “Have a seat,” said Mercy, her bosom heaving as she struggled to catch her breath.

  Lark hesitated. This felt like a trap.

  When she didn’t move, Mercy whipped her head around. “Let me remind you that you are in my house, Lark. It is only on my orders that you are even still alive. Sit — down.”

  Reluctantly, Lark walked over to one of the enormous wooden chairs and sat. She didn’t like not being on her feet and near an exit when Mercy was on the warpath, but a moment later, Mercy glided around the fireplace and settled herself into the chair opposite her.

  “I think you and I got off on the wrong foot,” said Mercy, her eyes moving over Lark in a way that made her feel as though she were being X-rayed.