“Yes, Sir.”
I feigned a salute, chuckling at his scowl as I snuggled into the soft throw he’d found in a hall closet.After so many months on basic, barely edible rations, I couldn’t believe I was about to eat pizza again.Like so much of our recent transformation, the meal seemed like a dream.
Sprawled out there on the sofa, it was almost impossible to believe that only a few days prior, I’d been a prisoner at the Fortorus concentration camp, bowing to idiots who just happened to have been born without a uterus.Watching his denim-covered ass as it disappeared into the hall, I realized the humongous change was going to take a lot of getting used to.
Pulling the blanket tighter, I permitted my mind to flit back to the horrors of those dark days, the relentless brutality and humiliating routines all the women had been forced to endure.Harper had himself found new and ingenious ways for me to prove my loyalty to him, but being in the luxury of his unit had afforded me protection as well as pleasure.
It was where we’d got to know one another.
It was where we’d fallen in love.
But even in the haze of those happier recollections, I couldn’t forget the fate of all the others.It wasn’t only Macmillan who might have paid the price for our escape.What about all those women we’d freed on our way out of the camp?Linda, Jean, and the others who’d helped me to survive the horror.
What had happened to them?
We’d sent them off into the night with minimal weaponry and no provisions.How long could they have lasted before sentries had been dispatched to deliver the same arbitrary fate that poor Fern had suffered?
Likely, their best outcomes would have been if some generous local had taken them in, but doing so would have come at great personal risk to the individual, and there had been so many women...How could anyone—however big their heart was—have helped them all?
Depressingly, I realized it was more probable that the same local would have ratted them out to Ian Jackson’s hideous authorities.I had to hope Harper fleeing had done enough to destabilize Fortorus, allowing at least some of those women to slip through the net.
My belly contracted at the dreadful conclusion.How was it fair that I had escaped with a man who loved and sheltered me, while so many others were left to rot?How was I going to live with myself, knowing there was nothing more I could do to help those women?
“Here we go, gorgeous.”He was back in the doorway, his spectacular body bared from the waist up.
I glanced up in time to see him nudge the door closed with his foot, his dark hair falling into his eyes as he carried the two huge pizza boxes in his hands.Half-naked and at ease, nobody would have guessed that only a week before, he’d been in charge of the fate of thousands of women.He looked like any other guy collecting a delivery for his partner.
“I hope you’re hungry, little girl.”He advanced with a grin.“It looks as though we’ve ordered enough for an entire family and—” He stopped, his brows knitting.“What’s wrong?”
I pulled in a breath, conscious for the first time that I was crying.The tears stung my eyes, demanding justice for those we’d left behind.
Ileft behind, I clarified.I was one of them, yet I abandoned them all at the first chance I got.
“Caroline.”He dropped the pizza boxes to the ground as he perched on the seat beside me.“What’s happened?”
“Nothing.”I wiped my eyes with the heel of my hand.
“I left you for two minutes to collect the pizza and now you’re upset.”His gaze was bewildered.“Talk to me.”
I could tell not being able to micromanage every minute of my emotional state was pushing him well out of his comfort zone, but even though I knew he had my interests at heart, I needed time to process my woe before I shared it with him.“I was just thinking about what we were discussing, that’s all.”
“Fortorus?”His tone was resigned.
“I don’t want to ruin dinner, Sir.”I signaled to the pizza I’d been so excited about.I wasn’t sure I had much of an appetite anymore.“Can we eat while it’s hot?”
“We can eat.”He lowered to collect one of the boxes and thrust it at me.“But you’re still going to tell me what’s on your mind.”
My stomach lurched at his firmer tone.It was one I knew only too well, one that conveyed that my resistance was entirely futile.I would be sharing with him, whether I was ready to or not.
“Thank you.”I opened the box, allowing the smell of the hot, melting cheese to rush to greet me, and right on cue, my stomach growled.Apparently, I was still hungry, after all.
“I’m waiting.”He grabbed the other box for himself, hoisting a large slice from its confines as his uncompromising gaze landed on me.
“Yes, I was thinking about Fortorus.”Discomfort crept along my limbs as I said its name aloud, as though the place was a demon I needed to exorcise.In so many ways, the analogy was fitting.
“I know those memories will haunt us for a long time, but we’re away from there now, little girl.You’ll never have to go back.”His voice was softer.
“I know, and I can’t tell you how fucking grateful I am for that, Sir, but what about all the others?”Emotion caught in my throat as I got to the crux of my concerns.“It isn’t only your driver who might be dead, but all those other innocent women, too.And I just left them!”
