And yet, strangely, I grab the sleeping bags and place them around the solar lamps. I’m still weak—I wouldn’t be able to take off running if I needed to, even without the shackles on—but I can move around a little.
Jude takes out the food that Margaret and Jess gave us and starts filling bowls. We eat in silence. But he keeps eyeing me over his food.
“What?” I ask eventually.
“What’s up with your obsession with Helios?”
I still. “I’m not obsessed,” I say in a low voice. I don’t want to talk about it. Ever.
“Dude, you sent your slavers in the wastelands for months to find all the young blonde men in the hope one would turn out to be Helios. If that’s not an obsession, then I don’t know what is.”
“They weren’t my slavers. As soon as it was known that I was buying able workers to build my underground city, mercenaries just flocked to the opportunity. I just warned them to be on the lookout for someone in particular.”
“How convenient, slavery,” he says with a sneer.
“It is. In our world, you’re either the slave or the master. I just decided some time ago that I would be the master. You’re naive if you think otherwise.”
For years, I was the scientists’ slaves. Their little monster to experiment on and turn into a weapon. Then, I was my father’s. I was a slave to his legacy. A perfect little soldier.
Jude lets out a humorless laugh. “I guess that makes me your master now. Let’s see how you enjoy it.” He rises and pulls his gun out. “Get up,” he says.
He leads me to theFireflyand orders me to drop my sleeping back close to the landing gear. I lie on the bag while he ties me to the aircraft with the heavy handcuffs the women provided last night.
Jude crouches over me as he locks the handcuffs in place, and his smell invades my nostrils. From where I am, I could lick the curve of his throat. I could bite his damn neck and tear it to shreds with my teeth before he could have time to shoot me. He would bleed out to death.
His eyes find mine, and he smiles when he notices me watching him.
“What are you looking at, pet?” he asks.
“Nothing.”
“Oh, really? Then why are you hard?”
We both look down. He’s right. There is an unmistakable bulge in my pants.
“No particular reason,” I lie. “My blood is thicker than normal humans. I get hard more easily.”
“Is it all that talk about me being your master that turned you on? Or have you been thinking about what we did last night?”
I grind my teeth. “I’m not thinking about anything. Now get off me.”
But he only trails a hand down my chest and to the buttons of my cargo pants. “Your blood really is thicker? Is that why your veins are black?”
I sigh and nod.
Jude’s smile turns predatory, and he starts to unbutton my pants and slide them down with his left hand while the other holds the gun.
“Stop it,” I say in a low voice.
But, of course, he doesn’t listen. He frees my cock.
“Gods, it’s huge,” Jude says. “I’ve been wanting to really take a look at it since I bathed you the other day. It’s so…peculiar.”
Shame burns its way to my face and ears. I know I’mpeculiar. Black veins snake around my dick, darkening the skin to the head. A few ridges travel from base to end. I have no foreskin. The shape is human-like, but much longer and thicker thanks to the density of the blood pumping through my erection. But the colors make it look almost alien.
I struggle against my restraints, but Jude angles the gun at my face.
“Now, now. Play nice,” he says.
