But Bella knew the truth. She could see the invisible mud on Sasha's clothes. She could see Maura's legacy in Sasha's body.
Sasha had put all of that out of her head, determined to just wait out her full transition until her next cycle in the safety of Kane's home, trusting him to not use and discard her, trusting him to honor the laws regarding breeders.
But he left her.
Weeks. She hadn't seen him for weeks, and that turned into two months.
All she had was his smell, and that was fading.
Sasha made it back to her room and the safety of her bed. She had come to love her bed, padded with Kane's shirts—all ones he had worn—as well as pillows and sheets pilfered from his personal sleeping platform in the other room.
No one was allowed to touch her bedding. She couldn't help it, she went crazy when they messed it up. It had to be arranged perfectly; a safe, cozy nest, so that her body was cradled in scents she loved.
The twins teased her about the stuffies from her childhood, and the quilt she had made with her friend Silas when she was young, or sometimes the blanket she had made out of Kane's coat, but Sasha just laughed with them. Her odd bedding made her feel safe.
Usually when she dove underneath the blankets and between the pillows and stuffed things, she felt untouchable. But Bella's words followed her now, embedded in her skin, digging deep, playing on all her uncertainties.
She had come to the compound with a plan. Now she had nothing.
And he had left her.
The tears started. As much as she hated to lose herself to them, once she started crying, she couldn't stop.
Lilla and Lanny came back from the laundry house, wondering where she had gone, only to find her red faced and snot nosed, bawling her eyes out with her fist wrapped in one of Kane's shirts and pressed to her mouth.
They couldn't cheer her up. Davila brought a meal, but Sasha wouldn't eat.
They tried to distract her with their own woes, but she turned her back.
They threatened to call the nurse, and Sasha wailed that they should leave her alone and let her die.
When Zinanno heard she had missed a snack and a meal, he called Sara, who reminded him that they could give her the little white pills. So they did.
Sasha slept five hours.
When she woke up, she'd made a decision. It settled like a hard little rock in her belly, firm and resolute.
She needed to leave.
*
To go back home, Sasha would have to ditch her guards and then get past the gates. When she’d snuck in before, she entered with work shift drones. But after the retraining and punishments the staff had received, and with security heightened, the guardsmen would be watching carefully.
She told Zinanno she wanted to go shopping. He was thrilled. It was as if she had given him a gift—finally the breeder wanted to do something he expected a woman to want to do. She said she wanted to buy gifts for her friends and asked for her wages for helping with the laundry.
Zinanno glared at her, offended on behalf of his alpha. "You think that necklace means nothing, my dear? You are under the protection of the alpha. You don't work. Whatever you wish is at your fingertips. How much do you need? What can I give you?"
Sasha felt like this was a lecture he'd been longing for the opportunity to give.
"I don't need very much," she said. "I have money of my own, an inheritance, but it's in holding until I'm married. I just need it for gifts. And I want to go alone so I can surprise them."
"You will have guards," he told her firmly.
"Of course."
Sasha pretended to be full of excitement at the prospect of going shopping. She wore her hair long and brushed out so that it touched the top of her bottom, picked out her most colorful dress, red slippers, and a brightly contrasting silken scarf. In her shopping bag, she packed a lunch and dirty clothes stolen from the laundry.
She didn't know who the tunic set belonged to, but she'd find a way to repay that drone later. All that mattered was that it smelled and looked droneish.
