to failure. Look where we’d ended up. The silence stretched on and on, but it got softer, less alienating as I stared into his eyes.
“I’m always going to love you,” I said. “That’s been made abundantly clear to me. I’d have liked to get out of Harvest Grove and have some life experiences, work out what I’m going to do beyond working for the vets before I had a child—” My hand snaked out and took his when I heard his shuddering sigh. “But this is me and you. When have my plans ever worked out the way I wanted them to? If we… If I…” My breath came rushing out as the shakiness returned with a vengeance. “If I became a mother…”
Where did the fucking sob at the end of that word come from? I frowned furiously, trying to stuff that back in its hole. I was done crying until we got out of here, I’d decided.
Jai’s arms wound around me, but I squeezed my eyes tight, not wanting the tears to come out.
“I can't have a baby in here, Jai. I just can’t.”
“They’re not keeping us, love. I didn’t want to get your hopes up, but when the full moon comes, I’ll be able to reach out to the pack, find out what’s going on. This is only temporary, I promise.”
We lay on the bed together, swathed in clean blankets now, snuggled up as close as we could be. We drowsed lightly, the heat under my skin and the shitty situation standing in the way of real sleep. When the morning came, the glass around us became transparent again, and some of Hollingsworth’s men wheeled in food and supplies. One turned to me, snickering when he saw my wide eyes.
“Rise and shine, bitch,” he sneered. “Time to jerk off some shifters.”
“Shan…”
I could feel Jai’s growl all the way down my spine, particularly when he jerked me back against his chest.
“Now, now, dog dick,” the man said, holding up his control. “You wanna be unconscious, pissing yourself all over your lady love? Or you gonna play nice? She just has to get ’em to come, doesn’t have to enjoy it.”
His snarl rose and rose, a full-throated thing that clawed at my nerves, forcing me to push him away.
“Do it, beast boy.” A weird light came into the man’s eyes, the challenge writ plain. “Fucking do it.”
“Mine!” Jai’s nose was thrust down into my hair, his hands gripping me tightly, nails starting to dig in. “Mine!”
“I don’t have to touch them,” I said, forcing Jai’s eyes down to meet mine. “I just need to be in the room. I have to, Jai.”
“Put the fucking whore down. I’ve been told not to zap you too many times, in case it fries your brains and then the boss can’t use you to control her, but I’m willing to say my finger slipped or something. Let the bitch go or it’ll ‘slip’ until you’re nothing more than a drooling husk.”
“Not much of a difference to what we have now,” the other guy snickered.
I saw it, exactly what they’d do to him, the way his body would writhe helplessly on the bed, over and over, how those fuckers would just grin as he did so, until he couldn’t anymore. Somehow, being in Hollingsworth’s employment had burned all the humanity out of them, leaving these leering monsters. I took a deep breath, knowing what I had to do.
It hurt, prising his fingers off me. Those nails burrowed deeper, reacting to the men, not me, but I was the one who yelped. I wriggled free when his hands relaxed at the sound, stepping off the bed before he could grab me again, thankful I’d thought to pull another gown on that night.
“No!” he shouted as I sprinted towards the glass. “Shannon, no!”
The wall slid up to admit me into the rest of the caged area, then slammed down before Jai could stop me. I heard the thud of his body against it, the steady thump of his fists as he tried to batter his way out. Tears pricked my eyes, thankfully blurring out the fucking trolley full of gloves and samples tubes and…
“Shannon?”
Nero was going for calm, gentle, but if I needed evidence of his beast, I got it now. There was a throaty edge to his voice, deeper now, as if he would throw back his head and roar. I dashed the tears away, and when I looked up, his eyes had gone a brilliant