Wings of the Walker - CoraLee June Page 0,255

“I love you too.”

I drifted backward, keeping my eyes closed to savor the feel of Jacob on me. “Can I just hold you? I want to hear about everything. I want to know what you’ve been up to.”

I held his hand and guided Jacob to the bed. We shuffled beneath the covers until my cheek was resting on his bare chest, and there was nothing between me and the sound of his heart.

“I trained with a healer,” I whispered before diving into tales about Lilly and Aarav. I told him about fighting with Huxley, pushing Kemper and Patrick away. I told Jacob how I refused to believe that he was hurt or in danger. I told him how I sulked and about Payne.

“I woke up here, you know. Tallis carried me out of Ethros on a transport. I just wanted to call out for you, but I couldn’t. It was like my brain could think the words, but my mouth couldn’t say it.”

I nuzzled closer to Jacob’s chest, breathing in his soapy scent. “The mindspeak helps, but I miss having control over my own voice.”

If I were being honest, I missed the sound of Jacob’s smooth voice too. Although I was thankful for whatever we could get, there was something about his warm tone that made me melt. But I’d rather miss his voice than miss him.

“I’m getting better though. Every day, I can say more.”

Jacob took the mindspeak from his ear and sat up taller. With a cough, he moved his lips before saying, “Lo-Love. Love you.” Hot tears of joy and sadness rolled down my cheeks.

“I love you too,” I whispered. We fell asleep, and although it was comforting to be in his arms, I still felt the weight of all the things still left unsaid.

Chapter Eleven

Staying at the Brothel was a uniquely divine experience. It didn’t feel like we were in the poverty-stricken Zone. Lavish gifts and fine foods arrived almost hourly. The Walker Companions had many Elite admirers. I’d always had this image that the Walker Companions had the worst job you could get, but they made it look preferable to my life at Stonewell Manor, but still another form of prison. Where I was confined to the home I worked, they were trapped in the eyes of their clients. Their bodies were their cages.

Each of the women approached their station in life differently. Blythe loved the attention, she reveled in it, squealing whenever the doorbell would ring. Jade would snort and gossip about the men sending her presents. She’d flip her blue hair over her shoulder and spill the secrets of the Elite to anyone that would listen.

Lowe, the pint-sized Companion, fumed with anger over her gifts. She found something to complain about with every wrapped present on her doorstep. And Kaye? The deep frown lines around her chapped lips were more pronounced. It was as if she wanted to seem indifferent to the station she had in life, but couldn’t force herself to go numb.

The guys all broke out into different areas after breakfast. Kemper worked with Louis on the database. Huxley and Patrick patrolled the grounds outside, and Jacob was headed to the tunnels to pick up a supply shipment of rejection cures. Tallis had managed to steal a crate for his camp back in Dormas and snuck them there last month. My guys would be injected with the last of the stolen vials today. Part of me was glad that we would no longer live in fear that the rejection would one day creep up on them, but another part of me was scared they’d contract X. We had means of preventing infection: sanitation stations and seclusion. But it was still a significant risk.

As I finished breakfast, Madam B dove into explaining the Companion system to me with bouncing pride. “Most girls become Companions when they hit puberty. There are some brothels in lesser known parts that deal young girls, those are unreputable places. The only people that do business with them are sick men and women with fetishes. I have purchased a few girls from them just to save the poor things. I then hire them on as handmaids here in the brothel.

“Parents will bring their teenage daughters to the brothel auction, and madams like myself purchase their vaccine in exchange for ten to fifteen years of service. Some, like Kaye, were born here. They grow up in these halls.”

She guided me towards the sitting room, and I tried to imagine