The Breeding Experiment - Laurann Dohner Page 0,24
hid, thankfully. The alarm sounded when they got inside. Mom didn’t realize that Becky was in that section with them. She sealed if off and overrode the safety controls to turn up the bulbs. Some burst, raining glass down on the men. The bulbs that held burned them severely.”
“Bulbs?”
“They mimic the sun indoors. The vegetation is tougher to grow on Radison and they need harsher UV rays than on Earth.” She lifted her arm. “Those bulbs tend to burn skin if you’re exposed for even a few minutes. We only turn them on when we leave those sections. Mom overrode the safety limit and the bulbs started burning those men in seconds. There wasn’t any shelter, since it was a new crop that had barely begun to grow.
“Once they were too injured to put up a fight, my father and brothers subdued them and called for help to have them arrested and taken away for medical treatment. That’s when they realized Becky was missing. It took us hours to find her. She had crawled into the seeder machine and had seen the entire thing. She wasn’t physically hurt, thankfully. The machine protected her from being cut or burned…but she didn’t talk for almost two years.”
Gnaw’s mouth opened but he said nothing. Sympathy shone in his eyes.
“We babied her after that. She had nightmares for years about the bad men getting ahold of her, and from witnessing their suffering, their screams as their skin burned. Becky went from this kid who used to run around the greenhouse on her own to always sticking close to one of us.”
“She’s an adult now,” he reminded her.
“Yes, she is. But we’ve still tried to shelter her from anything bad.” She put the shirt back on.
“Does she know about the brothels?”
“She knows they exist but not that women are forced to work there or that she was ever at risk of being taken away. Our parents didn’t even pressure her to get married. She was safe after I made that deal with Anthony. Men frightened her after the break-in. Especially after she heard them talking.”
Gnaw cocked his head in question.
“We have security feeds. Cameras.” She paused. “They monitor the sections inside the greenhouse. My parents played the feeds back to see exactly what had happened after those men got in. Becky looked unhurt, but they weren’t certain if the men had done something to her, since she was so traumatized. I snuck into the security room to watch and listen, too. Those men were horrible. Greenhouses like ours are run by families. They were hoping there would be women there.”
Gnaw scowled.
“Only men in good standing are permitted to get married or even pay to use the brothels. That means they must follow all the rules, have jobs, be deemed productive members of society. Otherwise, they never have access to women. The three who broke in not only came to steal food but women too. They were pretty vocal and crude about what they planned to do to any women or girls they found. Men like them steal us to use.”
“Use?” Anger tightened his features and the word came out sharp.
“Rape,” she whispered. “That’s what happens to women and girls who are stolen. Those men would have stolen us, taken us to the camp they came from, and abused us to death. That’s why we have alarm systems on our greenhouse and a security room in the bunker to lock our family inside. It’s not just to keep us safe from storms.”
“You’re never going back there.”
She forced a smile. “I never want to.”
“You aren’t.”
The wall suddenly opened. Gnaw snarled and moved, blocking Darla from the Elth and their weapons as another bucket of food was brought. Darla held still until the wall sealed closed and the big Veslor moved away from her. He walked over to stare down at the bucket.
“Meat.”
She was excited until she rushed over, seeing what was inside the bucket. Then she blinked back tears. They’d brought meat, but it was raw.
Gnaw crouched, sniffing at it.
“Can you eat that?”
“I’m not certain I want to. I can’t identify what it is.”
“Does it matter?”
“It could be other sentient aliens. It’s not human or Veslor, though. I’m certain of that. I’ve smelled the blood of both. Nor is it any race I can identify by scent.”
Her hunger fled fast. Would their captors feed them other aliens? That hadn’t crossed her mind. Gnaw stood and glared up at the camera, snarling, “What meat is this? We won’t