by Charlie Hart
Tia
As the Director and the guards leave the house with Giles handcuffed and barely able to make it out the door without stumbling, I’m finally able to pull myself free from Fallon’s hold.
“You can’t let him do this,” I yell, pushing on Fallon’s chest, then racing towards the door.
Banks catches me around the waist, his grip tight and bruising. “He made his choice.”
“No. No. No. He didn’t do it. It was me.” Tears burn my eyes, blur my vision.
But no one stops and turns, no one listens. They got what they wanted, what they came here for - a scapegoat.
Giles can hardly walk on his own, and he doesn’t have the medicine he needs or the supplies that are vital to his care. What if the infection comes back? Even as I think it, I know sepsis is nothing compared to the torture he’ll endure in a military prison.
Because of me.
We just got through the worst of it with him, and now he is likely to spiral back down. Only this time there will be no one looking out for him, watching over him.
I need to be by his side, or if not me, Banks.
“You have to stop them,” I beg him, twisting in his arms, eyes pleading. “Please, Banks.”
He shakes his head, and I push away from him, wrapping my arms around myself, tears streaming down my face. I watch through the open door as Giles is pushed into a government vehicle.
I won’t let him do this. Can’t let him sacrifice his life for me - again. Not caring what the others think, I start to sprint outside, towards the vehicle, but I’m stopped by large, powerful arms enveloping me, holding me still like I’m nothing but a helpless butterfly pinned to a board.
“Calm the hell down,” Banks says with such intensity, that I stop for a moment and meet his hard gaze. Fingers bite into my skin, not cruelly, but with a command that leaves me sucking in a breath. “Shut your mouth. Turn off the fucking emotion for a second and think rationally. You’re smarter than this. So, stop acting like a hysterical woman without a brain in her goddamn head.”
He’s never spoken to me so harshly. None of my husbands have. Even Fal, with his heated opinions, has never been so direct.
I look into his dark brown eyes, searching for some light. But there is none in his gaze. His jaw is clenched, and he isn’t backing down from his words, not taking them back.
“I can’t-”
“You can, and you will.” His hands tighten. “You won’t let his sacrifice be for nothing. Do you hear me?”
I want to argue with him, to scream, to cry, to chase after the car with Giles in it, but when Banks’ eyes lock on mine, I see something deeper. He isn’t trying to hurt me, he’s trying to warn me.
His severity is the wakeup call I need. If I tear away from my husbands right now, grovel at the feet of the Director and beg him to take me instead, I know I will make an even bigger mess.
And I’ve already screwed things up enough.
Shock covers my skin, but I stop crying and instead clench my jaw, refusing to utter another word.
Giles looks at me through the car window, and his handcuffed hands press against the glass. I reach out my hand, wishing it could hold him, pull him back.
I will not make this worse for him - for any of them.
My breath sticks in my throat as I watch the car pull out and drive away, Giles’ eyes on mine the entire time until he’s forced to look ahead.
When the car turns the corner down the street, disappearing from view, I fold in on myself. I fall to my knees.
Covering my face with my hands, I let the sobs escape once more. My body aches to go back in time, wishing I could change my actions, erase my mistakes. Wishing I could retrace my steps, wishing I would have trusted my husbands with my story a long time ago. Wishing my reality was anything but this.
“It’s okay,” Emerson is beside me, whispering in my ear, trying to help me stand.
But I don’t want to stand on my own two feet. I want to run out of this compound and get Giles back.
“It’s not okay,” I scream at him, my voice shocking even me. “I was going to turn myself in. Why wouldn’t you let me?” I stare wild-eyed at my remaining husbands.
“You can’t go to prison, Tia,” Fallon says. “You wouldn’t last-”
“Don’t you dare tell me what I could handle.” I push away from Emerson, not wanting any man to touch me, to coddle me, to make this okay.
It’s not okay.
None of it is.
No one would have listened to my story had I been interrogated. That’s the truth, and we all know it. They would have labeled me a murderer, not hearing that I was being held against my will.
We may live in the twenty-second century, but so much of humanity has reverted to behaving like cavemen, and I would have been locked up without a proper trial. At least it would have been me behind bars and not my innocent husband.
“You know Fallon’s right,” Emerson says, not touching me, but not moving away either. “Giles still has a chance to argue his innocence. His record is clean. And he’s a...”
“A man,” I say, knowing it’s what he meant.
Emerson winces and nods.
Even in Alaska, there is no freedom. I realize that even more now.
Women are here to give men children or die trying.
This pretend scenario, the Lottery, it’s all a ruse. Underneath the layers of love and passion is a twisted reality.
I am bound to these men for one purpose - to get pregnant, to bring a baby to term. To help humanity’s one vital cause.
They know it and I know it. And we may be trying to play house here, falling in love and stealing kisses and holding hands, but at the heart of all of this, we know the ugly truth.
If I don’t bear a healthy child, this is all for nothing.
And if I go to prison, they will have lost the chance.
I shake my head at Fallon, at all of them. “You don’t know what I’ve been through. What every woman in this country, this world has been through.” I can’t control myself. I unleash on them the deepest fear, the one lodged in the heart of every woman I’ve ever met. “At least in prison, I wouldn’t have to worry day and night about getting pregnant. About getting the disease. About dying.”
Banks isn’t having it. “Stop this. Now.” He steps in front of me, taking me by the shoulders as if thinking there is some way to steady me. But it’s not possible. I’ve become unhinged. “It’s not going to happen to you,” he says with a vehemence I’ve never seen in him before. “It’s not-”
“It’s not what?” I ask, flinging my arms up. Exhausted and desperate and so, so sad.
Giles.
Gone.
His body barely healed. He won’t make it.
“It’s too late, Banks. For me. For all of us. It doesn’t even matter, does it? This charade? It’s too late. There is no cure. And without one…” I shake my head, all hope gone. I say with the last ounce of my strength, “What’s the point?”
Banks cups his hand to my cheek, hard and tender all at once. I see his inner demons wrestling to be unleashed, but I’m already gone.
I crumble in his arms, not understanding him, but not caring anymore. My body is ragged and limp, and whatever heat and fervor I carried in my heart when I was so desperate to be heard, I am leaving at the doorstep of this compound.
I am just a woman in a world made for men.
“Get her to bed,” I hear Fallon say. I close my eyes, not wanting to see them.
Not anyone.
I just want to drift into oblivion where the pain no longer consumes my very soul.
“I know what she needs,” Banks tells them, gathering me in his arms.
It infuriates me, his insistence that he knows what I need.
That any of these men know.
I need to get Giles home.
Banks carries me up the stairs and I bury my face in his chest, hating that he smells of black amber and vetiver, scents that reminds me of
home. Of my father.
He lays me down in my bed, pulling a blanket over me, looking at me so intently that I want to both scream and make him leave, but to also drag him to my body, pressing his impressive frame over my narrow one, refusing to let him go.
He has a hold on me I don’t understand. He could be my worst nightmare or my deepest desire. And right now, I can’t handle more conflicting emotions. Right now, I need someone I understand, someone who understands me.
Giles.
With him I was vulnerable, but with Banks, I put up a guard because I’m scared of what might happen between us if I drop the veil. If I let him in.
I close my eyes, a heat building in my core.
This is not the time or place to feel such longing for a man’s flesh and bones. I’m ashamed of my primal longing. Maybe I’m just as much a caveman as anyone else. I want to fall into a man’s arms to forget the pain that has taken root in my heart.
He places me on my bed and leans over me, palms resting beside my head. “That guilt you feel, it won’t go away. Shouldn’t go away. But it won’t stop you from surviving this.”
“Maybe I don’t want to survive it. It hurts so much.”
“Pain can be a good thing, Tia. It’s a reminder that we’re still alive, and it’s the greatest teacher in this life.”
He starts to move away, but I grab his shirt.
“Stay with me,” I say, the words tumble from my lips before I can pull them back.
They have no place here.
But they are true, nonetheless.
I don’t want to be alone right now.
“I don’t trust myself,” I admit. Everything hurts so much. And I know I’d run again if given the chance. It’s my first instinct. And I know where I’d go, straight to the Director and confess everything.
Banks’ jaw twitches, and I can’t help but lower my eyes, the bulge in his pants is obvious.
He may have never made a move on me, but he’s hungry the same way I am.
The pain inside of me won’t go away unless he helps curb my hunger. It’s not just sexual. It’s the torment I know he can inflict along with the pleasure. I need that. Need anything to replace the overwhelming guilt and sorrow that saturates every cell in my body.
I want his punishment. Because that’s what sex with Banks would be. Hard. Cruel. No emotions.
“Stay,” I whisper, as Banks looks down at me, considering his options.
His restraint makes me crazy, makes me desperate, makes me lose all reason and focus.
Giles is being taken to prison and all I am focused on is dragging Banks into my bed, giving me a reason to hate myself even more. I need his rough hands on me. Know it’s the only thing that will ease the pressure that threatens to blow up inside me.
“You said downstairs you knew what I needed,” I say, staring up at him in challenge. “Then give it to me.”
Silence.
Tension.
Pain.
Heat.
Finally, he says, “And give you more reason to hate me?”
“I don’t-”
“Maybe not. But you would. And you would hate yourself more than you already do.” He leans closer, dark eyes studying mine like he sees into the deepest abyss of my soul. “I could take you hard. Allow the sting of my palm to wipe away the pain you’re feeling. The brutal thrusts of my cock to make your mind go numb from anything else but the tormented pleasure I would give you.”
I whimper, needing just that.
“Is that what you want, Tia?”
Yes. No. I don’t know. Squeezing my eyes shut, I feel fresh tears stream over my cheeks.
Banks lets out a huff of a breath. Still leaning over me, he says through a clenched jaw. “You were wrong down there, Tia.”
A stale laugh escapes my lips and I open my eyes and hold his gaze. “On which account are you referring to? Because I can’t remember the last time I’ve been right about anything.”
He’s silent for a moment, then says, “We will find a cure. You won’t die under my watch.”
I shake my head, squeezing my eyes shut as salty tears stream down my cheeks, fall on my lips. “I’ve been hearing that all my life. My father…”
The moment the words leave my mouth I realize how impulsive I’m being. I don’t know Banks enough to trust him with my truth.
That reality is like a bucket of cold water on my face. If I don’t trust him with my identity, how can I offer him my body, in good conscious?
I can’t, and I won’t.
“You should go,” I say, my steely tone matching his constant state of distaste.
He lifts an eyebrow. “You know, Tia, I’m not the enemy. None of your husbands are.”
“I didn’t say you were.” I wipe my tears away with the back of my hand, shivering as I do. The compound is cold, it’s like all the warmth left when Giles did.
Or maybe it left when I did, weeks ago, when I ran away in the dead of night, putting every one of my husbands at risk.
“Maybe you didn’t say as much, but-”
I cut him off. Finished for the day. “You let them take Giles and I can never forgive you for that. It’s not just me who should feel guilty. You and I both know that it should have been me they took.”
With a harsh breath, he stands, and I roll over onto my side, turning my back to him.
“You’re right. And everyone in this house will have to learn to live with that.”
Chapter 21
Giles
“He admitted to the murder,” I hear someone say, but the voice is metallic, distant, as I waver between consciousness. “You believe him?”
“I don’t know.” The voice is the Director’s. “Either way, they’re protecting that girl. I’ve done some digging into her files and she’s not who she claimed to be. There’s no listing of a Hypatia Curie anywhere.”
Tia. My first instinct is to rise to her defense. To protect her. But I’m too weak, and I know I’ll gain more information by lying still and listening.
“It’s not uncommon for the women who come to Alaska to come under false names.”
“But it is illegal.” The Director coughs.
“Then bring her in for questioning.”
“At my son’s wrath.” He sighs heavily.
“If she is the woman in the picture, the one the men were looking for, then it will be more than your son you’ll have to worry about. We can’t afford to have that kind of backlash from-”
“We won’t have any problem if they don’t know she’s here.”
I open my eyes slightly, see the Director pacing in front of a smaller man that I don’t know.
The Director drags his hands through his silver hair. “That’s even if she is Christina Thorne.”
“If she is Warren Thorne’s daughter, it’s no wonder she ran.”
Why does the name sound familiar? I can’t place it. But I know I should.
“The man’s cruelty in the name of science is sickening.” The smaller man fidgets nervously with a vial and syringe. “And that’s only the research that he publishes publicly. God only knows what the man does behind closed doors.”
“If it brings us closer to a cure, who are we to say what’s right or wrong,” the Director says stoically. “The human race depends on men like him.”
I can’t even guess at the horrors they’re talking about. But if hurting innocent women means saving humanity, then maybe we aren’t worth saving.
“It isn’t Thorne that you should be worried about. Are you really willing to risk the Jefferson family finding out that the Alaskan government is hiding their heir’s betrothed in a compound with six men?”
Betrothed. The word sends a chill down my spine. But parts of the puzzle start to fall into place. If the woman they’re talking about is Tia, that means she was engaged. And not just to any man, but to one of the wealthiest men in the lower fifty states.
Lawson Jefferson isn’t just rich, he’s corrupt, and his reputation for r
uthlessness has reached even my ears.
Who the hell is Tia? If she is who they think she is, then Tia was right. Every one of her husbands is at risk.
“I think it would be best to clean this mess up quickly and quietly,” the smaller man says, glancing over at me. “Give the mercenaries their scapegoat and give up the woman.”
“No,” I growl out, unable to stop myself. I don’t give a shit about my life, but I’ll fight with my last breath to protect Tia.
I try to sit up, but I’m handcuffed to the bars of the stretcher. I jerk my arms in frustration, then slam my head back down on the pillow.
“Commander Knight,” the Director says, removing the distance between us. “You have something to say on the matter of your wife? Perhaps you know her real identity.”
I grind my back teeth together, realizing now why Tia kept her identity secret. And glad I have nothing to give him. No information at all.
“Her name is Hypatia Curie and she is innocent, protected under Alaskan law. You swore to protect her.”
“And if she is who she says she is, we will. If not, then we’ll have no choice but to give her back to the people she ran from. That is Alaskan law.”
I jerk my arms again, knowing if I had my full strength I’d get out of these fucking handcuffs and strangle the man.
“Salinger would never forgive you.”
“My son will move on. I’ll find him another wife. One that won’t put a price tag on his head.”
“He cares about her.”
The Director laughs. “Salinger only cares about himself.”
“You’re wrong.”
He motions for the smaller man to come forward, and when he does he administers a dose of something into my IV.
“But first, we’re going to get some answers from you, Commander Knight.”
“You’re insane if you think I’d tell you anything to harm her.”
He chuckles. “I thought you’d need a little coaxing. That’s why Dr. Gilbert has just given you a large dose of sodium pentothal.”
Truth serum.
I growl low, “Then it’s good that I know nothing.”
“We’ll see about that.”
As my brain starts to cloud, and the world starts to shift like a bad Picasso painting, I keep one image in my mind’s eye - Tia.