“It’s rape.” The ugliest of words.
“It is.” A thing Brooke knew well, a word that set her eyelid twitching. “But I know it’s not like… what happened to me.”
“Brooke.” Eugenia took her friend’s hand, tears on her cheek. “It’s exactly like what happened to you.”
Brushing back her friend’s curls, Brooke whispered, “Yet you love him anyway.”
And Eugenia cried all the harder.
Because she did. She loved him so much that sometimes it hurt to breathe.
While self-sequestered on Level 9, she held that new baby, feeling her own quicken inside. Watched the women fawn over him, how they gladly shared the duty of breastfeeding him. Absorbed that the child was one of theirs and would be loved.
Slept all day, all night, for a week. Woke up to find a new tube of cherry Chapstick had been curled into her fingers while she dreamed.
And went home after the sun went down to find a wretched man badly in need of a shower and a shave.
“They’ve named him Noah.” Setting down her candle, she added, “I never want to know who fathered him, because if he comes to my clinic, I’ll kill him.”
Eyes wet, the captain agreed. “Fair enough.”
“I mean it. Hide it from me until the day I die.”
Aaron nodded.
“How are the stitches healing?” There had to be at least twenty across his chest the way she’d sliced him.
It was as if he hadn’t heard her, as if he might not be able to draw another breath unless he said, “I love you.”
“I know you do.” Which broke her heart a little bit more. He loved her so deeply Eugenia sometimes drowned in it.
Nodding at the unspoken ugliness between them, he asked, “Are you hungry?”
“Always.”
They ate by candlelight.
Months passed, their baby grew.
Another motherless newborn was passed to Level 9.
Eugenia felt doubt. She felt fear.
They didn’t speak of it. And, no matter how hard she searched, she could not find where those unwilling women were kept on the boat.
Aaron lavished her with attention, with affection, with bouts of sex that scratched an endless itch pregnancy had inspired.
He tolerated her moods, her sulks. Celebrated her joys.
The pair of them honored a silent agreement that some part of her would always hate him, and the greater part of him would swallow that hate and turn it into love.
Not that he deserved her. She definitely didn’t deserve him. Yet there they were, their baby on the horizon. Her bladder full, his smile gentle.
“Honey’,” he said, cupping her cheek. “It doesn’t matter what the women think. When we’re in here, what’s out there isn’t privy to our secrets.”
With a sigh, she looked down at the belly between them. At a baby who was running out of space and due to be born.
“Which is why I deserve you.” She deserved the burden of the other women’s concern and question of her judgment. Because she would never tell them she’d stolen the one thing not one of them would have.
“You had a long day and you’re tired.” Easing her toward the restroom, he ordered, “Use the toilet. I’ll have a surprise waiting.”
Grumbling, she obeyed. “The only thing surprising about your dick these days is that a man your age can still keep it up.”
Ignoring her sass, she was left in silence to pee. And came back to the room to find him holding up her coat.
Which, in all fairness, was surprising. “I’m not feeling up to a stroll about the deck.” Not when she’d hear the party on Level 15.
His smile grew, hazel gaze twinkling. “How about a moonlit boat ride on the lake?”
Expression excited, she blurted, “I want to walk on the shore.”
Wild dogs howled in the night.
With nothing but adoration shining from his eyes, he refused, “No.”
Thank you for reading Swallow it Down! It’s not often I write a book in three weeks, but I had to share this story with you. Hopefully, it brought you some joy, a few laughs, and a warm heart. Ready for more? Dystopian, dark, delicious, read BRANDED now!
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