Chapter 15
“An auction?” I toss my pack on the lone bed in the small room with so much force that it hits the mattress and bounces right back onto the floor.
I don’t even care. So what if the antidote smashes?
An antidote won’t stop me from being made some ex-con’s wife, will it?
“I’m supposed to just stand there and let them auction me off like I’m a piece of fucking cattle? They’re crazy! This is crazy!”
Maverick looks anxiously over his shoulder.
One of Darryl’s too-many wives had shown us to our room, taking great care to close the door behind her when she left.
From the way he’s hovering near the doorway, he probably suspects that she’s just on the other side—either she is, or someone else in this house.
To be honest, I wouldn’t put it past any of them to spy on us.
I just don’t give a fuck if they can hear me right now.
Let them hear me. I want them to know how angry I am.
Some cop. Fuck. Arrest these pricks. Tear down their prison town. Do something, Maverick.
All he does is bite down, the hollows of his cheeks on display as he sucks in a breath through his nose. He doesn’t say a damn word, and after all the chit-chatting he did with Darryl earlier, I get even more pissed.
Was this a set-up? Oh, I’m so sorry, kid, I fucked up… I went the wrong way… I read the map wrong… I brought you to East Jersey to sell you to a man who already has six fucking “wives”.
I thought I could trust him. And maybe I’m as naive as I like to pretend I’m not because I wanted to believe his apologies. His whispered promise that this was an accident.
No, Mav. An accident is grabbing my pack instead of yours in the dark. Bringing me to this misogynistic hellhole is way more than an accident.
It’s a disaster.
There’s a blanket spread across the bed, covering the pillows. A patchwork quilt is folded at the foot of it. Gathering the quilt up in my arms, I throw it at Maverick with all the strength I can muster, satisfied when he catches it with a grunt.
“I get the bed,” I snap. Because he looks so concerned, I drop my voice, but his paranoia that we have spies around us won’t stop me from saying my piece. “You sleep on the floor.”
“Kid—”
I’m not done. Glaring at him, I say, “I don’t know what you’re thinking, telling Darryl that you want to share a room with me.
Let’s get one thing clear. I’m not letting any of those creeps touch me.
But you… if you’ve been biding your time and think that I’ll fuck you now to get out this mess, you’re wrong.
” I dip my hand into Rory’s jacket, grateful I still have my pocketknife.
I pull it out, flipping the switch that releases the blade.
“Try touching me, cop. I’ll cut your fucking fingers off. ”
A flash of pain dances across his weathered features, there and gone again as if my threat actually found a target. I trusted him, and he knew it, but now… he’s just another rogue.
His eyes fasten on the blade, the way it shines in the lamplight. He takes a deep breath, then sighs. “You have a knife.”
“And you’re a regular Sherlock fucking Holmes.”
He ignores my flippant comment. “Good. Hold onto it as long as you can.”
That’s exactly what I plan on doing. As long as you can… he mustn’t think that Darryl will let me keep it. Probably not his gun, either, if the leader of East Jersey has any idea it exists.
And my antidote… I can’t let him get his hands on my antidote.
Frustrated, I kick my pack under the bed for safe-keeping.
Maverick says nothing else as he lays the quilt on the floor, leaving his bedroll with his own pack.
I think about throwing him a pillow because the hardwood floor probably isn’t any more comfortable than sleeping on the ground outside. No. If he wants one, he can ask for it.
Once he’s done, he exhales roughly. “You don’t have anything to worry about from me.” Him, maybe, but the rest of East Jersey… “But this was the only way I could think to keep you safe from any unwanted guests. Darryl gave us tonight. If we keep our voices down, we can figure out our next move.”
“I know my next move,” I retort. “I’m getting the hell out of here as soon as I can.”
When he doesn’t agree with me, my insides twist. I’ve gotten used to Maverick avoiding my gaze as if eye contact is some kind of crime with him, but he’s usually more discreet about it.
When he starts picking at his fingers before nibbling on the side of his thumb, even I can’t pretend that he isn’t purposely holding something back.
“I am… unless there’s something you know that I don’t.” I pause and, grabbing one of the pillows, squeeze it between my shaking hands. “Which there might be, because you’ve been here before. Right?”
“It’s not as easy as that—”
Yes. It is.
“You knew Darryl. You knew him from his whistle, and then you tried to keep him from finding out I was a woman.” His desperation should’ve been my first warning sign.
“You knew about the men here practicing their warped form of polygamy.” No denial there.
He just looks away, and I take a shot in the dark. “You knew about the auction.”
His head snaps toward me and I have to resist the urge to fling my knife at him.
My eyes blaze in outright fury. “You set me up.”
“No.”
“You did. Is that why you were alone when you came to the Grave? You’d sold the last idiot who agreed to come along with you to Darryl and his boys, then you needed…” What was it Darryl called it? “... fresh meat? How much do they pay you for this?”
“It’s not like that, Xandra—”
Oh? So now I’m Xandra?
“Tell me. I’m young. Strong.” I slap my side. “Got some birthing hips and a pussy they can use. I’ve got to be worth something.”
There’s that pained expression again. “You are. You’re a fierce hunter, and I never lied about why I needed volunteers.
I’m going to New York. I’m taking out that nest. I need all the help I can get, and I would never work with Darryl.
” His voice turns dark. “Never. I don’t agree with the shit he does here.
I don’t have to. I just need to survive it.
That’s what I am, Xandra. A survivor. That’s what you are, too. ”
“Yeah? Say I believe you.” Please let me be able to believe him… “How do you expect me to survive this auction?”
Because I’ll kill myself before I be one of these men’s “wife”. With my knife or Maverick’s gun, I’ll take the easy way out.
No one owns me.
“I have a plan.”
“I’m waiting.”
“You’re not going to like it,” he warns me.
“Will I like it any better than being bid on by a bunch of men who only got out of prison because the world ended?”
“When you put it like that…” Maverick gives me a crooked grin that makes him look a little younger than usual. “I’m going to win you.”
I’m gonna hurl.
“I hope that’s not all.” I close my eyes. “Please tell me there’s more to your brilliant plan than that.”
There has to be. While I don’t want to be won by anyone, it’s definitely better if Maverick can be my “husband”; at least I can hope that he won’t suddenly decide he wants to climb into bed with me and fuck me. The other guys? I’m betting that’s the first thing they’ll try to do.
But this is Darryl’s town. Darryl’s rules. And he certainly does like having many wives… who is to say he won’t decide he’s the winner?
Maverick seems certain that his plan will work.
“I have something that Darryl will want. I met him before, remember? I offer it up, he calls me the winner, and we’ll be out of here before you know it.
Trust me. The women in East Jersey do what their husbands tell them. If I say we have to go to New York…”
A frisson of hope fills me. “Darryl’s rules will say that I have to go with you.”
I don’t know what Maverick has that will be worth it for Darryl to give up on fucking with me—or the idea of actually fucking me. I have to hope he’s right because I’m pretty sure that’s as much as I’m getting out of the tight-lipped cop about this brilliant plan of his.
Still, I have to ask, “But what if it doesn’t work?”
“It has to work.”
I highly doubt it will.
“Why go through all that? Why not just leave? You got out before, right?” Don’t think I haven’t noticed that he completely blew past the fact that he hasn’t acknowledged why he’d been in East Jersey before. “You have to know how. Fuck his rules. You can lead me out of here now.”
“I do know the way. And I can leave whenever I want. It’s just… you can’t.”
That’s the wrong thing to say to me at the moment.
“Oh? I’d like to see them try to stop me,” I seethe, crossing the room in five strides and tugging at the doorknob.
It doesn’t even turn a little bit. A rush of panic makes my hand slip off the knob, my heart racing a mile a minute.
Grabbing it with both hands, I yank and I pull and I try to rip the handle right off the door, but it doesn’t give at all.
Are you kidding me? We’ve been locked in!
“Xandra,” and his voice is low yet urgent, “I need you to calm down. Think about it… do you really want Darryl changing his mind and barging in here right now? Because, I tell you, it’s only because he knows my face that he’s giving us any semblance of privacy at all.
Would you rather be with Darryl? You saw him. You met his—”
I whirl around, pointing at him. “Don’t even say it,” I warn.
“—you’ve met the women he believes are his. He likes his collection. If you weren’t in here with me, I have no doubt that you’d be up there with him.”
My stomach flip-flops. I managed to control it when they sentenced that poor guy to the lurker, but it’s definitely queasy now.
Maverick’s meaning isn’t lost on me. I met Darryl’s wives.
At least two of them were younger than me—and one was visibly pregnant which means he wasted no time after the Turning in knocking her up.
Oh, God.
I’m trembling as I march across the room, moving past Maverick so that I can drop down on the bed. “Fine. But you’re still sleeping on the floor.”
It isn’t long before his muffled snores fill the room.
Me? I’m still wide awake, and more than a little frustrated that Maverick was able to drift off so easily.
Anxiety is a bitch, and despite the fact that I’m sleeping in an actual bed for the first time in days, all I do is stare up at the ceiling and hope like hell that this prison town has as good of a handle on their borders as they claim they do.
They’ll need to. If they’re in the habit of feeding their people to lurkers to keep the rest in line, they probably have more of the monsters nearby than we do in the Grave. It’s like feeding stray cats. Once they know where food is, you can’t shake them.
Is that dark-haired man already gone? His screams as two of the other ex-cons dragged him away will haunt me for the rest of my life. He could be lurker chow, or if he managed to get away with only one chunk taken out of him, he could be a lurker himself.
What are the odds he’s another lone survivor, a rogue out in the world on his own?
That’s wishful thinking, and I stopped with that sort of bullshit nine months ago. That man is dead, one way or another, and if I can’t find a way out of this fucked-up mess, I could be next.
For now, I lie here, my ears open, my heart thumping, waiting for some sign, any sign that a lurker has invaded camp. My pack is half open and I’m holding onto a lighter, forever prepared because I know I can take out a lurker.
One of these East Jersey men? Not a chance. Not unless I have Maverick’s gun, and since he snuffles and snorts and starts to wake up when I try to steal it, that’s out of the question.
Hours tick by, but with my phone long dead, there’s no way of knowing what time it is. These last few days with Maverick, I’ve grown used to making camp at dusk, then breaking it up at dawn. I know I should sleep. I’ll need my wits tomorrow, and my strength.
But I can’t. I don’t move, lying there stiff and still, the night growing darker before it eventually begins to lighten. My body aches from all of the tension. I’m exhausted, but not sleepy. I tell myself it’s the snoring and being in a stranger’s bed, but I’m not fooling myself even a little.
The night seems to drag by and yet, I’m surprised by the knock at the door when it comes the next morning. The locks turns, and the door is thrown open.
It’s time to get ready for the block.