Chapter 18
Cry, baby
Moros—two weeks later
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“She swears, Moros.”
He’s nearly hissing at me again, despite the pastries in his grip because, yeah, we’re back to that. Back to talking about how Cassia got them approved to run with the Guard just … because. Somehow. Even though I know the rules. I know the man that made the decision.
I know what Amo refuses to see.
And still, more cherry-filled baked goods show up at my door accompanied by angry snarls from afar. Until today.
Today. My birthday.
He’s pissed I didn’t tell him that, too.
“You just can’t go through life like this, asshole.” And now he’s jumping topics again.
“Why not?” I push back, snagging the box from him and pinching a sugary treat.
I’m hungry and it beats eating him again. Though I wanna do that, too.
But something in my chest clenches at doing it without Wilson.
I’ve never had that problem before.
But he’s on his way back into town, one of my other guys making the trek out to post twenty-three for cover.
I should have added the guy to my roster sooner, so it didn’t have to always be me, except now I have that itch. The telltale voice in the back of my mind begging for …relief.
Fucking Amo ruining my shit.
“You’re so infuriating!” he yells, and I point to the door with my pastry holding hand. “Why is it so hard?”
Instinctively, I look at my flaccid dick hanging beneath my sleep pants. The ones I had to start wearing, also because I never knew when Amo would show up.
I know he’s not talking about it but I kinda want him to.
If he makes the first move, it wouldn’t be bad, right?
Though I want him to get on his knees and start sucking, he doesn’t. He keeps running his mouth about communicating and letting him in.
“You realize I’ve known Wilson for a decade and not even he knows this shit.”
That gets him.
Wide eyes swing on me, all shiny and intense.
It makes my heart twinge, and I curse.
“Okay!” I yell too loud and throw the pastry. “Fine. What is it? What do you want to know?”
“How old are you?”
I growl but answer anyway if only to get him to shut up. “Thirty-six.”
“You can’t fucking count. You’re thirty-five.”
I throw my hands up.
“Then why ask me?”
“Because I want to know you, dipshit,” he explodes, and I feel my brows jump up.
“What?” It comes out a little quieter than I intended and his eyes squeeze shut.
“We fucked, okay?” he snaps. “That means something.”
My cheeks puff up and my stomach twists.
“I don’t know what you want me to do about that, Amo.
” Something ugly and dark twists around in my middle, making the sugary-sweetness left on my tongue turn sour.
“I’m no good. I’m stuck out here while you’re in there.
And fucking Wilson is out there.” I gesture vaguely to the forest beyond my cabin, though I know he gets the point. “We aren’t supposed to mix like this.”
His shoulders slump and a noise I don’t like escapes his lips.
“I miss him.”
Pain lances through my chest at his admission and I nod knowingly.
This is all about Wilson.
Not me.
“Well, you’re in luck, kitten. He’s on his way in.”
Shoulders lifting slightly, he drags in a deep breath to even himself out when I expected him to get excited. “You’re supposed to agree with me.”
“Fucking hell, Amo. Just write down what it is you want me to say. Then maybe I’ll stop fucking it up.”
The little sniffle from his downturned face hits me deep enough that I swallow.
“Would you mean any of it?” he asks quietly.
Aw hell.
“Maybe half.”
That earns me a watery chuckle as he works his toe into the floorboard.
Dammit, he’s adorable. Why does he have to be adorable?
“She don’t know either.”
“Didn’t know,” I correct and sigh. “But what didn’t she know?”
“Cassia. She didn’t know about being infected. Or having to have the virus to be Guard. Said the elders allowed it. I swear.”
That ugly thing inside me rears again, but this time … this time it’s for a different reason.
“Is it because we won’t procreate, Moros?”
The soft resignation in his tone makes my blood boil.
But I do what I do, and I answer honestly.
“Yes.”
It’s because we won’t produce offspring and increase the population, and therefore the workforce that helps keep everything running.
The grunts and brutes that do all the labor that keeps the community running smoothly.
It’s because it doesn’t follow the law of scriptures listed in the ancient texts the elders live by.
It’s because our bloodlines end with us.
Disposable is what my father called us.
The memory of him twists my gut.
The sniffle coming from Amo has me flexing my fists.
“I didn’t give a shit when it was just me,” I mutter. “I was okay with being excluded.”
“But now?” Amo asks, still not looking at me.
“Now I’m fucking furious.”