Lie to Me (25 page)

Utter bullshit
.

“What a privilege to be able to serve mankind the way she will.”

Kella glared at Miss Dunn, the seamstress, while trying to decide if the woman believed that crock of bullshit or if she voiced the politically correct viewpoint. “Really? You think she wants to be bought by a stranger, raped at fourteen, and all so she can have the privilege of breeding his super babies?”

Jaw open, Miss Dunn gawked. It wasn’t her slack jawed expression that identified her as a mindless idiot, but rather the words the seamstress spewed. The government propaganda marked her as nothing more than a Regent-puppet, and the other woman’s conformist-mentality nauseated Kella.

Auction off one of those spooner X-gene bitches and the system would change in a heartbeat.

Kella pretended to peruse the clothing Miss Dunn spread over the bed. Going through the motions of acquiring new clothes frustrated her. More important issues bothered her. Like the fear in the eyes of a fourteen-year-old, who’d be auctioned and raped, and there was nothing Kella could do about it unless they plotted her escape. And soon. The sooner the better. Being holed up here at Stone’s mercy worked against her, frustrating her.

Minutes before, she’d been mourning the loss of the wind-up dog toy Stone had given her years ago. The treasure had been snug in one of the backpacks he’d tossed out of his flyer. While she bemoaned trivialities, this poor girl pined the loss of her freedom.

What is wrong with me
? She needed to get her head back in the game. The X-Ds had work to do.

Melancholy over the child’s loss of freedom, Kella sat on the end of the bed. She attempted to process her resentment as she fingered a few of the silky undergarments the seamstress presented for inspection.

“I recommend lace, satin, or silk. The satin and silk fabrics feel delightful against your skin, while most men find the lace sexy, but a man of your husband’s ilk will appreciate any of the three.”

The white-cotton panties held no enticement. They were practical, boring, and wouldn’t appeal to Stone. That’s what she liked best about them.

“These.” She selected two pairs of plain white, cotton panties and one white sports bra. The absolute basics, and the support bra would work perfect for excavation wear. She could wash them out in the bathroom sink because...
there is no way I’m going to become his paid-for-woman
. Playing along with his games was one thing, but she had every intention of ditching him at the first opportunity presented. She prayed that opportunity would come soon so she and the X-Ds could plot to save the new X-gene.

“I preferred the silk panties.” Stone eyed her as he pointed the remote control at the television set and turned off the Xeno pomp with a click of a button. “On second thought, I really like these.” He picked up the bright-yellow lace undies and held them up.

She preferred them too, just because she had a weakness for pretty lingerie, but practicality won out since he’d discarded all of her undies in the badlands with her backpacks. The teen Xeno’s presentation also served as a hard reminder of her place in Stone’s household. No way would she dress herself up with gift-wrapping and entice him to unwrap her so she could whore herself to him.

Yet the way he fingered the pair he admired seemed so personal...and erotic. Possessed the same effect as earlier in the shower when he touched her.

Kella flinched at the reminder. What the hell was wrong with her? They were undergarments, necessities, nothing more intimate than a shirt or pants.

“Are you okay?” He picked up the matching bra.

“Peachy.” She sounded anything but peachy, felt so discombobulated she wanted to scream at the universe about the unfairness of life.

“Is this all you’ve picked out, sunshine?”

“Don’t call me that,” she said as he indicated the two pairs of jeans, three tops, and white undergarments separated from the mountain of clothes on the bed. “It’s all I require.”

Logic told her he wouldn’t be up to supplying her with a foolproof escape plan.

“Sire?” Miss Dunn tapped her pen against a pad, her movements a clear sign of agitation. The businesswoman had probably anticipated a huge payday, and her disappointment had been obvious when Kella lacked excitement over the upcoming purchase. ‘Aren’t all women supposed to enjoy retail therapy?’ the uppity bitch had said at one point and twittered like a brainless idiot afterward.

Kella had had to bite her tongue to keep from telling the woman to eat shit and die.

“I have several garments that’d look lovely on your bride.” A girl would be sold off, and this fool of a woman chattered on about clothing. Kella wanted to scream as Miss Dunn droned on. “A royal-blue dress made of madworm silk and beaded in the finest gemstones. The color would bring out her flawless skin tone, and the cut would accentuate her figure, have all the men drooling over your woman.”

Kella rolled her eyes. “Save the drooling men for the sanatorium.”

A smile tweaked the corners of Stone’s mouth.

Miss Dunn sniffed at Kella’s sarcasm, and the speed of her pen tapping increased. “See the attitude I’ve had to work with? What woman of her prominence doesn’t want men and women to envy her?”

Of my prominence
?
Puh-lease
! The fucked-up law turned her into a whore. That was neither dignified nor a prominent position. Ironically, the lingerie was more fitting for her status than the cotton. “The one who doesn’t give a rat’s ass what anyone thinks of her. Or maybe the woman whose sole purpose is to be barefoot and pregnant.”

Stone’s jaw clenched.
Not his happy face
. Well, fuck him. Fuck him and the universe and all spooners and Regents that continued to repeatedly fuck the dregs. Her happy face had been displaced eight years ago when he purchased her like a household item.

“Absurdity,” the seamstress scolded. “She even rejected the canyon-leather pants.”

“Calamity.” Kella gave a mock gasp.

“They’re made of the finest and softest material.” Miss Dunn’s outrage remained evidenced in the rapping of her pen against the notepad.

“People are starving, being deprived of basic nutrition, others without homes.” Kella rose to her feet and faced off against the taller woman.
Rap, rap, rap
. She was close to snatching that goddamn pen from the seamstress’s fingers and snapping it in two. Or stabbing her in the hand with the ballpoint. Violence fit her mood at the moment. “Children are being auctioned off to pedophiles, and you chatter on about the ‘finest and softest material’. All you spooners disgust me. This is a waste of good money when it could be put to better use.”

Rap, rap, rap.
The seamstress huffed and faced Stone as if he served as mediator. “She’s ungrateful, spoiled, and willful.”

Kella threw her hands in the air. “I can hear you, Miss Dunn.”

“I don’t understand why I was called when she insists she doesn’t require any of my wares.”

Stone measured Kella, his fingers rasping along his jaw. She walked to the window to put some distance between them because she vacillated between wanting to drag her fingers along the scruff of his jaw and inflicting bodily harm on Miss Dunn. At least the garden was nothing fascinating to look at, with nothing more than shrubs, and it hosted a few of Stone’s men.
My gilded cage
.

“The poor burden her soul,” he explained to the seamstress. Kella snorted her disagreement, but allowed him to continue speaking without interruption. “She’ll take everything you have in her size, Miss Dunn.”

“Society’s pawn,” Kella mocked his hefty purchase. “You’re part of the problem playing up to expectations.”

“What was it you said, Kella? I don’t give a rat’s ass what society thinks?” He mocked her with her words. In the windowpanes she could see he’d stuffed his hands in his pants’ pockets. “I want the world to see how much I adore you.”

“
Pfft
.”

A flurry of movement reflected back to her as Miss Dunn’s assistants selected the clothing Stone requested.

“That’s agreeable, Sire.”
At least Miss Dunn stopped that annoying tapping of her pen.
“What of pajamas?”

A minute pause from him, and she couldn’t gauge the reason for his brief quietness. “Those too.”

“Waste of money,” Kella muttered beneath her breath. She didn’t plan on being around long enough to wear a week’s worth of the outfits, much less the rest of them. But what’d she care if he squandered his funds? He was a part of the problem after all.

The bill was tallied. Kella glanced at him sharply over her shoulder when she heard the ridiculous figure. Zero hesitation, he agreed to the sum and transferred the money immediately into the businesswoman’s account.

After what seemed like endless ass kissing on the part of Miss Dunn, Stone walked them out. Kella made gagging motions with her finger and mouth, not that anyone but herself appreciated her scorn.

As much as she wanted to throw on some clothing, her pride demanded she remain rooted to the spot shunning the new outfits. Soon she’d be forced to break down and wear something, but not yet. It was another defeat she wasn’t ready to face.

The brisk stride of his long-legged footsteps announced his return before he spoke. “I believe this is yours.”

She slanted her eyes to see what he held in his open palm. Her heartbeat escalated, creating a staccato noise in her ears. Snatching the toy out of his grasp, she peeked at the bottom to determine if it was
hers
or a new one.
My Kella, my sunshine
was engraved on the underside.

That meant he’d sent someone into the badlands to nab her backpacks. Relief and unnamed emotion thickened her throat. She clasped the toy to her breastbone, ridiculously happy it’d been returned to her possession. Peering up at him, she grappled with how to thank him without coming across too beholden.

“I sent one of my soldiers out to retrieve it,” he explained in a matter-of-fact tone. “I have your frams also.”

“And my clothes?”

“I’d give them to you, but I fear you won’t wear the ones I’ve purchased, so I’ll have yours burned.” Kella slid her fingers across the cool metal, gaining comfort from the knickknack, as he asked, “Why’d you keep it after you left me?”

It’d reminded her of the good times they’d enjoyed together. It’d also been a reminder to trust no one, not even those who seemed trustworthy. Of course she wouldn’t admit to either one of them. Instead, she gave him a half-truth. “It’s an antique.”

“Not buying that. You could’ve sold it, made life easy for yourself, at least for a time, but you didn’t. Instead you sold your virginity, something much more precious than this toy.” He tapped the tin in her hand.

“Don’t read more into it than you should, Stone.” Delighted to have the trinket back in her possession, she fingered the thin tin. She’d thought of selling the toy more than once, but hadn’t been able to bring herself to part with one of her best memories of Stone.

“As you told me, actions speak louder than words. You’re not fooling anyone, Kella, not me and damn sure not yourself. You just don’t know how to be honest with me.”

“I’m plenty honest with you.”

“Bullshit.”

She looked away, grinding her teeth together.

“Just so you know, you’re still my Kella, my sunshine.”

His ease expressing his emotions discomforted her. Being honest with him would give her a lifetime of sexual servitude. She wanted nothing to do with that particular conclusion.
If only I could have Stone on different terms.

Kella shook her head. Pie in the sky dreams. She’d given up fantasies long ago. Neither would their lives fit together. The Regent codebook probably frowned upon Regents condoning treason. “I
honestly
don’t want you.”

“I’m disappointed. I expected my new Kella to be as forthright as my old Kella.” He ogled her while she reeled from that low blow. “I’ll coax her back out.”

That sexy, intense stare of his ignited a meltdown at her core.

“To catch you up on everything, Christine confessed all. Do you realize she is Kris Stoddard? Was forced to work for Mark Evans, and he’s known your identity all along?” She shook her head, and he told her everything Christine had shared with him. How Mark Evans stole the money gifted to them from her benefactor, forced Christine to serve him sexually and professionally, while doing his dirty work. “My mother was the one who aided you.”

Stunned by that admission, Kella stared at him but couldn’t decide if he was angered or hurt by his mother’s betrayal. “I had no idea.”

“She’ll answer for her actions.” His casual shrug discredited the indignation he must feel. He held his other hand toward her, a cell phone in his grasp. “Yours.”

Kella refused to accept the phone. “It’s illegal for me to have possession of that.”

“Not as my wife. Take it. I can’t be with you twenty-four-seven.”

Her freedom counted on that.

“Reaper will serve as your bodyguard. Anywhere you go, he goes. Understand?”

She nodded. That wouldn’t be a problem, but she couldn’t figure out why he’d appoint Reaper. If anyone helped her escape Stone again, it’d be Reaper.

“Say you understand.”

“Yeah, I understand. Reaper is attached to my hip. Got it, Master Stone.”

“Don’t belittle what we have. I won’t tolerate your marginalization. And I’m damn sure not your master. Got it?”

“Sure.” She understood plenty. They had nothing to denigrate except a lopsided relationship in their youth. Practically eons had passed since then, and they were both different people now.

Sighing he shook his head, strode to his computer, and booted it up. He tapped the mouse pad area. “Come put your thumb print here.”

“Why?” Distrust rose fast as she secured the toy in her robe pocket.

“You’ll approve.”

She doubted that.

Wearing a slight grin, he crooked his finger at her.

That small action came across in a sensual manner. No idea why, but if she’d been wearing panties she was sure they would’ve combusted, which made no sense because it wasn’t like he was trying to get in her pants. Ignoring her body’s reaction to him, she marched to him and pressed her thumb to the pad on the computer.