Lindsey Piper - Caged Warrior

She would stay strong and learn what she could. No one would keep her from Jack. She only prayed to the Dragon that something of her little boy would remain.

The man returned. A chunk of soap landed by her hip. She snatched it up. A scant lather was enough to finish washing her body. She glanced behind her when she was about to wash between her legs. He squatted on the balls of his feet, with his back against the opposite wall. A folded pile of fresh clothes waited by his boots.

Goose bumps shivered up her wet back. He had grabbed her between the legs. The lonayíp bastard.

The human laboratory guards had used her that way, when she’d been drugged and bound. Deep instinct told her this man would want her to fight back.

Turning away, she lathered her grimy hair. A year ago, she’d lived with Caleb and Jack in a sunny Manhattan condo overlooking a small park. Her bathroom had been filled with sexy indulgences. Loofahs. Bath salts. Moisturizers of all scents and purposes. It seemed so ridiculous now.

The woman she’d become appreciated a scant chunk of soap. At least it wasn’t an astringent, hazmat-level disinfectant. Her skin had toughened, like the rest of her. This soap was something almost . . . pleasant. A small change in the scheme of things, but a change she desperately needed.

“Come get your clothes.”

Of course. What man would miss the opportunity to ogle a naked woman? She’d only waited for him to command her in that rasping, broken timbre.

Clothes. Then food. Each step stretched before her like Dorothy on her way to the Emerald City. She nearly smiled. Jack had been four the first time they’d watched The Wizard of Oz . The flying monkeys terrified him so badly that Caleb had traded out the DVD for Cars . Audrey had made popcorn. They’d let Jack stay up late to finish his favorite movie, but he’d fallen asleep on the couch, sprawled across Caleb’s lap. Her husband, so blond, had stroked their little boy’s wheat-pale hair.

Whatever this barbarian planned to do to her had nothing on that memory. Or the ones that followed: Caleb shot through the heart. She’d watched him die in an instant. Then came Jack’s screams. She’d caught sight of a Dragon King in a trench coat, just before a hood blacked her vision—but none of the horror.

Good and bad memories burned until she couldn’t breathe. Bodily pain could be disconnected, like flipping a switch. But messages from her heart attacked at unexpected moments.

Even when she stood wet and naked in front of a stranger.

Still shivering, she walked toward where he knelt. Never had she been so conscious of the surgical marks left by Dr. Aster’s experiments. Some scars never healed, not even for a Dragon King.

“Are you going to give me my clothes?”

“You have no possessions.”

She gritted her molars. “May I borrow them?”

The amusement in his eyes made her want to pluck them out. He flicked his wrist. A tank top and plain women’s briefs landed on her wet toes. A strange leather outfit followed.

“Get dressed.”

“Here?”

He nodded.

Let him look. Dignity had been replaced by one instinct: survival.

“My little boy is named Jack,” she said softly, just to herself.

She focused on her words rather than the vulnerability that punched her heart against her ribs.

The pants were tough, tanned leather lined with denim and what felt like . . . silk? The shirt was made of the same odd combination. Both fit snugly but with enough room to move. Had they taken her measurements while she was unconscious? Dragon be, there existed so many ways to violate a human being.

But she wasn’t human. Never had been, no matter how many Pixar films and bags of popcorn and bottles of lotion. That didn’t mean she could restrain the grief filling her chest like hot sand. She needed to speak it aloud. Audrey MacLaren had been a high school art teacher, married to a marketing exec. So content, she’d taken it for granted.

Now, that contentment was nothing but pain.

“Jack Robert MacLaren.” Stronger echoes touched the back wall of the training room. “He’s almost six. My husband’s name was Caleb Andrew MacLaren. He was thirty-four when he was murdered trying to defend our son. I would’ve liked the closure of attending his funeral. Instead, I was strapped to a laboratory table. Dr. Aster had taunted me that no one would investigate the crimes. ‘Our family has a great deal of influence, Mrs. MacLaren.’ He always used my married name. Salt in every wound.”

“I didn’t say you could speak.”

“So stop me.”

The beastly man stood. So damn tall. Audrey was a respectable five foot eight, but he dwarfed her. “Is that a dare?”

“I’m doing what I was told. Why do you care what I talk about? I needed a distraction while you slavered over me.” The clothes were armor, like wearing a fortress. Assurance lined her bones with steel. “Did that turn you on? For a defenseless woman to shiver and beg? If I grabbed between your legs, you servile, brainwashed dog, would you be hard? I hope not. I hope you fondle your limp little prick tonight and cuss a blue streak because you can’t get it up.”

Massive fists bunched along his thighs. His scarred lip twitched. Eyes narrowed to slits that glittered like deep brown topaz. A heavy pulse ticked at his temples, where his serpent tattoo stopped short. Branded by the Asters.

Disgusting.

“I didn’t say you could speak.” It was no idle repetition. It was a prelude to violence.

Audrey smoothed back wet hair and met his gaze. “If the Old Man wants me here, he won’t appreciate seeing me harmed. I bet you can’t risk that, warrior .” She sneered the word. A warrior fights to be free, not to grovel in the dark. “So hit me, throw me back in that cage, or get me some Dragon-damned food.”

♦ ♦ ♦

During combat, Leto would’ve laid waste to the insulting bitch. He’d have crushed her ribs before she uttered another infuriating syllable. With the collars temporarily disengaged, his speed and reflexes—the hallmark of Clan Garnis—would’ve made that possible.

He couldn’t remember the last time a neophyte figured out how their relationship worked. Symbiosis. If this woman failed to entertain, Leto would share the blame. To lose face left him seething.

He checked his thoughts. There was always something to be done when a neophyte got lippy—no matter how clever. No matter how fucking sexy.

Leto shut down that thought even faster. Just as he tried to forget the healed surgical incisions on her lustrous golden skin. A violation.

“Get in your cage.”

“Go to hell.”

“You can stay out here, but I won’t feed you.”

Defiance dazzled from her bright eyes.

This time Leto was able to hide his renewed surprise that she knew how to pick her battles. The Tigony made no secret of their disgust for the Cages. They were the Tricksters of the Five Clans, more eager to wheedle than fight. They could storm fire from the heavens, yet few tapped into that potential. They simply talked too much.

“Get in your cage, Nynn of Clan Tigony. Or I’ll throw you in.”

“What happened to letting me have free rein of this . . . cave?”

“That was before you insulted me.”

She shot a disdainful glance toward his crotch. “Hit a little too close to home?”

He pulled until her ear nestled against his mouth. She smelled delicious now. Fresh. Scrubbed clean of the sweet, unnatural scent of decay that the lab refugees always carried. He never let his mind journey to Dr. Aster’s lab. Imagination was best left to techniques in fighting. But he couldn’t deny what his senses told him.

Whatever happened there was simply wrong .