She finally turns to look at me, and there’s a hint of a smile on her lips. Her eyes are mostly dry now. “I just wish I had a choice,” she says.
“A choice?”
“If I could, I’d make myself not care anymore. ”
We’re both silent for a long moment.
If I could quit caring about my parents, frozen below, would I? It would make things easier. I wouldn’t wake up every morning with a hollow ache inside of me.
And then I think of Elder. It’s the question I ask myself every time he looks at me with those soft eyes of his, every time he jumps to do something just because I asked it: do I love him? I don’t know. But I do know that I can at least tell myself I don’t.
“I think love is a choice,” I say. That’s why I can’t love Elder. Because I don’t have anyone else to choose from.
“But who,” Victria asks, “would choose this?”
We both look up when the elevator doors slide open.
Shit.
Really?
After all this, he has to walk in? What, does he have a stalking meter on me or something?
“Get out,” I say.
Luthor grins.
“My two lovely carros, all in one room together. ”
“Get out,” I say again.
He moves toward where we are sitting. I jump up, but Victria doesn’t; she curls her legs up under her and wraps her arms around her stomach.
“You know,” Luthor purrs, “I think it might be fate. To see the both of you, here, together. ”
I put my hand in my pocket, but I don’t back up as he draws closer. There’s nowhere to back up to, anyway—we’re trapped in front of the windows.
He reaches out to touch me. He strokes my left arm in a sickeningly gentle way until his fingers brush against my elbow, then he grabs me and pulls me roughly to him. Victria chokes out a sort of sob-scream, but I jerk my right hand out of my pocket and slap him full across the face.
It’s a strong slap—but not strong enough to make a full-grown, well-muscled man fall to the ground. Not without a little help, anyway. He crashes down, his fingers still wrapped around my elbow. My shirt rips before I can shake him off. He lies on the floor, looking up at me passively.
“What the frex?” Victria whispers. She’s still curled in on herself, but she leans forward to stare at Luthor’s body.
“Kit gave me one of those new med patches,” I say. I nudge Luthor’s face with my foot, showing her the pale green square outlined by my handprint on Luthor’s cheek.
“You were pretty fast to get that out. ”
“Yeah, well,” I say, “I don’t exactly trust Luthor. ”
“Yeah. ” Pause. “Me either. ”
I look at her, really look at her, past the hard shell she always wears. Luthor spoke to both of us with that purr in his voice. And, even now with Luthor on the floor, she holds her arms around her stomach. In protection, but not for herself.
“Are you pregnant?” I whisper.
Stupid question. Nearly all the women on board the ship are pregnant—the Season did most of that, and Doc’s needles did the rest. But the ones not on Phydus, people like Harley and Luthor and Elder and Victria, chose whether to participate in the Season or not.
She nods.