Chapter Eleven
Two months later...
We return to the home my father built, far out in the rocky ridges. The journey takes several days, and we must go slowly so as not to stress Pharaoh. We are all laboring under supplies. We bring Tore with us, and when we arrive, he is placed to rest under the acacia bush where I put my father’s remains. It looks out toward Dallas, and there they both lie sentinel. Tore, and my father, watching over us for all time.
We make our home in the one-room shack my father built, and we learn how to live together in some semblance of peace. I find comfort in the small things, because the small things are all I have.
“Your father did well here,” Alexios says, his muscles rippling in the sunlight. He is shirtless, as are the others. They are working on trying to irrigate a patch of dirt with the runoff from the spring where I get my water. They want to grow seeds and plants.
“He did,” I say, feeling no small amount of pride at his appreciation.
We are all doing well. I know how to hunt, as do they. Together we have caught enough wild game, coyote, and small birds mostly, to feed us. We are surviving well here, perhaps even beginning to thrive.
This is strange for us all. At first, our grief made the beauty of the place seem melancholy, but slowly we are all regaining our spirits. Silver, Alexios, Pharaoh are all my men. I belong to them. They belong to me. Blood has been shed in the making of our bonds, and only blood will dissolve them.
“You don’t want to go back to your sponsors? You don’t want to go make all that money you wasted buying me?”
“That was not a waste!” Alexios’ hard palm finds my bottom sharply. “Worth every cent we scraped together.”
“It was millions. And you never got it back. It’s sitting in Dallas.”
“What do we need money for out here? Are we going to pay the eagles?” Pharaoh makes a smirking joke.
“Well, no, but you were rich.”
“Money is a tool. Not an end. We have you. That’s what we wanted.”
“But you didn’t need to buy me in the end...”
“No,” Silver says, coming up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist and nipping the back of my neck lightly. “We just needed to hold you down and fuck you in front of every man in the city.”
I have not had sex since Tore. They have given me time to heal emotionally, but I know their lusts are rising. As is mine.
The thought of his name gives me a pang of sadness, but it is a bittersweet feeling. I am sad because I cared for him. I am sad because I lost him, and that is because I had something to lose. And not just Tore. I lost Keanau. I lost Zen and Cowboy before I even knew them. They died for me, just as all these men will.
One day I will lose these men too. Or they will lose me. We cannot have each other forever, and the mere thought of that can bring me to tears at times.
“I can’t stand it,” I sob softly. “I wasn’t worth it. I wasn’t worth what you lost. I wasn’t worth anyone’s life.”
“You bring life as much as you take it,” Pharaoh rumbles.
“That’s not true,” I sniffle. “I’ve never even managed to grow a potato. And potatoes grow on their own!”
There is a little snort behind me as Silver finds amusement in what was not a joke.
“Tore lives in you,” Pharaoh says, approaching me to wipe away my tears with the pad of his thumb.
“His memory maybe, but that is not life. That is just a slower death.”
Pharaoh’s amber gaze catches mine. He speaks with an intensity I do not understand. “You have not bled.”
“That’s because nobody has gotten close enough to cut me.”
They all look at each other.
“We have been here eight weeks. You have not bled,” he says, speaking slowly. “Do you not understand the significance of that?”
“Oh!” I understand what he is talking about. My period has not come. “I have been too stressed, I suppose.”