Whatever had possessed Brenya dried up. Her anger waned. Again her voice was colorless. “I hope you don’t find any.”
“Drink your tea, mon chou. You are shivering.”
It was an order. Following orders felt natural. The cup went to her lips. She swallowed every scalding drop.
Annette radiated concern, looking at Brenya as if she were some strange thing. “How long is she going to be like this?”
Rolling indolently to brace against the armrest of his chair, Jacques grew beautiful and dangerous. “Sparks of temper are a good sign my Brenya is progressing. Soon enough personality will develop, and you will see the smile you were eager to encourage, Annette. It cannot be easy to relearn what one is.”
They began to discuss the Omega as if she were not there. “She is close to crying.”
“You misread the signs.” Jacques sounded genuinely forlorn. “Brenya is hungry, but cannot eat. She is thirsty, but cannot drink. Her metamorphosis has been uncomfortable.”
Brenya looked to the pregnant Beta woman, saw her offered smile, and muttered a hoarse, “I want to go home.”
For just a moment Annette’s smile wavered, then it grew stronger, her voice purposeful, “My darling, you are home. This is your home.” Her energetic eyes darted over the room, finding great beauty in every carefully selected item. “And what a grand home it is.”
“I want to return to Palo Corps… to my sisters.”
Jacques answered for her. “No. They are Beta, you are Omega. The error in your placement has been corrected.”
She was never going to be returned to her cot at the barracks—there was no place for her there, her skills were no longer needed—this he had told her every time she’d questioned.
“I know you don’t feel well right now, Brenya, but you need to eat something.” Annette braced her hands against her chair’s frame, struggling to raise her bulk from the seat. The man at her back, Brenya could see by the way her husband tensed that he wished to help her, but he would not dare step deeper into the room.
Ancil was being tolerated only so long as he remained by the door. Not that it stopped him from watching the Omega, or raising his nose to scent the air every so often.
Padding across that opulent carpet, Annette took a seat on the divan at Brenya’s side. Kindly, she offered her a plate of sweets, well-meaning in her caution. “You must shore up your strength to assure a speedy recovery.”
Jacques had claimed he would not force his cock back into her body until she was healed. That knowledge was the reason her stomach refused food. But she could not tell Annette such a thing.
Sex was not discussed openly in the Beta Sectors. Such lewd behavior was not encouraged. The girls Brenya knew did not talk of mates and pair-bonds. Those raised and educated together had been warned of imprudent breeding. She’d been an exemplary student. The few times she had consented to fornication, measures had been taken to prevent conception.
Brenya had no attraction for sex, found little interest in the actual act, and only performed the minimum she was expected to. All her interest laid in the pride of labor. Her life had been uncomplicated and even fulfilling.
She had been perfectly content.
Now, she missed the regimented structure of her days, did not understand these Centrists, or why life was so foreign here when all lived under the same Dome. Even their accent, it wasn’t hers.
Her speech was vulgar, unmusical in comparison. Amongst these people, it made her self-conscious to see how they cringed at the way she pronounced words.
They didn’t dress the same as she did, but were colorful, each person’s attire different. In Beta Sector there was specific pride in sameness; there was equality. Centrists, Brenya was learning, found such an idea laughable. And as their voices were honeyed, their food was rich. Every item on the plate Annette offered exuded aromas she’d never known. It looked like it all tasted awful.
Annette patted her hand again. “Eat, before silly Jacques orders you to do it.”
The pastry in hand, Brenya stared down at a piece of art. An actual plate made of bone china like the ones on display in the Dome’s Museum. Its scalloped, golden edges and hand painted symmetry had come from another era. That plate had belonged to someone before the virus cleansed the world and was a treasure of such value, resting it on her lap made her nervous.
What if she dropped it?
“You look pale.”
That impending voice, it made her jump. She had not heard him come closer. She’d been too distracted to see. Head flying up, their eyes met. Her lower lip trembled to find Jacques kneeling at her feet. His hand engulfed her shaking knee.
Brenya wanted to scoot back, to put distance between herself and the massive Alpha, but couldn’t. Just like the first time, she couldn’t move when under the power of his gaze.