Page 49 of Morally Gray Daddies

I took hold of the bag and was able to cram everything I wanted inside. I still had some free space, so I reached for my ivory brush and mirror. They were the only possessions of any value I had ever owned, and when I saw that Erik noticed I’d pulled them from my box, I froze. I expected he would confiscate them for himself and possibly be angry that I hadn’t admitted to having them earlier.

His dark eyes studied them in my hand, then he looked at me, but there was no anger present on his face that I could discern. Erik then surprised me and nodded, silently giving me permission to place the brush and mirror in my sack, which I did before the other brothers took notice.

“Are there blankets down below?” he asked me.

I nodded.

We each had several to help keep us warm and comfortable during our journey. Erik entered the lower part of the ship, then quickly exited with the bundle of blankets in his arms. He headed over to the boat that belonged to the brothers where they were preparing to leave and tossed the pile into the much-smaller fishing boat. He really did seem to be taking our warmth into consideration.

Erik returned to me. “What about food?”

I pointed to a compartment on the floorboards of the ship that held a large bag of supplies. “They kept the food in there. Some dried meats, some beans, and some rice.” There actually was a good deal of food. I would say a few days’ worth for five people. As Erik was pulling open the compartment, I added, “In that chest behind where the drivers sat, is where they kept all their cooking supplies and pots.”

I wasn’t sure how to view the brothers. Were they our rescuers? Or were they our kidnappers? Should I be helping them, or figuring out a way to run and escape? But I did agree that we couldn’t simply sit here on the boat and do nothing.

I wasn’t one to ever be helpless; I had grown up tough. My father ruled with an iron fist and a brutal cane he often and relentlessly used. My father had resented that I was not a boy, and he’d made me pay for that daily. And if he wasn’t making me pay for it, then he made my mother pay for only giving him a useless daughter, for which she would then turn around and make me pay for as well. The only good that came from the hell of my youth… strength. So yes, I wasn’t one to be helpless, but as I struggled with the large chest belonging to the drivers, I was beginning to feel pretty damn weak. No matter how hard I pulled, the heavy trunk remained in place.

“Fucking hell,” I murmured under my breath as I put my back into it and gave it my all, but still to no avail.

A big hand covered mine, and I looked over my shoulder to see Erik behind me, reaching over to assist in pulling down the cooking supplies. “You shouldn’t speak like that.” His voice was deep, and he wasn’t really scolding, but more informing. “Your name is Maya, right?”

I didn’t reply, and I certainly didn’t apologize for my profanity. I didn’t belong to this man nor did I answer to him, and after the situation I just experienced, I had every justification to say whatever curse word I pleased. I had left the tyrant, otherwise known as my father, not only miles and miles behind me, but I’d put an entire ocean between us.

Of course, being owned by a man I had never met before in the States opened the doors to possibly meeting another tyrant, but if it ever got too bad, I could simply try to escape and at least I’d be in the United States. If I had to, I could figure out a place to hide and start a new life. Anything was better than Russia and my father.

“We need to get going,” Pasco called out.

Erik nudged me out of the way while he lifted the trunk I was struggling with, then placed it on the ground. He tossed me another sack. “Fill this up with the essentials.” He then went and began helping his brothers load everything onto the fishing boat.

I quickly went to work filling the bag. I grabbed a cooking pot, all the bowls, cups, and the utensils. I then saw the large knife used for cutting the dried meat. Stealing a glance at the brothers, distracted with loading everything with their stolen cargo, I wrapped the knife in a muslin cloth and secretly stuck it into my boot. The brothers hadn’t done anything to hurt us… yet. But I wasn’t going to be foolish enough to assume they never would.

After a few more minutes of grabbing the last of the essentials, the brothers agreed they had acquired enough, and it was time to go. Erik reached for my hand and led me to the boat. Without asking for permission, he placed both of his beefy hands on my hips and lifted me off the ground, assisting me onto the weathered wooden seat. Both Dabney and Rue seemed panicked when Pasco and Shay did the same and placed them next to me.

We were leaving our transport vessel, our dead escorts, and our one-way ticket to becoming a wife, a sex worker… god knows what was in store. What happened now, however, I had no idea. But we were alive. I had to count that as a blessing.

Before boarding, Erik reached for one of the dead men’s wool beanie. He removed the hat and placed it on my head before I could even flinch away.

“I don’t want it,” I argued, disgusted that its owner was now dead, staring at me with hollow eyes. The thought of his soon-to-be decaying body made me gag, and I worried I would vomit what very little food I had in my stomach. I couldn’t risk losing the calories, so I struggled to hold back the bile forming in the back of my throat.

“You will wear this. You’ll need a hat to keep your head warm and you from getting sick.”

I shook my head. “No. It belongs to that man.”

“That man is dead.”

“I can’t. It’s wrong.”

“Wear the hat. Final.” His voice boomed, and the way he glared at me from over his shoulder made my heart skip and my belly flip. “Or else.”

I swallowed back the stream of curse words that wanted to fly from my tongue and nodded. I hated that I allowed him to win, yet I wasn’t prepared to go up against his wrath… at least not yet.

Satisfied with my answer, he hopped in the boat with everyone else and sat down next to me… too close. I had no choice but to press my body up against a complete stranger, as I wore a dead man’s hat, riding off to the unknown.

Chapter Two

“We’ll camp here for the night,” Pasco declared after we landed on the shores of what I assumed to be the island of Heathens Hollow. There wasn’t much of a coastline, and we were instantly met with the thick of the woods.

Tucked away within the pine trees stood three dirt bikes. The brothers clearly had this all planned out, and transportation awaited.

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