Page 44 of The Sin

Roman walked me to the apartment. He didn’t stay, but he didn’t leave immediately. One moment he was at the door, on his way out, and the next moment he was striding back inside and gathering me in his arms for a very passionate, very thorough kiss.

His coat was unbuttoned and I snaked my arms inside and around him, our bodies pressed so close together, there was no place where I ended and he started. His breaths were mine as his kiss devoured me. He was pine and ash, hard where I was soft, lean muscle that rippled beneath my exploring fingertips, an elusive, exotic spice that I apparently craved.

Small groans escaped around our kiss, his or mine, I had no idea.

By the time his lips slanted off mine, I was breathless and boneless.

A grin shaped his sexy mouth, and he stood there another long minute, running a hand through his hair and shaking his head at me, as if I was the one who’d broken his ‘no more kisses’ rule. He looked so sinfully hot with his roughed up hair and that wicked gleam in his eyes, I almost broke it all over again.

He didn’t give me the chance. “Lock the door and don’t leave the apartment until daylight.”

“Even though it’s perfectly safe here,” I mimicked from the instructions he’d already given me the first time he’d started to go. No unsavory elements intruded on Gardens. The Protectorate made sure of it. “I won’t do anything stupid and you don’t have to worry. I’m not scared to stay here alone.”

If for no other reason than Roman would never leave me here by myself if he thought there was any possibility of danger.

We shared a look, then he said goodbye and left, this time for real.

I fell into sleep with a smile and woke up the next morning to a cold, empty apartment. The electrics hadn’t turned on yet and the portable heater had run down its charge during the night. I tried to hold onto that smile as I ate breakfast from yesterday’s bread and packed up my belongings, but some of it chipped away.

Roman would be here shortly to walk me back, and I wasn’t sure how last night’s romance would translate behind Capra’s walls.

He was a warden.

I was in the Sisterhood.

It felt like everything between us had changed, butthathadn’t changed at all.

I wasn’t ready for this interlude in The Smoke to be over.

Capra was my home, however, and I had to fight for it, not hide out here forever.

When the lights came on, I had a quick shower and then brewed coffee, which I took with me out on the balcony.

The sky was dull and overcast, and there wasn’t a breath of wind.

Below, the streets were busy with people who had some place to be. Now that I knew about the balanced gender ratios here, it was impossible to miss. Activities in Capra were often separated, so it wasn’t unusual to be in solely female company, but those times it was mixed, the male presence always dominated heavily.

The flow of foot traffic on the street below had no bias.

There was more or less the same number of women to men, and they appeared to have equally important places to be.

The concept of sperm sorting fell way outside my comfort boundaries. The theory was great, but there was something disturbing about selecting gender like you’d select a dress from the rack in a shop.

Then again, if science hadn’t intervened, the human race would be extinct. I didn’t have the knowledge or wisdom to judge.

The question I was really asking myself, was how I felt about the double standard between Capra and The Smoke.

Sure, I heard what Roman said.

In Capra, the goal was to fix nature.

In Capra, the aim was to keep everything as natural as possible.

In Capra, it was our responsibility to reverse the damage of the plague for the greater good of all mankind.

In Capra, women went without some basic human rights all in the name of de-stressing and de-cluttering and damn well de-living.

It was all starting to feel like that put a lot of onus onto us, while everyone else went on about their merry, old world lives.

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