Page 16 of Free Beast Mate

Chapter Seven

Emma

My back had finally healeda week after the lashing, though I presumed I’d have scars for life. In retrospect, I shouldn’t have disobeyed Tom. I knew better. And Adam? He was just doing his job. Stealing went against the Community X rules, a crime punishable by lashing, cutting off arms, or even hanging if the person hadn’t learned from the prior punishments. Tom made an example of people who stole, and Adam followed the rules. The fact Tom had me lashed for stealing bread from the beast or that the beast had actually thrown it away fell on deaf ears. Tom told me I shouldn’t have picked it up in the first place. We are all hungry, he’d said as he applied healing balm on my back last Wednesday. What makes you think you’re entitled to anything more than others?

It made me ashamed I’d eaten the bread. Just as well because I’d vomited as soon as Cole helped me up the stairs. They’d removed him from my sector soon after. Tom worried the boy had attached to me and wouldn’t breed who they wanted him to breed. He was only nine but soon enough, in a few years, he’d forget about me. They’d train him to pick his breeder stock, and I was not a breeder.

To think I could possibly be a mate to the beast sounded absurd today. I didn’t know what I was thinking, other than trying to find a way to get us food from the Beast Father. If Amoris found a mate, we’d have food, medicine, and anything else we wanted. And I wanted a lot, probably more than I should. “Thou shall not want,” Tom had reminded me when I’d confessed the reason I’d offered my body to the beast. But still, I wanted. It made me gluttonous? God would punish me, Tom had said.

When I came back to work in Sector Zero, the lord’s quarters, both Adam and John sat behind the monitors. John nodded, a slight movement of his head. Adam smirked. “Here she comes.” He tapped the mike. “Here comes your whore. Enjoy.” He laughed.

Heat crawled over my neck and face. I glanced at the wall next to me, where they projected the inside of his quarters. Amoris was exercising, his powerful back flexing, sweat trailing down his spine. This beast was magnificent. I hadn’t imagined a beast would look like this one. I still thought he was handsome.

Something must’ve showed on my face, because Adam started laughing again. “Look at you. Salivating over the beast.”

I squared my shoulders. “You’re supposed to put him away before I get here.”

“The look on your face. Priceless.” He tapped the mike. “Okay, into the holding box you go.”

Amoris ignored him, kept up with his push-ups.

Adam’s jaw worked, making the scar on his face wrinkle. “Get inside!”

Amoris didn’t move.

Adam walked the few steps to the armory and got a tranquilizer gun. He passed by the desk, but John gripped the gun’s barrel. “Wait a second. What are you doing?”

“Gonna put him out. The girl needs to get inside.”

“We’ve paraded over a dozen women in there for the past week and you didn’t put him inside. Why now?”

“Rules.”

“And they are?”

“Carefully selected breeders can see him. Whores can’t. If he picks up a whore, he’ll unload. We need him to breed his mate on sight. We need him on the edge. He hasn’t had pussy in over a year. Trust me, if the willing whore goes in there, he’ll unload inside her, and for what? Nothing. She won’t give him heirs.”

“Heirs?”

“Yes, John. Heirs.”

“I already told Tom the heirs have been born. All six of them.”

“Unholy heirs. This one will produce true heirs.”

John frowned, looking confused.

“What Adam means,” I said as I put my supply caddy on their desk, “is that this beast is a true son of Alpha Nie, the Beast Father. He’d betrayed him when he followed his brother Jamie and left Tineya. We captured him as a favor to Beast Father.”

John blinked, still looking confused. “There are two brothers. Alpha Beast and Tineya’s Second. There is no other heir to… What the fuck is Beast Father?”

“They think Lord Amoris had died in a horrible bike accident that left his body unrecognizable. It is not so. He’s been with us the entire time. When Lord Amoris mates, Beast Father will wipe the Earth of unholy beasts, and humanity will rise again.” God, these new warriors knew nothing! Adam should’ve told him this.

“Nope, not getting it,” John said. “Why does he need this guy to mate? He can try to wipe the Earth of unholy beasts right now.”

“We don’t question Tom’s message,” I said firmly. “He receives word from the Beast Father, and we make it so.”

John looked to Adam for confirmation as if not believing me. Men.

---