Page 57 of Free Beast Mate

“Who?”

“Mayhem.”

Amoris burst into another fit of laughter.

Vice looked annoyed. “I could volunteer you, if you’d like. See how funny you find it, then.”

Amoris lifted his hands in surrender.

We went back to staring at the thing.

“Well,” Dewlyn said. “Seeing as Emma is from Community X and they knew she was your mate, we thought we’d share something with you two before… Oh, this is harder than I thought it would be.”

Vice threw a hand over her shoulder.

Dewlyn took a deep breath and continued. “I can’t have kids,” she blurted and locked her brown eyes with mine. “Can you?”

“Oh God, you’re Dewlyn McJohn.” I pressed a hand over my mouth. I remembered the jar in the center of Dolly’s collection. A trophy jar with a label that read “Dewlyn McJohn.”

“I guess the world knows.”

“There’s no shame in it,” Vice said. “I don’t care about the world.”

Dewlyn expected me to answer, perhaps explain. Those jars meant nothing to me for as long as I remembered, not until Tom and Beast Father placed me in a position where I could become the next trophy. “They didn’t alter me,” I said. “I wasn’t a breeder, not even considered for mating, so nobody bothered. They altered mates from Above, above the ground, I mean. You were Dolly’s most prized catch. Her personal trophy. I regret not killing her.” I gulped, but it was true. I wished I’d had enough strength in me to strangle her the day she jabbed me with the needle.

“Go on, ladies,” Amoris said. “I’m feeling a little left out.”

“I can’t have kids because Tom sent a woman to my community. She ripped my fucking insides out.”

Amoris blinked.

I hung my head, ashamed I’d believed and supported our evil cause for so long.

“But Vice mated me anyway, told me it didn’t matter. But it mattered to me. When Torrent’s leg arrived a few months ago, so did the news of an alternative from another advanced species. I didn’t know anything about it until after he’d traded the ship I loved for this.” She pointed at the object. “We wanted you to know there are ways, in case they’d robbed you of choices like they’d done to us.”

“What is it?” Amoris asked and bent for a closer look. We all followed, trying to sneak a peek inside, but couldn’t. Our faces reflected in the glass.

“Well,” Vice said. “It’s supposed to grow a baby.”

Silence.

“Weird, isn’t it?” Dewlyn made a face. “But I’ll take it.”

“How?” Amoris asked and tapped the glass. “Hellooo.” He put his ear on the glass.

“Gene manipulation. It’s supposed to act as a womb.”

“Supposed to?” I asked.

Vice smiled. “Yeah.” I saw doubt in the way he glanced back at Dewlyn, who pressed her ear against the glass too. This beast would give her the world if he could. And he might’ve found a way to do just that.

“Have faith,” I told him.

A bang on the door, and then it opened.

I jumped, my hand over my heart. There stood a replica of Beast Father, only much bigger. A male so big, his head nearly brushed the ceiling as he pushed inside the house sideways. “This door needs widening,” he said.

“It’s not the door,” Amoris said.

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