Page 68 of Protected By the Convicts
“Too little, too late,” Sersie mumbled.
“You all now have a real chance of having families on Narkos. Units of three and four may add a woman to their unit. The women will be housed in a dorm for unmated women. There will be planned gatherings, opportunities to meet them and to find a woman that is compatible with your unit. The woman and the unit must both agree before I will register the woman with that unit. If you men cannot abide, then I will tell the Company to send the women elsewhere.”
“Send them. We’ll comply,” one of the unit heads said.
“We agree,” said another.
“You give us a real shot, Foley, and we’ll follow your rules.”
More shouts of men agreeing to the terms rang out.
“Like you care!” Sersie shouted. “And those women who get pregnant? Then what? You’ll keep the men here forever. And the children. You’re no better than Dresden. You’ll never let us go home.”
Vaughn hauled Sersie backward and clamped his hand over his mouth until he lurched free. The crowd was raging again, noise all around. A few fights were starting to break out.
“You looking to go back to being a solitary?” Vaughn asked. “Or worse? Dead?”
“I miss her,” Sersie said, bending over, putting his hands on his knees to handle the dizziness.
Vaughn’s hand fell to his back. “I know,” he said softly. “But don’t ruin this for others. If Foley’s true to his word, he’s giving them a real chance at a life.”
“Fucking managers. They play God. The whole fucking Company does.”
“What do you want, Ren?” Vaughn asked. “You going to rebel, get punished, maybe lowered to a 5?”
“Does it matter?”
“It matters,” Sersie said, still bent over. The dizziness was passing, but the hopelessness remained. “I feel as if I’d be failing her if I broke up our unit. It’s all she ever wanted for us, to be a family.”
“A family?” Vaughn scoffed. “We’re not a family. Never were.”
“You’re starting to sound like me,” Ren said to Vaughn. “Though I sort of like having a unit.” He shrugged, even as he watched several guards haul away three men who had been fighting. Foley remained on the dais, waiting for the crowd to settle. “It’s less lonely.”
“You don’t want your house back, your life back to yourself?” Vaughn countered, skeptical. “Or are you hoping to get another female when Foleyimportsthem.”
“Fuck you, Vaughn. I miss Hannah as much as you do. More.”
“Not more.” Vaughn walked away.
“If he wants to leave our unit, I won’t object,” Ren said.
“This is what she hated, you know. All the fighting between us. We still haven’t learned to work together. Maybe if we had, they’d still be alive.”
“Fuck you too, Sersie. You and your idealism. We were doomed from the start. Dresden was never going to let us keep her.”
“She wasn’t a pet.”
“I fucking know that!” Ren said so loud that everyone around them seemed to quiet down.
“You,” Foley pointed to Sersie.
“Shit,” Ren said beneath his breath.
Larger than life, with his tall frame and silver-streaked hair, Foley stepped down from the dais and the crowd parted for him and the five guards protecting him as he approached Sersie.
“You bring up a good point, Mr. Campós,” Foley said, his dark eyes focused on Sersie in a way that almost made him flinch. But Dresden had already caused Hannah’s death. . . There wasn’t anything worse than this new manager could do to Sersie.
“Double shit. He knows us already,” Ren mumbled as Foley took those last steps to reach them.
