Aidan stormed into his cabin, flinging the door open so hard it hit the wall and bounced back, nearly catching Dusk in the face as she came in after him. She slammed the door shut again, ignoring the way it made the windows rattle. “You said I had the right to leave,” she insisted again, and Aidan was by now sorely regretting the throwaway comment he’d made about berries and whipped cream being better than a night alone in the wilderness. Dusk had snapped out some sharp retort, he’d snapped back, insulted by whatever she’d said – he couldn’t even remember what it was anymore – and a raging argument had ensued. “You’re the one who said it was my choice,” she yelled at him, “so I don’t see why you’re so pissed off about it.”
Aidan slammed his fist against the far wall, then turned to face her. “You don’t have a clue what you’ve done, do you?” Idle comments around the campfire had not gone unheeded. The men were fully aware that back in the forest after the battle, it had been Whisper who had saved the day, not Aidan. He’d broken the deadlock, realising that winning the argument was less important than persuading the women to stay, while Aidan had still been stewing in his own anger.
“What the hell do you mean?” Dusk demanded.
“These men, this entire village, have been waiting for years in the hope that one day they’ll have wives, children, families… A fucking future! A reason for getting out of bed in the morning greater than the thought of a beer at the end of the day. Every single one of them is watching us, watching me, to see if I can make this work. I offered you the world, Dusk, everything I can lay claim to, and the first instant it was anything other than you, alone, starving to death in the wilderness, you leapt at the chance to get away!”
“You offered us a choice between starving to death and being raped by default by our so-called husbands.”
“Bullshit!” Aidan yelled back, the pair of them standing a foot away from each other, neither one backing down so much as an inch. “This is not civilisation, it is not a safe world, and I offered you the best that was in my power to offer.”
“You treat us like livestock! Something to be owned, a prize to wave before your friends and tribesmen!”
“For God’s sake, can’t you realise it’s not about you? The whole of western civilisation collapsed under the weight of its own greed and self-interest. I’m just trying to build a future that’s worth living in.”
Dusk simply gaped at him for a moment, eyes wide, expression shell-shocked, and Aidan wondered whether he’d finally succeeded in making a point…
When she spoke again, it was with far less volume, but no less determination, and the sudden change sent a cool shiver down his spine. He was on dangerous ground here. “Of course it’s about me,” Dusk told him, with quiet, cold intensity. “This is my body. My life. My future.” Her voice cracked, but even then, she didn’t back down. “This is all I’ve got.”
She was right. It was personal. His throat feeling suddenly tight, Aidan asked, “Am I really such a poor choice that you’d run naked into the wilderness to get away from me?”
How could they be arguing the same point, and yet be on such completely different pages? With a sigh and a muttered curse, Dusk sank down onto the bench in front of the fireplace, staring at the cold ash. “I wasn’t trying to get away from you,” she admitted finally, not looking his way. “I just couldn’t let one more woman wander off into the world alone.”
Whisper set Julia down on the makeshift pile of blankets that would be her bed for the night. Longer term, they could build some proper beds and install an extra wall in the cabin to make a small room at the end where the children could sleep, but for the moment, a pad on the floor would do. Julia was already fast asleep and didn’t even stir as he pulled a sheet up over her.
Willow put Mikey down beside Julia. He was blinking sleepily, but had insisted he didn’t want to go to bed until the party was over. Thankfully, after two rescue missions in forty-eight hours, most of the men were feeling weary, so the festivities had wound down a lot sooner than might otherwise have been the case.
“Goodnight, Mikey,” Willow said, tugging the sheet over him and kissing his forehead. “Sleep tight.”
“G’night, Mummy.” The words were slurred with tiredness. But then, before they could get too comfortable about both children being settled for the night, he suddenly asked, “Where are we going to go tomorrow?”
Willow glanced at Whisper, a sudden fear in her eyes. They’d been on the move for a while, he’d learned that afternoon, and for all the tribe’s promises of a safe place to live and a stable future, it would take some time before their actions could prove the validity of their words. “We’re not going anywhere tomorrow,” Willow told Mikey, and Whisper could tell from the waver in her voice that she didn’t quite believe it. “This is our home now. We’re going to stay here for a long time. And Whisper’s going to be your new Daddy,” she reminded him, not sure if the news had really sunk in yet. “Do you remember, I told you that one day, we’d find a good and kind man, and he’d look after us, and nobody would hurt us again?” Mikey nodded solemnly. “Well, Whisper is that man. He’s going to teach you new things, and make sure we always have enough food and clothes.”
“And kill the bad men?” Such violence, from the mouths of children.
“Yes, and kill the bad men,” Willow agreed quietly.
Mikey turned to look at Whisper, and he braced himself for awkward questions or attempts to extract promises from him that he wasn’t sure he could live up to… but instead, Mikey just held out his arms, asking for a goodnight hug.
The simple gesture shook Whisper to his core. He knelt down and wrapped his arms around the fragile little body. “Goodnight Mikey,” he murmured, shocked that someone who’d seen so much trauma at such a young age could possibly trust a man like him so easily. His gaze crept sideways to reassess Willow. He had no idea how she’d been raising the children so far, but she seemed to have done a bloody good job of it…
“G’night Whisper,” Mikey said, letting go and lying back on the blankets.
Late this afternoon, after he’d heard he was to be receiving a wife, Whisper had strung up a blanket across the room as a simple curtain, and he drew it over now, blocking out the light from the candles to let the children sleep.
Willow followed him across the room, and Whisper went about his nightly routine, checking there was water in the canteen beside the bed, double-checking he’d barred the door, unstrapping the knife from his ankle and setting it beneath his pillow. Even in the middle of his own village, surrounded by his own tribesmen, he always slept with a weapon close by. Life had been a harsh teacher, and he’d learned his lessons well.
Meanwhile, Willow sat down on the end of the bed, her hands fidgeting in her lap. Just two tallow candles were lit at the moment, set on the sturdy wooden table in the centre of the room, and they cast warm shadows, muted reds and yellows flickering over her skin. When Whisper was finished his preparations, he came and sat beside her, leaving enough space that their knees didn’t quite touch.
“Children are amazing,” Willow said, not quite meeting his eyes. “Mikey will be out like a light in under ten minutes. I envy the way they can sleep anywhere.” She forced a smile and glanced up at him for a moment. Then she looked down at her shirt, a neatly sewn buckskin blouse she’d chosen that afternoon, laced together with sinew down the front. Deliberately, she tugged at one strand of the lacing, letting the bow slip loose. Then, looking Whisper steadily in the eye, she pulled the lacing out of the first set of holes.
In Aidan’s cabin, he and Dusk sat side by side on the bench, both of them staring at the pile of ash in the fireplace.
“Women have always got the short end of the stick,” Dusk said, calmer now than she had been before. “Every time there’s a war, or a new political movement, or a fit of religious fervour, we’re always the ones who have to pay the price. A century of progress has been wiped out in a few short years, and now we’re back to being sex slaves and trophies.”
“We’re doing the best we can,” Aidan told her, not sure what else he could say. The arrangements they’d made for the women, though far from ideal, were still the best they could offer. The truth of that would be proven in the next few days, as the rest of the men reacted to Rochelle’s presence as an unattached woman. He wasn’t looking forward to seeing the fallout of Whisper’s hasty decision to let her stay, with her refusal to abide by the conditions the others had accepted. “Given the way the world’s turned lately, this tribe still has the short end of the stick. A slightly different stick, maybe, but still the short end of it.”
Dusk opened her mouth to reply, then hesitated. “For what it’s worth, I do admire what you’ve done here,” she said finally. “Arranged marriage is not ideal, but it’s a hell of a lot better than what a lot of other tribes are doing at the moment. So, kudos to you for making the effort.”
Deliberately, but cautiously, Aidan reached out and put his hand on her knee. He really wasn’t sure how she was going to react. He risked meeting her eyes. She stared back impassively. “I’m not going to rip your balls off,” she informed him quietly. “I agreed to this.”
She had. And yet she hadn’t, not really. “I’m not just looking for a warm body. I want a wife, not a living doll.” She didn’t look up from where his hand was resting on her knee. “I will be gentle,” Aidan promised her. “If you let me, I can make it good for you…”
Dusk turned to face him, eyes roaming over his face as she sought out the truth of his words. “You dispense violence and rage with one hand, and now claim to give pleasure and comfort with the other. Do you even know who you are, behind all that ideology?”
“I’m far from perfect,” Aidan replied easily. He’d already spent far too many nights debating the morality of killing one group of people, to keep another group alive. “But every human being is capable of both love and hate. You must have seen that in yourself by now.”
Unexpectedly, she leaned in to kiss him. It was awkward, neither of them quite sure what to expect. The second time went a bit smoother, and Aidan felt his self-control slip a fraction. Christ, it had been a long time since he’d been with a woman. Her lips were warm and firm, her scent divine. Keep it slow, he warned himself, feeling his groin throb. And then, as if that wasn’t enough to test his resolve, she suddenly reached down and stripped off her shirt. Small, high breasts were encased in a plain white bra, and for a moment, he was unable to look away.
“How about we take this over to the bed,” she suggested, and if he was paying attention, he would have realised that her tone was neither sensual nor inviting. She stood up and took his hand.
Helpless to resist, he followed.