Sloan rubbed his beard. “Garrett’s people? Definitely. Same goes for Con’s. But Brynn only has a few decent fighters in her camp, and Mick lost most of his after the last southern sweep.”
She nodded. “But we’re sending each of them ten of our people. Hopefully that balances shit out.”
“Hopefully.”
Biting her lip, Reese rose from the sofa and walked over to the window. Sloan’s cigarette pack was on the ledge, along with a lighter and a cracked glass ashtray. She didn’t smoke often, but right now she was too on edge.
Were twenty people enough to send to the other camps? Or should she ask for more volunteers? She knew the teenagers in Foxworth would jump at the chance to join the ragtag army she’d raised, but she didn’t feel right putting any of them in the line of fire. Yes, Rylan and Pike had given everyone intensive weapons and hand-to-hand training last month, but that didn’t mean she wanted kids like Randy or Sara or Ethan being sent to the front lines. She’d simply wanted them to be prepared.
She lit a cigarette and sucked on it so hard she got a head rush. As she exhaled a cloud of smoke, Sloan came up beside her and rested one forearm on the window ledge.
He stared at the setting sun on the horizon, the burnished orange tint of the sky. Then he asked, “Want me to track down Rylan?”
She took another deep drag and ignored the question.
“Teresa.”
Her spine prickled. She hated it when he used her full name. Only Jake had gotten away with calling her that. Before Jake, it had been her mother who’d used it. Now the honor fell to Sloan.
The damned man knew how much it bothered her to be reminded of the woman—no, the girl—she’d once been, but that didn’t stop him from calling her Teresa. He usually did it when she was being stubborn.
“Don’t give me that Teresa shit right now,” she muttered. “I’m not in the mood. And I’m not in the mood for Rylan either. Did I tell you that bastard jerked off in front of me the other day? I turned him down, so he took matters into his own hands. Literally.”
Sloan chuckled.
She narrowed her eyes and jabbed her cigarette in the air. “I don’t need you laughing at me right now, Sloan.”
That got her another chuckle.
“Fuck you,” she growled.
“You should’ve helped him out.” Sloan shrugged. “Don’t tell me you didn’t get off on screwing the guy.”
Which was just another source of anger for her. She hated how desperate she’d been that night with Rylan. Hated that she’d been so out of control she’d needed Sloan to be there. To keep her in line. What the hell did it say about her that she couldn’t even fuck without needing a chaperone?
“You’re losing control again, sweetheart.”
“No, I’m not,” she answered through clenched teeth.
But he was right—she was. Control wasn’t something she’d ever been good at maintaining. Even as a kid she’d had trouble checking her emotions, her temper, her lust. From the moment she was old enough to recognize what a shit show her life was, she’d harbored rage and resentment that threatened to consume her.
Reese still remembered taking the crayons her mother gave her and drawing pictures of dead council members. GC buildings in flames. Enforcers hanging from the power lines running above the city. She’d hated the council for taking her mother away from her, despite her mother’s reminders that they should be grateful to the GC. Grateful. Ha. Why? Because they’d let Sylvia keep her firstborn daughter? That wasn’t exactly a grand gesture on their part. Every breeder was allowed to keep her first baby.
It was all the babies that came afterward that were whisked away.
Reese never let herself think about the fact that she had nine siblings in the city somewhere. Sired by different studs, of course, but they all shared the same mother.
Her mother.
The sight of Sylvia’s pregnant belly used to enrage Reese. For the first twelve years of her life, her mom had been pregnant. Always fucking pregnant. It made Reese sick to see it, and not even the nice little house they were given in exchange for Sylvia’s “services” had made the situation easier to stomach. She hated that house. Hated being banished to her room every week when the city doctors stopped by to monitor the latest pregnancy. Hated the depression her mom would spiral into after each pregnancy.
Reese had never seen anyone cry more than her mother. Sylvia cried when she found out she was pregnant. She sobbed when the babies were taken away. She was inconsolable the day she was ordered to bring her daughter to the clinic. Reese had been prepared for it, though. She’d been warned what would happen when she became a “woman.” The sterilization process was supposed to be painless, and it was. Physically, anyway.
But it left behind the kind of pain that never, ever went away.
Rage and shame and sorrow rose in her throat now, bubbling to the surface along with the memories she usually tried to suppress. She wanted to scream. She wanted to grab her gun and empty the clip into someone’s head, but Sloan was the only person in her vicinity, and she couldn’t very well shoot him.