But now the phenomenon was multiplied by five. They glared at him en masse. He recognized the look of trapped, seething rage. He’d felt it on his own face.
Too fucking bad. Everybody had their time to squirm. He’d done his time and now they could do theirs. In his service.
They’d pay for their attitude. At his earliest convenience, at the highest pain setting and for the longest time he could risk without causing neurological damage.
But in the meantime, they needed fuel. Which dovetailed with his last pickup.
This was the last of the prototypes. A female, R-Gen 57-1221, also known as Sierra Horst, aged twenty-four. She was a waitress at a strip mall steak house outside Salt Lake City. She’d just served them all big glasses of ice water.
She gave them a big smile as she brought the man across the room his bread basket and soup. Like the others, she was a stunning specimen. Tall and stacked, with blue eyes and a bouncing blond ponytail, she did the waitress uniform more justice than it deserved. Maybe her shoulders were a little too heavily muscled and her calves too stringy and defined for his tastes, but even so. She’d had a much more advanced iteration of Braxton’s muscle-and-bone cocktail vectored into her genes than Mark, and would have been brainwashed into compulsive exercising just like her other fellow slave soldiers, so it was hardly her fault. They’d been sculpted by psychopaths.
Mark’s eyes slid over Raquel’s smooth golden skin and perky tits, and then eyed Sierra’s eye-catching ass. He was rethinking his plan to skip stopping for rest as they drove toward Seattle. An hour in a roadside motel exploring the possibilities of using a control freq wand as a sex toy would be better than sleep.
She approached them with a bouncy step and gave them another brilliant smile as she poured their coffee. “Have you folks decided what you’re having?”
Mark looked around the table. The five slave soldiers glared at him fixedly. For fuck’s sake. “Bring us all steak, baked potato and string beans,” Mark said.
Sierra scribbled on her pad. “Right away!” she chirped.
Mark assessed the restaurant as they waited. It was late for the lunch rush, early for dinner, and their section was empty. He decided to activate Sierra now. Risky, but he was trading one risk for another.
When she came back with the tray of plates, he waited until she had set them all set on the table before pulling out the freq wand and giving her a long, hard zap.
She stumbled forward with a grunt, hitting the table. A water glass fell over, scattering ice cubes and water across the table and onto the lap of R-Gen 57-629, also known as Ty Matthews. Ty did not react to the ice water. He just kept staring.
Mark put his hand on her shoulder, speaking low and clear, keeping the freq want pointed at her. “You real job just started, Sierra,” he said. “I own you now, and you’ll do everything I say. Do you understand?”
Sierra swayed drunkenly as the spilled water soaked into the front of her apron. Her sig showed the same violent color upheavals as all the others had done. Her lips were forming words, but she couldn’t force them out. Or wouldn’t.
He dialed up the pain setting, careful not to overdo it. He didn’t want her to make a scene or fall to the ground. Just a sharp jab. To show her how things were going to be from now on.
The sudden shocking pain made her bite her lip. Blood welled up on the full, sexy curve of her plump lower lip. It made his cock stiffen and throb. He smiled at her.
“Come closer, Sierra,” he ordered. “Lean down . . . and kiss me.”
She took her time, so he took his. He just let the freq wand buzz. The combo of intense, racking pain and her obedience programming finally won out.
She slowly bent over him. Her formerly rosy face had gone sickly pale, shiny with a sheen of sweat. The blood on her lip was a striking contrast to her pallor.
And she still hesitated, inches from his lips. Fighting it. Dumb, stubborn cow.
He seized her chin, his fingernails digging brutally hard into her smooth skin as her lips touched his. His cock thickened at the contact, a hot pulse of lust, sharpened by the revulsion showing in her sig. He licked the salty drop of blood off her lower lip. Thrust his tongue into her mouth. Intensive retraining was in order for this one.
He could hardly wait to administer it.
Fresh blood had welled into the bite wound on her lip. He spread it with his fingertip like lip gloss, covering the bluish pallor of her lip. He took his hand from her chin. His nails had dug half moons into her skin. They too had filled with blood.
“Nice to see a bitch who knows her place,” he whispered. He pinched her nipple through the white polo shirt with his bloodstained fingers. His fingers left a rusty smear.