Page 28 of Darkness I Become
“It’s a Wastelander settlement up north,” Cade said. “Only a hundred-and-fifty kilometres or so from the Delta.It’s independent, not owned by gangs. Some good people there. But it didn’t matter, because the winter after that, there was a plague that wiped them all out.”
Asha gave a small gasp. “All of them?”
“Yeah. I don’t know why me, Leo, and Dom didn’t get sick. Only thing I can figure is that, coming from the compound, we must’ve been immune somehow, or just damn lucky. But nobody else was. It was…grim, for a long time.”
She softened. “I can imagine. Do you think…I mean, I don’t know if it’s possible, but…that it wasthevirus that caused the Fall? I know they told us it’s extinct, but they also told us that there were no Wastelander settlements.”
Cade’s brow furrowed. “I guess I don’t know. They didn’t have the classic neurological symptoms, but then again, none of us ever saw someone afflicted with it before. It’s possible, I suppose, that through our implants, we’re immune somehow. But…”
“But they always said there was no vaccine and no cure,” Asha finished. It was an unsettling thing, to realize everything you knew was questionably true. Sorting through propaganda was never an easy exercise.
“Yeah. Hard to know the truth.”
“So…what happened after that?”
“None of us wanted to stay after that,” Cade continued. “Probably stupid in retrospect, but at the time, we were demoralized. We’dworked hard to build a decent life on the outside, and it was torn apart so quickly. We decided to be nomadic again—move from place to place, seeing where we ended up. We traveled south because we knew there were more settlements here, especially near the old capital.”
“And that’s when you met Angel?”
“Yeah,” Cade said bitterly. “About eight months ago, we ended up in a skirmish with some of the members of a rival gang. Angel was there and saw what the three of us were capable of. So, he made us an offer: become his special forces group, and we’d have a decent place to settle, food to eat, and more. We weren’t starving, but winter was coming, and we knew how quickly that could change.”
His lips twitched. “He dubbed us the Blackguard because of our black military uniforms, and because he wanted us to sound intimidating. He let me pick out some of his better fighters, and we trained them as best we could. We’ve been here ever since.”
Asha let out a breath. “Not your best decision, was it, soldier?”
Cade shrugged. “Not my worst, either. My job is to make the calls that keep my guys alive. I did what I had to do at the time.”
There was an uncomfortable silence where Asha wasn’t sure what to say. Cade was hard to pin down. She wanted to villainize him, to write him off as a willing participant in the horrors in this awful place. At the same time, however, he was the only reason she wasn’t either dead or servicing every man in the Nest. He’d admitted he found her desirable, and he certainly could’ve taken advantage of her in her weakened state, but he hadn’t made a move. If anything, he’d tried to put her at ease as much as possible.
But it was also his fault that she’d ever been in a position to be raped by Angel. He’d miscalculated how much Angel would enjoy cuckolding him, holding something over his head, because Angel wasn’t a rational man who would negotiate in good faith. He was an amoral psychopath who saw his power as an opportunity to inflict cruelty with impunity. Heenjoyedit. Cruelty wasn’t a side-effect of his reign; it was the whole fucking point.
“So, what makes you think Angel’s going to let you have me this time?” she said acerbically. “What’s stopping him from holding me over your head again as a prize for whatever stupid thing he wants you to do next?”
Cade’s expression darkened. “I’ll handle it. There’s supposed to be a welcoming party tomorrow night…and I plan to give him a gift he won’t forget.”
“Well, I wish that made me feel better,” Asha said with a sigh.
His expression softened slightly. “I wish it did, too.”
The tension between them didn’t lift, and for a moment, they stared at each other in silence. What a fragile thing trust was, Asha thought. Even its beginnings could be shattered in a single second.
Cade was the first to break the staring contest, clearing his throat awkwardly. She followed the black snake on his arm with her eyes as he unfolded his arms.
“So…you had a husband, back at the Cave?”
“Yeah,” Asha replied, not keen to discuss Eric. “Not like we had much choice, right? I’m guessing you had a wife, too?”
“Eventually,” he said with a small, rueful smile. “In the military, you can apply for delays on spouse assignment. I always figured they allowed it because when you’ve got less to lose, you’re not as worried about dying on the job.”
For some reason, the thought of Cade having a wife at home bothered her. She pictured him going home after a long day on patrol to a kiss and dinner on the table with the perfect wife—her exact opposite.Ugh.
“Why are you making that face?”
Asha rearranged her features carefully. “I’m not making any face.”
“You wrinkled your nose,” he said, amused. “Interesting.”
“I wrinkle my nose all the time,” she insisted, irritable. “Ever considered that you repulse me?”
