Chapter 131-140

Sasha had had a conversation with a friend once, when they were relaying a part they’d been to. Where they’d been sexually assaulted. How it had changed their life and… her friend had trembled in exactly the same way. Her entire body vibrating. Not the way it happened from cold, where skin and muscle were reacting to something outside. But… it was like the body couldn’t contain everything it was feeling and began to shudder.

Zev stared at her, his eyes pleading and she held his face.

“Tell me,” she whispered, though she didn’t want to hear it. “Tell me what it was like, and how it made you feel, and what comes into your head when you think about it. I’ll never ask you again unless you want to talk about it. But tell me once. Let’s get it out there and… deal with it,” she whispered. “Because I love you, Zev. And once I understand, that’s going to be it. We’re going to be together and we’re going to be happy. So… tell me.”

He stared at her sadly for a long minute, then he did. They sat there together, him shaking, her trying not to weep, as he relayed the sick dread he woke with every time he knew he had to go to the place he called the Breeding Arena.

Zev talked about the conversations he had with Nick about how crucial this “work” was. How every time he wanted to pull out or stop, Nick would convince him that the future of the Chimera depended on him.

He told her that at first he thought he was the only one who really didn’t want to do this thing—that the females were so eager for offspring that they were open to him.

He was told that they wouldn’t bond with him, because he couldn’t form the bond, remember?